A Book Reviewer without a Blog – The Rise of Bookstagram Tours
Hello friends!
Not all heroes wear capes, and not all book reviews have blogs.
Today I’ve got a really fun post which includes a guest post from Donna (@yorkshirebknerd on Twitter & @yorkshirebooknerd on Insta), who doesn’t have a blog but uses Bookstagram exclusively. She recently saw my tweet about requesting ARCs, and came to me saying that she didn’t have a blog so couldn’t do it. I urged her to anyway as I know a lot of publishers are doing bookstagram tours these days. She took my advice and I was thrilled to get her DM when she received her first ARC!
So I asked her to share with us why she only has Bookstagram and what it’s like to not be a ‘blogger’ in the traditional sense.
Without further ado – over to you Donna!
I don’t really know where to start so I’ll just dive right in…
Why don’t I have a blog?
There are a number of reasons: I’ve never blogged before so have no idea where to start, how do you even go about setting one up? What’s the best platform to use? How often should I post? What should I post? But the honest answer is I just don’t have time. I’m a full time working mum/wife and therefore the free time I have is limited. If I had a blog I’d want it to be the very best it could be and that would require time I just don’t have right now. Maybe that’s me putting extra pressure on myself and I’m sure people are thinking what’s the difference between doing that for a blog or for Instagram? Probably not a lot but on Instagram people are able to view content from lots of people all at the same time where as a blog is personal. People have to purposely search you out or chose to receive updates about your posts. Maybe I’m talking rubbish and don’t know enough about it to really comment 🤷🏻♀️
I do know that I don’t have the time to promote a blog (if no one’s reading it then what’s the point?) and that I don’t want to spend so much time talking about books that I have no time to actually read any!
Instagram was a natural progression for me.
I already had a personal account that was slowly but surely being taken over by my book obsession. So much so that I was missing posts from my real life friends!
I decided to bite the bullet and create a Bookstagram so that I could keep my book obsession separate to my personal account and I could stop trying to make up excuses for why I hadn’t seen my friend’s posts!
Initially it was really daunting. I had no idea what I was doing, no idea on a theme and no real artistic talent (which I still don’t have btw). Plus I’d been following amazing bookstagrammers that had been doing it for years and had thousands of followers so didn’t really have a realistic view of what it was like to be a bookstagrammer. However I made some good friends really quickly, some just starting out themselves, others who had been doing it awhile, and was able to learn from and with them. It was slow going for a long while. I struggled with ideas on what to post and got very little likes/interaction, but for me it was somewhere to gush about all things book related and I wasn’t there for likes or followers so I just did my own thing. Posting what I want, when I want was so much fun! Although looking back at some of those posts is so embarrassing!!
I still try to follow that motto but I have to admit I do feel a lot more pressure, now that I have more followers, to post regularly and to try and come up with new and interesting ideas.
But it’s a good kind of pressure. I love my followers and the bookish community. They are so warm and welcoming. I know lots of people have experienced negativity within the bookish community but I genuinely never have. The worst I’ve experienced is the dreaded follow/unfollow trend which is annoying but not the end of the world and that’s what the “Block” option is for right? But seriously I’ve gained so much from being part of the Bookstagram community and the bookish community as a whole on GRs/Twitter/FB etc. I have so many great friends who I chat to on a daily basis, who understand my need to own 10 versions of the same book and don’t judge me for it. Friends who I have so much in common with that I often talk to them more than my friends IRL.
I get great book recommendations and have discovered so many amazing small businesses, who sell bookish merch, that my book obsession is seriously out of control. I’ve been lucky enough to have authors reach out to me to review their books and I’ve been able to review numerous arcs through sites like Netgalley. Most recently I’ve started receiving some physical arcs, which is literally so exciting that I squeal a little every time one comes through, and thanks to great people like you Jenn, I finally had the courage to request an arc I really wanted from the publisher, and it came!!
I wouldn’t change my little part of the bookish community for anything in the world (well maybe all the books in the world but come on I’m only human haha).
Thanks for sharing with us Donna! If you are active on Bookstagram I urge you to reach out to publishers and publicists – so many are now doing bookstagram tours! You’ve got nothing to lose!
What has your experience been with Bookstagram tours?
A special thank you to my Patreons who make my blogging possible! Check out my Patreon and what rewards you can get by supporting me on this link.
Special thanks to Cassandra who is Galactic Warrior!
1 Comment
Yorkshire Book Nerd is AMAZING! Love looking at her IG 😁