Being a perfect parent is the toughest in this universe and so is earning a good income as a blogger. The universe conspired and humans have developed a new niche field of expertise – the parenting bloggers!
Topics related to parenting issues, toddler tantrums, and teenage troubles are finally being talked about on the internet like never before. The parenting content is packaged just in the right way to please the internet audience.
What happens behind the door of a family home is right in front of our phone screen these days – thanks to Instagram. Personal lives are being sold as advertisements and sponsorships in this pretty glammed up world – thanks to the “Sharents”. Read my article on Sharenting for more details.
Mastering The Art of Sharenting
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Well, today if you open the page of any macro influencer or micro-influencer with a niche in parenting – you’ll see a whole crazy world.
I personally thought to give this “Instagram influencer celebrity kind of life” a try. I mean what major would it need? Writing a few lines that nobody really reads, concentrating on good quality pictures and few hashtags.
But the game is not that simple. It evolves every day and every day it demands more.
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The Time When I Became One of Them
Having an experience of handling my own parenting blog on Instagram – I had my moments of euphoria, I got lovely messages for my content, I had countless sleepless nights, and believe me, almost every day a piece of my heart got bruised emotionally.
Instagram family parenting pages showcase an impossible perfect mom, perfect dad, perfect daughter, perfect son, perfect grandparents, and perfect pets in one frame. Even the movies these days don’t show such an illusionary world.
The family rooms of some popular influencers are actually covered with cameras that are set in different angles, kids getting dressed up, grandparents getting dressed and even the pets getting dressed up. The only concrete talking happening in many urban houses these days is video editing, product review, and social media marketing. A family that earns together stays together – is becoming the new age mantra.
Believe me, in that period of four months, I had seen it all. Though I wasn’t a big influencer, knowing a few of them little more than personally; their entire stardom gave me jitters.
At one point, I really wanted the online mom bloggers association to talk about real stuff that was happening.
I was looking up to those modern cool moms on the internet to discuss sensible things like – teenage drug issues or maybe obesity in young kids but probably the society is not matured enough to talk about these things openly. Or maybe I am a little outdated.
Maybe I was expecting the wrong thing. Maybe it was never about sharing “knowledgeable” information.
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The Ugly Side of Parenting Influencers
In the beautiful camera-driven world created by the “Sharents” awareness about any cause or event on Instagram is just wrapped up in recommendations and reviews is a form of emotional marketing, which the followers don’t realize.
Sadly, the ugly naked reality is never talked about. There are very few who come outside their cocoon and discuss real things. With my experience of doing Instagram Parenting Blogging for a few months, I now realize that these online marketing strategies have taken away the innocence of family relationships in many homes.
Parents and kids wait for food to come on the table just to click eye-pleasing pictures of food. The quality of family time is being compromised in getting the perfect shot.
I myself had waited hours with my fellow bloggers to get that perfect shot of the drooling cheese pizza. The immaculate picture of my entire family enjoying my son’s first birthday literally took hours and by the time we thought of enjoying the cake, my son was already asleep. It’s not an easy affair, trust me. It requires compromises and so many staff members to help you out.
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The Virtual Game of Fame Is An Addiction
The desire to outperform in each and every post to get love from billions of unknown followers is a disheartening reality of our generation. That world is getting big and it’s so tempting. But believe me, it does create a lot of anxiety. Your constant aim in life becomes in creating content. And the competition this time is sometimes with your own famous stuff and sometimes it is with the entire group of billions of bloggers.
The great number of hits and outreach leaves you behind salivating for more. The celebrity kind of life is like drug addiction and you’ll always crave for more and more.
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All’s Well That Ends Well
So after reaching a score of some 4000+ followers and doing a few brand engagements; I permanently closed my parenting Instagram blogging account a month back before Christmas of 2020.
The account is deactivated and all my personal family pictures have been removed. Do you know why because at one point I started getting scared? Lockdowns taught me something. Because of no outdoor content, I got a chance to become that carefree cheerful person once again. Lying all day in PJs, playing hide and seek in the messy home, and doing the real writing brought me back. It felt so good to be the real mom, real wife, and real daughter – without being surrounded by any hashtags.
Always remember,
Humans are always designed to ignore the disgust and appreciate the delight! Don’t get disheartened by looking at the outer shell of those perfect families because with my personal experience I know the big dents that exist in everyone’s life.
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This post was previously published on Medium.
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Photo credit: Marcos Paulo Prado on Unsplash