Friday Freebie: The journey can be long but rewarding

Targets stop stagnation, but don't get hung up on them

Welcome to the Friday Freebie, the free posting coming at you every Friday across the season.

This week I’ve decided to share with you my blogging story and to encourage any of you who have the urge to start a blog or whatever you wish to call it, a newsletter, some ramblings, a place to vent; to ask any questions in the comments below.

At school I wanted to be a footballer, many of you reading can relate to that no doubt. In those days there were no super academies that you see today, just the Sunday morning games and that was where you’d be picked up.

There were no mass scouting networks or analysis, it was word of mouth and a slice of luck if you get spotted too. That idea soon received it’s kick in the teeth having to wear glasses and subsequently at too late an age contact lenses.

A change of direction was needed, I can’t play it so why not write about it instead, the next best thing surely. I didn’t want to do the standard university route to come out with a good degree and a job in print media, anyone who knows me will probably agree I like to do things outside the box, test the boundaries and not follow the norm.

So that idea of doing what I wanted stayed on the back burner in the rear of my mind, if it came to fruition great, if not then maybe a feeling of I should have gone down a conventional route.

Five and a half years ago I decided to start a blog, more for my own place to put down some ramblings than anything else. After all I’d been watching football since I was eight years old or so in a live environment, not TV football as many kids see it as today.

At around the same time I had been dabbling in social media for my local club Wick FC in Sussex, starting with a Twitter account and extending to Facebook, a website and Instagram. This was the true beginning of it all.

Building something from scratch is exciting, rewarding and a sense of direction you can take something in. Sometimes the direction lends itself to you. Two things stick out during this period and two very different occasions that led themselves to help with where I am now.

Firstly, at Wick we signed Marcus Bent. Yes, that Marcus Bent, the one who played for Everton, Ipswich and Charlton Athletic to name a few. A Step 6 club pictured signing a former Premier League player, actually my picture as you see below. This picture went nationwide, used by the papers, the first real taste of stardom I guess, but no credit for that one.

The image of mine than went worldwide

For a few days, everything went nuts! The club social accounts, the national media picking it up on the basis of my press releases etc, our Pitchero website at the time ranked inside the top 20, up against clubs in the National League North and South.

It gave me the taste and quickly learning how to deal with the speculation, added attention and how to be careful with the words you use. Marcus never played a game; however I did to get interview him, my first time in that kind of situation but not to be the last.

Applying for international clearance as his last club was in Thailand was also something I can’t say was on the bingo card, but sure enough I had to take advice from the FA, quite the whirlwind time!

I hadn’t actually begun blogging then but once I had I was already Secretary and Treasurer of Wick and with it plenty of material to use throughout the season, first hand viewing from the trenches and it wasn’t without drama even at that level.

WordPress was my original site to set up upon, and of course during 2020 I had a captive audience for a good couple of months. Non-league football gives you no end of content to write about and with people craving something to do or get involved with, figures just spiralled.

I dabbled in Saturday video interviews with some Barnet FC legends, stepping outside the comfort zone and keeping minds occupied during uncertain times for many. They say never meet your heroes or people you admire, I spent time interviewing a lot of mine, plenty who are now friends still today and message me for advice, knowledge and general chat.

Despite people returning to work I expected a drop in numbers, however they didn’t, they plateaued and then astonishingly they started to rise again, this after life returned to some normality.

And they kept rising, realising that I was onto something here, not just in the UK but read all over the world, quite humbling, I mean I am and was just a person writing words on a non-league football blog but captivating a worldwide audience, is this going beyond the dream?

Blog stats for 2021

In a single year I had reached over 35,000 visitors. I had breached 20,000 the year before and had been challenged to hit 30,000, a comfortable reach with a month or two to spare at that time.

I had been toying with the idea of going paid during that period, I had the audience and the eyes on me, would people realistically pay me to write? I mean that had been the dream since schooldays, was it actually possible?

So I dabbled with one or two pieces behind a paywall, and they did, people actually paid for what I wrote! Well then, that’s the route to go, it is possible.

In March 2022 I moved from WordPress to Substack and immediately went paid. I set myself a target, in fact I set myself targets every year and sometimes weekly or monthly, you can’t grow without them.

I did my sums, worked out 30 paying subscribers along with some outside work away from football would allow me to drop a day a week at the day job and live on the same money.

Six months later, I was there. Mondays dropped to write about football and take up the outside work, justifying the drive inside my brain to get to that point and prove a few people wrong.

Today that Monday is there still for football reasons. I write for some other sites as well and in that two years set up a secondary blog purely for Barnet FC fans called 'So you won't believe what happened at Barnet FC', that one for free, the other sites along with my own generate the money.

Since then I’ve reported on an FA Vase run to Wembley for my current hometown team Littlehampton, coverage for over four months in total in the Littlehampton Gazette which generated over 5,000 online page views for the work leading up to the final itself.

I have a podcast, Trev Talks, on the same Substack platform, a different format and another enjoyable thing to do. I’ll be honest in saying I don’t do enough of them, they lend themselves to be a listen of short bursts, on the commute, in the evening with a spare 20 minutes or half an hour, I’m still learning disciplines to fit it into life and routines like I have set in place for the blog.

Trev Talks podcast, available on all good podcast platforms

At the moment the pods come for free, like these Friday pieces. Eventually they will be paywalled when that subscriber lists get to a sensible level to do so. A fiver a month to get eight articles is simply good value, 50p a piece that works out, I know a lot of bloggers who charge similar for less to read.

The free pieces give you an idea of what goes behind the paywall, there’s over 740 articles in total on the site, the full range of the pyramid from Step 1 to Step 6.

I’ve actually achieved what I set out to do over 30 years ago, get paid to write about football and not doing it in the conventional way. Social media has helped no end, but when I see respected football journalists getting the boot from print media, doing things my way has worked out for the better.

If you’re thinking of setting up your own blog, don’t be afraid to ask. Find a niche, not everyone will like your style, not everyone will like everything you do.

Go free, go paid. Test the water, trust in your own ability. If it doesn’t work, tweak it, there are no boundaries. Constantly keep evolving, seek feedback and take criticism on the chin, it’s part of the process.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments or alternatively send me a message via the function button, no idea is a silly idea, ever……..