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My Instagram: Kayte Demont

Brad Bahner

Kayte Demont, 24, founder of lifestyle website Mass Musings, has grown her online presence from a personal style blog to a team of six. The former Mainer studied English with a concentration in studio art at Gettysburg College before moving to Back Bay and launching her site in 2012. She hopes someday to turn the blog and her brand (@mass
musings
) into a full-time gig.

Q. How did you get started as a blogger?

A. When I launched, blogging wasn’t exactly what it is today. I started on Tumblr doing fashion and beauty and I had a lot of mirror selfies thinking I looked awesome. It’s embarrassing to look back on now. I relaunched my site about a year ago, and that’s when it morphed into what it is today.

Q. What do you think caused the blog to evolve?

A. I realized as I was going along that there were so many blogs focused on personal style and fashion. While I love that aspect of it, I didn’t feel like I was making a name for myself in a unique way. I wanted to be viewed as someone who brings something new and exciting to the table. I wanted to push the boundaries into something people were really interested in.

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Q. And what do you mean by that?

A. I just started talking to new people and researching new things and pairing topics together. Like just recently, I did a shoot collaboration with a photographer who is fashion-focused, but it was inspired by “Alice in Wonderland” and Pleasure State, a band I just saw.

Q. So what’s your day job?

A. I work in Waltham at a software company as a 9-to-5 and it’s almost like I work two full-time jobs.

Q. How are you balancing your time?

A. It’s definitely challenging. I attribute a lot of my time management to high school. I went to a small private school in Maine and we were required to play three sports in place of gym. It got us to learn to balance our time, between practices and school work. I have to budget a certain amount of time to dedicate to the blog each week. At night, I’ll set aside a few hours to answer my e-mails, queue up posts, and get on social media. Then I have an intern who has been really helpful with taking on projects.

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Q. Since you started, do you think Instagram and other social media channels have made blogging more of a time commitment than it once was?

A. 100 percent. When you’re first starting out there’s such a big learning curve that takes patience. Once you begin to get a name for yourself and gain a legitimate following, it becomes more difficult, because you have to post so many times a day on Facebook, then on Instagram, and then synching up blog posts on Twitter, and promoting events. When you’re a blogger, you’re building a personal brand, but at the end of the day, it’s also still yourself. You’re the brand. It’s an emotional journey and it’s stressful, but it’s fun.

I have this thing with floors... at brunch #ihavethisthingwithfloors #brunch @ihavethisthingwithfloors

A photo posted by K A Y T E D E M O N T ✌️ (@massmusings) on


Rachel Raczka can be reached at rachel.raczka@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter at @rachelraczka.