Pinay Problogger: Gloria Gamat

Glo often refers to herself as a tech-ignoramus for being such a novice in the blogosphere. A dear friend based in Germany lured her into the wonderful world of blogging a year ago, mainly for better tracking on each other’s lives. But blogging awakened in her a long-forgotten passion which is writing.

Glo is originally from Gubat, Sorsogon and came to Los Baños in 1989 to study Chemistry. She never got to leave LB since then. At present, Glo is a proud single-mom to Raine (Rainier Brando: born 29 December 2002), a task she juggles with being a Researcher but has already resigned from her work to become a fulltime problogger this month.

• How would you define problogging?

  When you are earning because of blogging. Otherwise, blogging is a hobby or a passion that is being pursued.

• When did you start blogging? When did you get into problogging and how did you realize that there’s some money to be had from it?

  I started blogging sometime in August/September 2004. A year after, august 2005 i started a blog under one network. That’s when i realized that you can earn from it through advertisement and affiliates.

• Which blogs are you writing for and which blog networks are you affiliated with?

  Currently, I blog for the following:
  Know More Media: The Pharm Voice
  Creative Weblogging: Straight From The Doc
  B5media: Filipina Soul

• Are you problogging part time or full time? Do you see this career as a part time gig or you are looking into going fulltime problogging?

  Starting next month (April 2006), I’ll be problogging full time. If you are a risk taker and has bumped into the right network that really pays big time and on a fixed monthly payment scheme, then you can say that problogging can be a career.

• How do you monetize your blog? Which ones bring in the most revenues?

  I have Adsense and some affiliate on my personal blog but it’s hardly earning. Well, if you consider 0.01 cents per month. On the networks that I am blogging, I get monthly fixed payment.

• What are the requirements to go into problogging for a network? Flat fee or profit sharing? How much is the salary range?

  Depending on the network, most common is revenue/profit sharing but the really big ones give monthly fixed payment. I am not allowed to divulge the exact rate let’s just say that the range is $200PHP 11,737INR 16,950EUR 190CNY 1,456-1,000 USD per month (per blog).

• How much time do you spend on problogging?

  Average, 4 hours a day currently. But that may change soon when i go full time.

• What other benefits do you get from problogging?

  The only thing i could think of is that because I reside in the Philippines, what i currently earn may not be enough to sustain a family if i were based in Europe or US, but because I live in the Phils, the amount I get is always times 50 so i guess that’s the advantage. It’s not the only reason but problogging gave me enough “strength” to quit my current regular job.

• What’s the most significant event/moment you had in your entire problogging career?

  The most significant event was being connected with Creative Weblogging because it paved the way to getting another big science blogging gig.

• What personal tips can you share with bloggers who want to try out problogging?

  I feel that I am not in the position to give any peronal tips on problogging. I just happen to be at the right place at the right time. Knowing the right people helped a lot beacuse they lead me to the networks where there’s money. But of course, you have to be equipped too with the right blogging/writing knowledge.

More Filipino Probloggers:

Melissa Atienza-Petri
Joachim Guanzon
Ruth Schaffer
J Angelo Racoma
Markku Seguerra
Gloria Gamat
Paulo Ordoveza