Meet Colleen Shibley

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Colleen Shibley. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Colleen below.

Colleen, appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?

I have always been a creative person even as a child. A box of new crayons and a sketching tablet were the perfect gift. I entered essay contests, coloring contests, and anything art-related I could find. As an elementary school student, I was selected as one of 5 students in the school to participate in painting a billboard mural. As I grew older I found less time for my creative outlet until I connected with the online scrapbooking community and began creating and selling scrapbooking kits. I gave that up sooner after as it was taking too much time from my one year older daughter. Eventually, I was able to get back to being creative through my blog Shibley Smiles. My blog was created out of a desire to have a creative outlet and 14 years later I’m still at it.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I am an accountant by day and I love my job, my co-workers, and everything in between. I am a blogger at night which is my creative passion outlet. I created Shibley Smiles in 2010 at the urging of a high school friend and it has grown from there. As I began to immerse myself in the blogging world I made great friends, met amazing people (even a few celebrities), and had the opportunity to review some groundbreaking products. I am proud to have been one of the very first people to review the Fitbit before it became the #1 fitness tracker. My family and I have enjoyed many perks of my job such as visits to Disney World and Universal Studios. My family has been my support system throughout my blogging career and is the inspiration for many of my articles. My youngest daughter was 5 when I began blogging and is now 18 getting ready to go to college. I’ve transitioned from a mother of 3 kids to an almost empty nester with 2 grandchildren and 1 on the way. Therefore Shibley Smiles has also transitioned form a traditional Mom Blog to a Lifestyle Blog where I can share tips & tricks to my readers as well as a little bit of personality.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

Community – I really began to see growth in my site when I joined other like-minded individuals. We are able to help each other navigate the ever-changing world of blogging by sharing ideas, and thoughts. It is also a great networking tool to help get your site in front of additional clients.

Persistence – Blogging can be very cyclical at times with ups & downs, you have to be persistent and keep moving forward. You have to keep your thumb on the “now’ and adapt. Over the course of my blogging career, we have been introduced to Pinterest, Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok.

Enjoy What You Do – When it becomes less enjoyable and more of a job it may be time to re-evaluate what your end goal is. I really enjoy blogging whether I have one visitor or 1,000. As mentioned previously it is a creative outlet for me that has fortunately become a nice side income for my family. I plan to continue with it as long as I enjoy it.

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?

The biggest challenge when running a blog is keeping a captive audience and dealing with the interworkings of the internet (for ranking purposes). I am struggling with both as I have taken a back seat lately to my blog and didn’t put in the effort needed to maintain both of these areas. I have recently taken a renewed interest in getting it to be more useful and resourceful to others and trying to get it in front of the right people. I am still working through these challenges by doing a lot of research and leaning on others in the industry who can help with their extensive knowledge.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://shibleysmiles.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shibleysmiles
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShibleySmiles/
• Twitter: https://x.com/shibleysmiles

Image Credits

All photos were taken by me or a family member.