4 Reasons I don’t do sponsored posts on my blog

Hey everyone! This is part one of a two part series on sponsored posts! We wanted to show both sides of the coin of sponsored content. Since Becky and I both allow sponsored posts on our blogs I asked my friend Aprille of Beautiful in His Time to share today about why she does not allow them on her blog. I hope you enjoy this perspective and it helps you to decide what the right decision regarding sponsored content, is for your blog! Be watching later in the week for part two and reasons why I do allow sponsored posts.

1. WordPress.com regulations on monetization
I am one of the rare bloggers who is on WordPress.com (as opposed to self-hosted WordPress, or WordPress.org).WordPress.com has far stricter regulations on monetization (to include advertising, affiliate links, and more). While it appears on the surface that they WordPress.com allows sponsored posts, I have heard of bloggers getting their blogs suspended over steps toward monetization. I personally have not wanted to take that risk and have been playing it safe until I make the switch to self-hosted (which I hope to make before the end of the year).

2. My niche and mission statement
Sponsored posts simply are outside of the vision and mission statement I have for my blog. My blog is a personal chronicle, through which I offer hope and inspiration to others because of my own vulnerability. While I am not against promoting products that I find useful, that’s just not really what my blog is about. I did promote products available through my amazon.com associates store in my recent blog series about preschool resources, but even that was a part of my greater goal of encouraging tired moms through my own story of mothering tired. Dropping affiliate links within my posts is not something I plan on doing regularly.

3. My readers’ trust

I have spent a lot of time reading blogs, and honestly, I don’t enjoy reading sponsored posts. In fact, I almost always skip over them. They don’t seem genuine or honest (even though I know, a lot of times they are). For me, vulnerability and openness are a big part of my blogging, so to promote a product I may or may not use simply because I am getting paid to do so goes against the kind of blogger I am. My readers come to my space expecting that honest and personal blogging, not words about latest products or gadgets that may or may not sound convincing.

4. My priorities

Making money through my blog has never been a priority, and my readers know that. That’s not why I started my blog and not why I sit down at the keyboard. This isn’t to say that my priorities are better than those of a blogger whose goal is monetization. They are simply different. I have a hard enough time finding the time to put up the things on my blog that I really want to write about – the nitty-gritty heart stuff. Taking precious blogging time to do sponsored posts is not something that interests me in the least.
I won’t promise that I never do a sponsored post in the future. I have done a few book reviews and helped to promote a friend’s book, so I’m definitely not against promoting something I truly believe in. I hope that when the time comes for me to put up a sponsored post on my blog, my readers will know that I 100% back the product because of the level of vulnerability and honesty that I have demonstrated to them for the past six years of blogging. They will know that I promote said product from a place of wanting to truly help them and encourage them along their journey, rather than simply to make money through my blog.

Bio: Aprille is a twenty-something mom of one very active little boy and the wife of a combat veteran. She blogs at Beautiful In His Time, her personal chronicle about finding God’s beauty in her often messy life – her marriage, her mothering, and her personal relationship with God. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, GooglePlus, Pinterest, and Instagram. You can also find her online at beautifulinhistime.com. Sign up for her monthly newsletter here!