Image via The Sunday Chapter — *Image via* *The Sunday Chapter*

Only a few short years ago, we referred to people like Aimee Song and Julie Sariñana as fashion “bloggers”. Like the name suggested, they had personal style websites where they documented their outfits, travels, and lifestyles through photos and copy.

But now we have largely transitioned to using the term “influencer” to describe this group of fashionable individuals, thanks in large part to the rise of social media. In 2019, many girls who we would refer to as influencers have foregone the traditional blog in favor of a social media-only presence. Running an Instagram account is easy—and free!—and the younger crowd has gravitated toward social media over websites as of late.

However, there are still plenty of advantages to owning a blog or website and publishing content on a consistent schedule.

Here are 3 reasons why you should still maintain your blog:

Create Content With A Longer Shelf Life

Social media is all about the here and now, which means everyone is always sharing the latest and greatest, but that means the shelf life of social content is a day or two, tops.

Blog posts, however, can live forever, essentially, and can be found and re-shared again and again. Share your outfits of the day and other current content on social media and on your blog, but be sure to sprinkle in some “evergreen” content as well, aka blog posts that are timeless.

Some examples of evergreen posts: a carry-on packing guide, best skincare products, the 10 staples you need in your wardrobe—all these topics are classic topics that will be applicable to readers both today and a year from now.

Own Your Content

As Brittany Hennessy, the author of Influencer, said, “Mark, Larry, and Sergey do not care about you or how many hours you pour into your content. They do not care that branded campaigns are how you pay your tuition/mortgage/Netflix bills.” At the end of the day, relying solely on social media platforms like Instagram and YouTube to share your content can be risky. What if Instagram shut down tomorrow? What if that privacy policy that you accept without reading says you don’t own the content you post on the platform?

Every time Instagram is down, we’re reminded how important it is to have content created by us that is hosted by us on this website. You should always be adding content to your own website, because as unlikely as it seems, you never know what could happen to your favorite social media sites in the future.

Build Your Subscriber List

Newsletters and mailing lists might seem a little old-school, but they are incredibly valuable! Consider adding a newsletter sign-up pop-up to your blog home page to start building your newsletter list. Even if you only send out newsletters with new posts every once in a while, a robust mailing list is such a valuable thing to own, and will make sharing any big updates—a new brand or website redesign, for example—incredibly easy to share!