I want to write something here. I want to send out an email to my tiny remnant that re-upped their subscription when I changed email providers. (And I do mean tiny. Over 93% of my email list did NOT re-up. That’s not a typo. Less than 7% did. They are the tiny, faithful remnant.) If you saw the updated bio in the sidebar or saw what I added on the Start Here page then you probably already know where this post is going.
So I want to write something. But I abhor fakeness so I’m not going to come on here and prattle on about happy stuff when I don’t have it in me. I’ve watched over the past few months as two years of really hard and intense work have gone up in smoke due to the choices of the monopolies that control virtually every aspect of our lives, especially online.
The choices made by these soulless bureaucrats have decimated the livelihoods of so many people. I know from multiple interactions with a wide variety of people that it’s not just me. It’s so many people in virtually every niche. And it’s not even that these monopolies are weeding out “bad” websites. The monopolies are being driven by making changes that are solely focused on their bottom line.
Whether it is Google, Amazon, YouTube, Facebook, Pinterest, Teachers Pay Teachers, or any of the other companies that impact the ability of millions of people to run their online or brick-and-mortar businesses, they all are making decisions with only one person ultimately in mind – their investors. The content creators that they’ve built their businesses on, be damned. They really don’t care about the people who make what they do possible. With the exception of Amazon, none of those companies would exist if other people didn’t create content for them to use.
As I’ve said before, they have built these monopolies on the backs of individual content creators working hard in their own little businesses and these same monopolies have the power to turn it all off on a whim. I can watch in my statistics as Google turns various filters on and off because my traffic, product sales, and ad revenue will fluctuate with it. Nothing has changed regarding the quality of my site or products. If anything, it’s only gotten better and better the past few years. However, the only thing Google is looking at is how to squeeze every last penny out of their search results by choosing the filtering that gives them the most ad clicks. It is not about providing the best answers for people. If you think Google is a search engine, you have been completely duped.
Before someone says something perky like, “You just need to pivot” or “Work is hard and you have to just keep going” or ” Owning a business is about change” I want to say that I’ve already used those approaches for a long time. I’ve done the pivot thing more than once. I’ve worked my behind off the past few years in an attempt to get over the proverbial hump in multiple ways. I’ve studied, read, and learned so much that I then applied to my individual situation. Every time I made any progress, I would get kicked back down by faceless people making changes to increase the profits for their investors with zero regard for how it would impact individual businesses.
These companies will tell you to do something a certain way. So you spend massive amounts of time doing it in order to play the game.
- Pinterest wants to change how the feed looks on their site? They issue new dimensions for images. Somehow everyone is supposed to go back and redo hundreds or thousands of images in order to be seen on their site. A year or two later, they change it again.
- Google wants everything to be high quality, optimized content according to certain SEO guidelines? Everyone reworks their content. Until Google decides that something else will bring them more money and they change everything a year later.
And on and on and on.
Every monopoly does this over and over. They are obsessed with changing things and now it happens at warp speed.
How long do they expect content creators to keep this up?
The employees at the monopolies get paid no matter what happens.
The content creators don’t.
The truth of the matter is I’m really not sure what to do next.
It’s just no longer worth it.
It’s becoming increasingly difficult to build anything online that will last unless you have a staff and a lot of money to pay-to-play. The monopolies are all-in on putting the little guys out of business.
YouTube basically announced that this week with their updated Terms of Service. Google owns YouTube and has been operating it at a loss in order to take over the online video space. Now they are going to remove any channels that aren’t profitable enough for them to host. So all the smaller funny, quirky and original channels will be gone. All that will be left is the big companies.
Google is not a search engine. It’s now all-in on being an advertising racket and they don’t even try to hide it. Their search results have become so bad in recent months that you now have to often go to the third page of results to find an answer that is an organic and content-focused answer instead of an ad or shopping page designed to ultimately make Google money. (I switched to Duck Duck Go months ago and encourage you to switch to it or Bing or something else.)
Last year my Amazon affiliate earnings could pay our natural gas bill most of the year. Now it won’t even pay to fill the gas tank of our car once. Why? Because Amazon has steadily decreased the affiliate payouts the past few years. They no longer need affiliates sending them traffic now that everyone is addicted to Amazon Prime and has creepy listening devices in their homes. They have virtually wiped out small and medium sized affiliates in favor of large conglomerates they are partnering with to write “product reviews” on their Amazon site.
And on and on.
I know it’s unseemly to discuss money, but I’ve never hid the fact that this website is part of the business I own with my husband. A lot of what I do here is interconnected with work he does for other clients.
But I also know that the average person who uses the internet has no idea what is happening. They have no idea how much they are being manipulated by the monopolies. They won’t understand why YouTube used to be full of fun and quirky channels and is now a repository of videos by the media conglomerates and Hollywood personalities.
So for now, I’m giving up. I’ve reduced the expenses of running this site as much as possible. I went to a cheaper email service. I got rid of the nice podcast player I was paying for each month. As I told some people, podcasting is a luxury. It takes a lot of time to write, record, and produce a podcast. I truly enjoy doing A Quiet Simple Life podcast, but I can’t ask David to devote time to producing them and creating the graphics when they add no value to our bottom line. It makes me sad to set aside the podcasting, but it’s a necessary economic choice in our home.
And so on.
I really don’t know what I’m going to do next. I am thinking of setting up an Etsy store for my clip art, planners, and other digital products that will fit in over there. I hope that will help replace one of the other income streams that has dried up to a trickle.
Maybe God has something else for me to do. I don’t know. There are so many people online now vying for attention. For a long time I thought I had a unique perspective to offer, but right now I just feel lost in a flood of monopolies and bureaucracies over which I have no control.
I’m tired and probably burned out. You can’t give when you are depleted. I preach that over and over again to homeschool moms and moms of gifted kids. I’m not going to be a hypocrite and pretend that all is great when it isn’t. Whatever my faults, I’m not fake. I never have been and don’t intend to start now. I don’t preach one thing to women who read what I write and run my life in a different way.
So we’ll see what happens. I really don’t know when I’ll start sending out emails again. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe next week. Maybe next month. Maybe next year.
I don’t know when I’m going to write new content or what it will even be. I will put up the Friday Follow-up tomorrow and probably keep going on Streams in the Desert on Sundays since those are already created. But I have no idea beyond that.
I really don’t know what comes next.
In Our Cozy Home This Week No. 2 – Home Inventory, Christmas Planning
I’ve noticed a huge difference in Amazon Affiliate earnings over the last year. If I can believe Facebook numbers, only a fraction of people who “Like” the blog on Facebook actually see updates since I won’t pay to promote it.
That doesn’t even begin to cover the number of conservative commentators who have had their YouTube accounts either demonetized or taken down. I don’t know where it is all going but it doesn’t look good.
Brenda,
I have followed the Amazon Affiliate discussion board for a number of years. Most affiliates are down at least 70-80%. It’s only a matter of time before they shut the entire affiliate program down OR they decide to keep it and piddle out pennies to keep all those links out there on people’s sites.
It makes it hard for people like you and me who have hundreds or thousands of Amazon links. I am loathe to leave them on my site when they aren’t paying me anything. I’ve contemplated switching them all to Barnes and Noble, but people are so addicted to everything cheap and quick from Amazon that I don’t think I can make enough to justify the time to switch them all.
Sallie
Re: the attack on conservatives… It’s not just conservatives. Tim Pool (the Leftist whose videos I often share on my other site) had his Facebook page suspended for hours because he used the name of the whistleblower. He constantly has to be careful what words he says when offering commentary on the news and READING MAINSTREAM NEWS for fear that his videos will get yanked or demonitized. It’s insane.
I didn’t address the censorship issue in my post since that hasn’t been my specific problem, but it is a HUGE problem. I’m planning on writing about that at some point. It drives me nuts that people think Trump is the problem. He’s NOT the problem. He’s simply exposed the power structures in this country that will do almost anything to maintain control. But that’s a post for another day.
Sallie
I love what you’ve posted here, in fact I swear it’s like you read my mind.
I know our industries are different, but the exhausting need to jump through social media hoops to drum up photography business has done me in. I’m so over it. There was an episode of a popular marketing podcast recently that all but suggested we turn over our first borns to Zuckerberg, and it was totally serious! The host was out of breath rattling off everything we “should be doing” to attract business. How is this healthy? Why aren’t we at their doors with pitch forks refusing to live like this? We’re the ones surrendering our original content like fools to fill the blank spaces of their apps and this is what we accept in return?
I gave up on Insta. I only post on social media so people know we’re alive. It cannot be how I get business because I’m not getting any.
Another toxic trend I’m seeing is this need to be “friends” with everyone. Not just congenial, not just professional and pleasant to work with, but BFF level compatibility. Clients are being counseled by young business podcasters to only entertain service providers that they’d love to have coffee with, who they’d ask to be their child’s godparent. Nonsense. Some of my best work was done for clients I have absolutely zero in common with in our personal lives. I can’t help but think of how many amazing business relationships aren’t coming to fruition because clients are only looking for experts who love mac and cheese and have an equally complex Starbucks order. Remember the days of when the only “connection” you needed was the client had a problem and your skills could solve it? Those days seem to be over.
I’ve gone the old school route and had portfolios printed to hand out to prospective clients. Thankfully I don’t rely on any income from my little business to support our family, so my heart absolutely breaks for those who do. Social media and internet is killing business, just as you said. I would throw unrealistic expectations and nonsensical relational points on that list, too. How are so many so blind to what’s going on?
I’m reading “Zero Hour for Gen X” and have thought about blogging through the chapters. Your comment made me think about the book content.
So much of this ridiculous advice is coming from Millennials who have a skewed view of life. Gen X has quite a bit to offer the culture that neither the Baby Boomers or Millenaials have because we have had a more balanced life experience when it comes to life both with and without technology. Unfortunately we are stuck between two self-absorbed cohorts so it makes it difficult to get a word in edgewise.
Book link: https://amzn.to/32LsnGK
This is from the Amazon description:
In Zero Hour for Gen X, Matthew Hennessey calls on his generation, Generation X, to take a stand against tech-obsessed millennials, apathetic baby boomers, utopian Silicon Valley “visionaries,” and the menace to top them all: the soft totalitarian conspiracy known as the Internet of Things. Soon Gen Xers will be the only cohort of Americans who remember life as it was lived before the arrival of the Internet. They are, as Hennessey dubs them, “the last adult generation,” the sole remaining link to a time when childhood was still a bit dangerous but produced adults who were naturally resilient.
More than a decade into the social media revolution, the American public is waking up to the idea that the tech sector’s intentions might not be as pure as advertised. The mountains of money being made off our browsing habits and purchase histories are used to fund ever-more extravagant and utopian projects that, by their very natures, will corrode the foundations of free society, leaving us all helpless and digitally enslaved to an elite crew of ultra-sophisticated tech geniuses. But it’s not too late to turn the tide. There’s still time for Gen X to write its own future.
—————
So much I could say about what goes on behind the scenes re: online experts who tell everyone how to do everything…
Sallie
“We’re the ones surrendering our original content like fools to fill the blank spaces of their apps and this is what we accept in return?”
This is the case on every level. The search engines, social media, etc. are RIFE with free content in order to attract people to our sites or businesses. I have tried it myself over the past two years. Now I have to decide what to do with it. All of these experts and platforms expect us to constantly devalue our work to a greater and greater degree. Meanwhile they make millions and billions.
Sallie
So true! I need to get that book. I’d love to hear your thoughts on the gurus one day. One podcast I do still like is Barb Corcoran’s show. I think because she’s 70 and has real experience to share.
I don’t know what to say either. Just I’m sorry this is happening. I absolutely loved social media in the very beginning, but now I’ve even become wary of writing what I’m actually thinking, even on a very small scale. Everything, and I mean everything, has broken down in my world to be only about power and money – of which I have neither.
I’ll wait around in support of whatever you choose to do, because when I first set out to homeschool in the 80’s there were so few people who homeschooled without an agenda that I found no support at all. You provide that for so many, and I am saddened that you are losing your voice and services for that world. Ugh. It’s just soooo wrong!
Hi Judy,
I’m sorry to hear things are still difficult for you. I will pray for the Lord to give you strength and joy in the midst of it.
I appreciate you!
Sallie
Sounds incredibly saddening and frustrating and disappointing. What about short length books? Sorry if that’s not a helpful comment. I’m sure your narrowed options will eventually point to a great fit, I sure hope so anyways. ❤️
Hi Linda,
Thank you for your kind words. Suggestions and comments are always appreciated when they are meant kindly. ♥
Sallie
I’m sorry to hear how frustrating this has been for you, Sallie. I don’t have any sage advice, but I wanted to comment so you know you have a “listening ear” among the 7%. You will be in my prayers as well. Thank you so much. I appreciate you.
Cheryl
Hi Cheryl,
Thanks for your prayers and listening ear. Both are greatly appreciated. ♥
Sallie
I’m so sorry you’re affected by this financially! The censoring is bad enough. 🙁 I’ve only blogged for fun, but it’s upsetting that I can no longer find like-minded bloggers to connect with, because of no way to search for them, and no way my blog will show up in a search. Same with lots of “search engines.” I was looking for something on YouTube the other day and it insisted on showing me current events instead of what I was looking for, and there was no way to refine the search. Even Amazon…I’m already giving them my business, yet they want to put sponsored items first, restrict search results, and only show a few results per page so that I keep having to click onto another page with more ads. But again, I’m sorry these these algorithms affect ordinary people who are trying to make a living or just connect with other real live people online!
Hi ElizabethS,
Search everywhere is just becoming ridiculous. They have completely lost track of the user experience.
I can’t remember if I shared this story on another post. I might have. This summer I did a search on my phone for Barnes and Noble. The first result was an ad for Barnes and Noble. The second result was their actual website. That is incredibly crappy. The “ad” logo is so tiny that most people will instinctively click on the ad since it is the first result. There is NO reason BN should have to pay for an ad when someone looks specifically for their website.
That was when it really hit me how much Google is manipulating search results to maximize their profits. It’s gotten exponentially worse the past month.
Thanks for your comment!
Sallie
David was on Facebook a little bit ago and he started laughing. I thought he was going to share a funny meme with me. I turned around and asked him what was so funny.
He was in a (blogging related topic) Facebook Group to look something up and discovered there was an active discussion about how people’s traffic has tanked over the past several weeks, specifically Google-referred traffic. One person said he made $100,000 last year. This year he is going to be lucky to make $5,000.
It’s everywhere.
And, by the way, Epstein didn’t kill himself.
😀
I am so saddened to hear of your troubles and problems. I always look forward to your e-mails, as they are always interesting and informative. I always share them with my sisters. I love your printables,too. I hope this difficulty can be solved for you and all the others. I will keep you in my thoughts and prayers for apositive solution for you. God Bless.
Marilyn
Hi Marilyn,
Thank you for your kind words. I always appreciate your thoughtful comments.
God bless you too!
Sallie
I am so sad to hear how this has affected you! I’ve only been following you for several months now, so on the one hand, I will be a bit sad to see fewer posts from you. But honestly, I would do the same thing in your shoes. It’s really gotten ridiculous. The craziness is actually why I shut down my blog several years ago. I had a newborn at the time; I didn’t want to spend my time staying on top of the frequent changes and relearn the rules each time. It’s gotten so much worse since then. I’ll still continue to stop by and check for updates, but I am also praying God gives you some clear direction on what to do. I am very thankful for the words of truth you’ve spoken here on the blog and on the podcast. You’ve been a great encouragement to me!
Hi Jess,
Thanks so much for taking the time to comment. It really is crazy now and I’ve decided that I have to step off the crazy train. I’m not going to stop completely because I really do love blogging and interacting with other women, but I’m definitely done working so many hours in order to appease the monopolies.
I’ve thought for some time that old-fashioned blogging would make a comeback and I’ve written about that the past year or two. I think bloggers and readers are tired of the endless marketing and such.
I guess we’ll see what happens. But keep coming by. I’m not leaving. Just trying to figure out what to do next.
Sallie
https://sallieborrink.com/new-trend-returning-old-fashioned-blogging/
https://sallieborrink.com/creating-a-cozy-life-by-choosing-the-propaganda-you-view/
If someone wants to take a deep dive to really understand how bad this is and how Google is manipulating everything to their benefit, check out this article.
http://www.seobook.com/brands-vs-ads
Republicans and Democrats don’t agree on much right now, but there are 50 attorneys general working together to go after Google from two different angles. I believe one group is being led by a Republican AG and the other group is being led by a Democrat AG.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/14/states-google-antitrust-probe-to-expand-into-search-android-businesses.html
In a strange way it makes me glad I’ve never really tried that hard to make an income from my blog. I enjoy writing and sharing material, but in all honesty, I just don’t have the bandwidth to make it make serious money the way so many other bloggers do. I don’t know if it’s I’m not that focused, or what it is, but it’s just not in me. I feel like I should, and I have lots of ideas, but there’s just so much to do.
You probably made the best choice. If I wasn’t married to David, I wouldn’t be able to do even a fraction of what I do. He has invested untold tens of thousands of dollars worth of unpaid time into my site over the past fifteen years. Fortunately some of that has translated into work for clients, but we’ve still invested far, far more into this site and such than we have ever gotten out of it monetarily. It’s not even close.
Sallie
Dear Sallie,
Thank you so much for blogging about your life and homeschool experience. Your words have spoken life directly into our home and school. Our kids are not gifted, but your words have helped our family so much. I am sorry to learn of the troubles you are having right now. Thank you for not being afraid to speak truth and be real.
Mary,
Thank you for taking the time to share this. Truly. It really does encourage me to know that things I’ve written or said have made an actual difference in the life of a specific family. Sometimes I just have to believe it’s true, when I don’t know it as a fact. It’s so helpful to hear someone express these words.
Thank you.
Sallie
I’m so sorry the remnant was tiny! Did you resend the email again to unopens, with a “Time Sensitive” subject line? At least some people are still finding you for the first time…like me! I think I’ve only been following you for a year, maybe? You have my attention in the online space, and I do hope you keep writing.
I, too, get dizzy from all the “pivoting.” There’s a lot to think about with all the updates and monopolies and other internet stuff coming to light.
Oh, I’m very happy with my little remnant! Truly. I only want to send emails to people who really want them and are excited to get them. If people want contact with me, they will make sure they are on my list. Otherwise I’m just wasting their time and I’m wasting money to keep a large list of people who aren’t engaged with what I’m doing. And that’s okay with me.
I’m done pivoting. I’ve pivoted more than a few times. I’m doing my own thing. For me, it’s been like peeling back the layers of the onion the past few years. Leaving Facebook, etc. has all been part of it. The Google sham was the proverbial last straw.
Sallie
Hi Sallie,
I just wanted to say that I’m so sorry for all you’re going thru. How discouraged you must feel. 🙁
I’ve cut my online time down dramatically in the last several years, and then again even more recently. I’m just feeling rather done with it all. I don’t even do what you do, and I’m tired of it all. Anyway, I just wanted to encourage you and let you know that I do appreciate all your work, and I do enjoy my stops by your site. You are a sane voice in a crazy world. I’m glad you’re speaking out.
Hi Pam,
Thank you for taking the time to leave this comment. I appreciate your kind words.
I left a comment on someone else’s blog today re: her discouragement with blogging and podcasting. I mentioned that I think part of the reason people don’t engage much on blogs is because people are overwhelmed, stressed out, overextended, etc.
And I think many people like you said are just kind of disillusioned or done with the online life. David and I have been discussing this lately. There is a shift happening. I don’t know what comes next, but there is a shift that can be seen if you are watching things on a consistent basis.
Thanks for stopping by!
Sallie
Saw this tonight. This is the guy on the Left I watch daily. He keeps a good eye on what’s happening. This is about how Google is censoring people.
https://youtu.be/8Td1AcGAcL0
I just saw an article talking about this same thing on Discrn.
“I’m shocked, shocked I say, to find out there is censorship going on in this establishment.”
I am now one of the remnant. I wondered why I hadn’t gotten a Sallie email in what seemed like forever, so I went to your site. Long story short, I discovered I had missed a lot of posts! I never got an email about needing to re-subscribe, so I have only just now done so. I wonder if that’s the case with some others?
Hang in there. Your wisdom does not go unnoticed.
Hi Erika,
Good to see you! I am sure some people did not see the email so hopefully they will make their way back.
It is getting more and more difficult to get emails through to people unless they are engaged with them. Email services are filtering more and more. I should remind everyone in the email I send out today that you need to open and click on them each time to tell your email service that you want to receive my emails.
Sallie
I’m going to put this in the Forum as well, but here is a look at exactly what is going on with YouTube. He provides good details, showing YouTube’s guidelines, video from a YouTube exec, etc.
https://youtu.be/OEWDP1v1tFY
New “guidance” that is non-guidance from Pinterest. For the past year or two they have been telling everyone to make multiple “fresh pins” for their content. The content doesn’t have to be new, but the pins need to be new.
I thought this was dumb. I don’t want to be tricked into clicking on something I think is new content which is actually old content that I’ve already read.
Anyway, now they have decided that you should only pin your own brand new content and not very often. You also aren’t supposed to pin other people’s content in order to build up your own following even though that has been a cornerstone of Pinterest guidance for years. Oh, and boards don’t matter any longer. After they told us for years to create specific boards for specific, niche topics.
*************This is the exact opposite of what they have been telling people to do for years.**************
These people clearly have NO IDEA what they are doing, what they want their business model to be, etc.
Jump through the hoops people, jump through the hoops.
I’ve spent the past couple of days blowing up my Pinterest account. I’m almost done. I have a few more boards to deal with and then I’m done. I probably deleted half of my boards. I deleted thousands of pins, mostly other people’s.
I never wanted 90 boards. I almost have it to where I actually like it now.
Sigh, I need to figure out exactly what I want to do with the new plan. For actually being usable, I like my multiple boards. I guess I need to get back to the old plan of going through and occasionally deleting and getting rid of old and bad pins.