The rise of the parenting blogs

Vuelio’s UK Bloggers Survey revealed there’s been a steep rise in parenting bloggers, the category now making up 29% of all bloggers in the UK. This is a marked rise from 2016, when only 16% of parenting bloggers were focused on parenting.

So what’s going on?

One possiblity is that a lot of the new parenting bloggers were already established in other fields and have since had children – shifting their focus to parenting. We know from the study that 43% of bloggers are aged between 25-34 and in the UK the average age of having your first child is 30.4 years.

Bloggers are also mostly female (78%) and many parenting blogs are started during materntity leave to find a new community of understanding people online that can share day-to-day struggles. It’s not just for mums, dads also find comfort in a community and the knowledge they’re not alone.

For many, finding the community but not the right answers is a big impetus to start a parenting blog. Elliott Rae, founder and editor-in-chief of MusicFootballFatherhood.com (MFF) said: ‘I started MFF when my daughter was three months old, on New Year’s Day in 2016. I had loads of questions about fatherhood and wanted to hear about others’ experiences.

‘There was nowhere online that I felt I could read or discuss all the questions I had, so I started MFF to provide that space.’

Jo Middleton, author of top parenting blog Slummy Single Mummy, joined Vuelio for a webinar discussing the Survey results, and she believes that a visible group of successful parenting bloggers are encouraging a new generation to start. As a new mother on maternity leave, seeing bloggers can be sent products and paid to write reviews is an attractive proposition.

Jo has seen a rise in the professional blogger, those who start blogs with the intention of making it commercial from the beginning. This is also reflected in the Survey results, which reveal there has been in a rise in both those making money from their blogs and those intending to in future.

Sometimes a clever solution to a parenting problem can encourage bloggers to start. Jo Addison, who writes Kiddieholidays, said: ‘I’d recently had a baby and struggled to find somewhere to go on holiday which was suitable for babies. I was looking for somewhere that had loads of baby equipment, lots to do in the local area for young children and didn’t cost a fortune, but I couldn’t find many places. Then I had the idea about Kiddieholidays.

‘I want the site to match up amazing baby and toddler friendly destinations and accommodation with parents who are looking for ideas about where to go.’

One of the biggest reasons we’re told parenting bloggers start is they want a way to document their child or children growing up. Tim Liew, who writes Slouching Towards Thatcham, is a typical of this, he said: ‘So much of the early years of parenthood focuses on the big ‘firsts’: first word, first step, first day at school and so on. I also wanted to document all the little moments and observations that otherwise get lost in the mists of time. Bearing in mind this was back in 2008, it didn’t really occur to me at the time that parent blogging or dad blogging could become a ‘thing’. Now, it definitely is!’

Whether this rise in parenting bloggers will continue is difficult to predict, especially when considering the growing number of lifestyle bloggers and the popularity of ‘alternative sharing platforms’ like YouTube and Instagram. Either way, the Vuelio Bloggers Survey in 2018 will reveal all the answers.