"the last time i saw you"

All that being said, after over a decade of souvenir shopping experience in markets all around the world, I’ve figured out a few ways to get the best price. Haggling, bartering, bargaining, wondering-if-you-should-sell-your-first-born-for-that-carpet… I’ve done it all.

I have recently written a few posts about blogging, which is weird, because I never wanted to be that blogger who just talks about blogging all the time. The fact is, however, that my entire life is dedicated to blogging, either on This Battered Suitcase or for my work. Whether I’m working on my own blog, collaborating with tourism boards, running a major travel brand’s blog, consulting travel PRs on who to hire for their campaigns, or giving presentations on working with bloggers and influencers (I still can’t say that word without cringing, anyone else?), I am talking about or working with blogs seven days a week. My recent post, When Did Travel Blogging Get So Boring? really hit a nerve, and many people came forward to say that they felt the same way.

Because seriously? If I hear one more person say, “It’s just about posting good content and using the right hashtags,” when giving advice about Instagram, I’m going to… sit behind my laptop and quietly seethe. NO. IT’S NOT JUST THAT. THERE IS SO MUCH MORE. It’s complicated sometimes, it’s frustrating sometimes, and, most of all, it takes a lot of work.

So I decided to write this post: every single thing I know about Instagram. And yes, this is all going to be my subjective advice, my personal opinions, and so on. But what I can tell you is this: a lot of what happens on Instagram is some straight up bullshit, and trust me, you’re not imagining things.

Ready? Grab your glass of wine and let’s do this.

“You don’t want kids?” he asked, a surprised look on his face. “How can you be so sure?” I was a bit annoyed that THAT was the point he picked up on – not the fact that his friend had just declared she was on track to build her dream life and travel the world.

“Well, I’ve given it a lot of thought, and at this point in my life I do not see children in my future,” I took another sip of my beer, hoping he’d just accept my answer… you know, the answer ABOUT MY OWN LIFE. I have had this conversation so many times, and it’s getting old.

“Yeah, right,” he chuckled. “You say that, but I guarantee you’ll end up having kids. You just need to meet the right guy.”

Recently, I pulled back a bit to take a look at this blog, and where I’d like to take it. As I recently went down to part-time to focus on this as a possible business, it was necessary for me to outline what I wanted for the future of This Battered Suitcase, and for my career. I started going through my archives. I started looking at the posts that I loved writing the most. I started looking at the posts that readers loved reading the most. And it hit me: if I keep accepting all of these trips, and if I keep chasing SEO stats, my blog might grow, yes. But isn’t my blog also going to get really fucking boring?

It’s the final week of this experiment, but I’m starting to realise it no longer feels like an experiment, one with a hard end date. Technically, next Sunday (or, if we’re counting all of January, next Wednesday) I can have a drink. Technically, I can go on all the dates my heart desires… though truth be told, it’s not like I’m getting offers for dates left and right. Dating, for me, has always felt like a “when it rains it pours” scenario, because I either go through long spells of no romantic encounters or periods of time when multiple people seem to be interested.

I decided to divide everything I have to say into two posts, because I am both a masochist and a sadist. First, in this post, I’ll talk about some general tips (more like opinions, if I’m honest) about social media that will hopefully apply to all channels in some form or another, although it’s important to note that each social media platform has its own value and use as well as its own audience, though they do overlap. In the post that will follow next week, I’ll outline some specific tips regarding the social media platforms I use the most. For the sake of the length of these posts (and our collective sanity) I am not mentioning YouTube or Vimeo at all, because I am not a vlogger, and video is so huge that it would require its own post by someone much more qualified (though I will mention Facebook live videos in the post about specifics).

So. Buckle up, get a cup of tea (or something stronger), and here we go… every single thing I know about social media.