UK Blog Awards 2014

Dress by Natalie Ross Handmade Designs

As you are all aware this year I entered the UK Blog Awards 2014 in the category ‘Most Innovative Blog’ and I was shortlisted as a finalist.

A Finalist! Appleton Pin Up Girl

The National UK Blog Awards 2014© are the only Blog Awards recognising a multitude of industry professional talent across the UK. The UK Blog Awards provide a unique opportunity for individual professionals from their sector and organisations to be recognised for their social media achievements through blogging, with the chance to network and be inspired by other industry bloggers.

The top 10 organisation and top 10 individual finalist blogs in each of the 14 categories finally had the moment they had all been waiting for and found out who the winners are at an awards ceremony in London.

The awards ceremony was held at The Grange, St Pauls, London on Friday 25^th April 2014. I attended with my partner Geoff before heading home a little early as he had a 5am start the next day flying off to work in Norway for two weeks.

The night started with welcome drinks, canapés and networking from 6.30 – 8.30pm. The night was hosted by Alan Stevens who introduced us to Gemma Pears Founder of the UK Blog Awards and Becki Cross her partner. At 8.50 we had a warm welcome from Content Click (Gold Sponsors for the evening) with founder’s brother and sister Alex Attinger and Jessica Attinger. We then had the awards presentation followed by the after party with live band to see out the night.

I didn’t win my category however I did have a wonderful experience. It’s great to be recognised for the hard work, time and effort that have gone in to my blog since I started. Bloggers generally work very hard, long hours into the night, pump lots of money, time and effort into what they do with very little reward or recognition. It was great to see so many people getting the spotlight they deserve.

I may not have won the award but I did support a raffle supporting a charity for autism that evening and we won a wonderful Twinings hamper from the events main sponsor! A big basket of tea, now there is something to celebrate!!

Me with my partner Geoff at the awards 
Dress by Natalie Ross Handmade Designs

I have learnt a lot during this process, about myself, my blog and things to think about moving forward. The event gives you the opportunity to connect with others and learn about other people, tools available to support what us bloggers love doing and of course a fun party.

Some things I have learnt about the evening and the experience overall:

• I have done really well to get this far and sometimes need to take a step back and celebrate my own success.
• I am not great at networking! Believe it or not I am actually quite shy in certain public situations and need to learn to approach people more and be more proactive and talking to others and getting my name out there.
• Get business cards! One error made is coming along empty handed as it would have been the perfect opportunity to dish out my

  

   Dress by Natalie Ross Handmade Designs

  details to people. Will make a start on this!!
• Meet more bloggers! I started my own blog as a total novice and it still amazes me I have a blog as I am so bad with technology! Meeting other bloggers can make you feel as though you are not alone. You can build relationships and friendships, swap and share ideas to help one another out. You may need support from time to time whether it is technical help, content ideas, layout and design etc so having a network of support is great.
• Turn up the volume on social media! I must start being more active on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Everyone is connecting and social media is generally how I find a lot of information so it makes sense others will find me there too, as long as I get the right messages out there and keep frequent regular content flowing.

The whole experience has been a worthwhile celebration of ‘Appleton Pin Up Girl’ so far with the help of all those who nominated me! I can now say I am proud to be a shortlisted for the National UK Blog Awards 2014 for ‘Most Innovative Blog’ award. Of course I hope to be able to share news some day of being an award winning blogger – you can all help me with that mission so stay tuned for something special coming on 1^st May!

For more you can search social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram using #UKBA14!

 

Thanks for all your support and stay tuned! 

xoxo

I painted my own nails for the awards
in spring colours with little gems!

I styled my own hair for the awards, very
basic easy hair style you can do at home!