Hello from an Early retiree blogger

[nash031]

FWIW, I have a blog and I know there are apps you can use to pre-write your social media posts and then they are automatically sent out when you have scheduled them. So, you don't actually have to sit around personally doing it every hour or whatever. I haven't yet used once of those apps, but they exist.



I actually do blog every couple of days or so and spend quite a bit of time on it. I have a Facebook page for it that I also tend to and I do use twitter (although not every hour for sure).



It does take time, but for me it is a hobby. I enjoy do it. I haven't actually monetized it. But, I've sometimes had a thought about putting some ads on there, mostly to try to cover the expenses I have with the blog. It would be nice to have those covered.



Since the blog has only cost me money and I haven't earned anything from it, it clearly isn't work for me. On the other hand, I am hard pressed to think that if I put a couple of ads on there, it would suddenly disqualify me from early retirement qualification.*





* Most here would probably disqualify me anyway. I do an average of about half a day of work from home each week. Some weeks it is more and some weeks it is nothing. It is no way is financially necessary, but I do get paid for it.

To each their own. Some people blog a paragraph or two a day and don't proofread or plan out posts. Some blog and that's it not hoping to drive traffic for clicks.

If you follow his list, which was drafted with the goal of generation of traffic in order to drive income on your blog, no, you are not truly retired IMO. There is a big difference between what you described and what he is apparently doing, and also a huge difference between driving traffic to raise money via the various available website monetization options and "putting a couple of ads on there".

If you "put a couple of ads on there" without doing what he suggests, you're raising a few cents a week unless you just have a whole lot of organic traffic. Many/most hobby bloggers (as I was in my time) are probably generating a few hundred clicks a week if they're consistent and interesting. In the world of Adsense, that's nada.

It's been discussed on here with respect to Mr. Money Mustache and whether or not he is truly retired or if he's now a professional blogger, and I would err towards professional blogger like fellow "retiree" Mark Sisson over at Mark's Daily Apple.

Either way, in no way should you let what I or anyone on this forum thinks about your retirement status drive what you want to do. Believe me, if/when I'm still training for various endurance events to the tune of 15+ hrs a week while not working, a lot of other folks would not "count" that as "retired" either!