On sponsors, affiliate links, & all that blog business no one discusses

In my last weekend recap I shared that I want to do more personal posts. It's Saturday afternoon and this is what is on my mind. This post has been a long time coming. I have always struggled with the whole idea of making this blog more of a business. In the end I decided that wasn't for me. I still host giveaways and do some product reviews (I try to limit these kinds of posts to 2 a month). I have 1 sponsor that is in my left sidebar and labeled "Sponsor." The rest of the buttons in my left sidebar are just stores I love to support. I don't receive monetary compensation for posting. I enjoy highlighting small businesses and nautical finds. I am happy to do that for free. I have affiliate ads in the right sidebar for stores I like shopping at (J.Crew, Kate Spade, etc). But I am most definitely NOT making anything more than a little spending money (I average about $25 a month in affiliate ad revenue). Last year I was putting a disclaimer on every post: "this is not a sponsored post" because I was so nervous that readers would think posts about new companies/businesses were sponsored (when they weren't)!

I want to be transparent in how I run this blog. If there is an affiliate link included in the post it will now say so at the end of the post. I didn't do this before because I thought it was fairly obvious that affiliate links were being used. But now it will be even more clear. I will continue to post whether I was given a product for free to review. If there is no disclaimer at the end of the post then you will know that I was not given anything for free or compensated in any way.