$50 Giveaway, 2021 Reflection, & 2022 Updates

2021 has been a huge year for me, so I wanted to take some time to pen down my thoughts regarding the past year.

I also want to share some of the plans I have in mind for my blog for 2022 so you guys know what to expect in the year to come.

Thank You!

I want to start off by saying a huge thank you to all my readers, both new and old.

I started this blog with the intention of spreading awareness about personal finance and sharing tips/opinions about various topics with everyone.

Without you guys visiting my blog and reading my content, this blog would be for nothing.

I really appreciate all the support that you guys have shown me and I’m truly thankful for each and every one of you.

As a token of my appreciation, I’ll be hosting my very first giveaway here on my blog – just for you guys!

More details will be shared below.

2021 Journey

This year has been an extremely eventful one for me.

I committed to posting regularly on my blog, joined the personal finance community on Seedly and Reddit, graduated from university, and started work at my first job.

For those of you who didn’t know, I actually started this blog back in June 2020, during my summer break when I was still in school.

I started posting for a while, but I quickly found myself too busy in the following semester while juggling an internship along with 2 evening classes.

Then, in 2021, I moved on to my final semester where I was much less busy with only 2 modules (albeit 1 was my FYDP).

So I decided that I should have time to post regularly, and made the commitment to post weekly.

I’m proud to say that I managed to achieve that, missing only 2 weeks where I was swamped with other commitments.

I’m not going to lie, though, it was pretty challenging to churn out post after post every week.

But I’m glad that I did it anyway because I enjoy learning and writing about personal finance.

One of the major factors that motivated me to post regularly is the support from all of you, my readers.

It’s extremely humbling to receive emails and comments from people I don’t know, thanking me for my content or seeking my opinion on certain topics.

Every interaction that I have with you guys serve as a reminder to me that I am achieving what I set out to do with this blog.

It also means that I’ve impacted someone, hopefully for the better, that I would otherwise never have been able to.

This makes me feel that what I’m doing with my blog is meaningful, which truly makes me happy and I couldn’t be more grateful.

Interacting with the personal finance community in Singapore via platforms like Seedly and Reddit has also been a huge part of my 2021 journey.

Personally, I seldom have discussions or conversations about personal finance with my friends and family because it’s generally a sensitive topic to talk about.

I also don’t want to be that guy who always and only talks about savings accounts or investing whenever I’m around people.

These online communities served as an outlet for me to share my enthusiasm for personal finance with like-minded people by participating in discussions and sharing tips.

I even got to connect with some of these members and learn about their personal finance journeys so far.

I also constantly learn new things by being active in these communities because people are always sharing their best tips and talking about the best deals and promotions.

Sometimes, these things that I learn make it into posts here on my blog to spread the word about them.

Speaking of learning new things, I finally ventured into the crypto space in late 2021.

I used to be super sceptical about crypto and wanted to avoid it.

But I felt that I had a responsibility to try and make sense of it and dip my toes in the water so that I could share some insights/thoughts about crypto with you guys.

It was pretty overwhelming when I first started to learn the basics about cryptocurrencies and how to go about investing in them.

There are quite a number of differences between the investing procedure for crypto and traditional stocks/ETFs, so that was something I needed to get used to.

Not to mention the countless different coins that are around now which may operate on different networks and have different functions, adding yet another layer of complexity in trying to understand crypto.

While there’s still a lot more for me to learn, I’m glad that I took the first step to venture into crypto and I’m looking forward to sharing some of the things I’ve learned with you guys soon.

2022 Updates

Posting Schedule

Moving forward in 2022, I’ll be reviewing my posting schedule.

I still plan to continue posting regularly on my blog.

But as much as I’d love to upload a full post every week, I don’t think it’s something I’ll be able to sustain in the long run.

In the 2nd half of 2021, after I started work, I already started encountering difficulties in meeting this schedule, but I wanted to press on until the end of the year.

Even while working from home for most of the time, I still found it hard to set aside sufficient time to work on full-length posts every week.

Now that I’ve started going back to the office half the time, I’m going to have even less time to work on posts.

My plan, for now, is to alternate between uploading a full-length post and a short post every week.

Full-length posts refer to the regular weekly posts that I’ve been uploading throughout 2021.

As for short posts, I’m thinking of reviving the TFH (The Frugal Handbook) series that I attempted to start sometime in 2021, though I haven’t decided if every short post will be a TFH post.

So the schedule would look something like this:

Week 1: Full-length post

Week 2: TFH/Short post

Week 3: Full-length post

Week 4: TFH/Short post

And so on.

This way, I’ll still be able to upload content for you guys every week while having slightly more time to work on full-length posts.

Posts will continue to go live on Fridays because I feel like that’s worked out well for me so far.

Hopefully, this is a schedule that I’ll be able to sustain for the year to come, but I’ll have to see how it goes as we move along.

I haven’t decided when I’ll start implementing this schedule but rest assured that I’ll update you guys ASAP!

Post Topics

This year, I’m also looking to review the topics of my posts.

While I’m not going to stop posting about savings accounts, credit cards, or investing, I hope to expand the scope of my posts to the following:

• crypto
• insurance
• periodic reflection/review posts

As I mentioned earlier, crypto is something I only recently started getting into.

Even though I’m still learning, I think it’d help to share my experience and journey thus far so that fellow crypto newbies can learn from my struggles.

Insurance is another area that I’m not familiar with but given that I’ll be responsible for my own insurance from this year onwards, I figured that I should start learning and writing about it as well.

Finally, I want to write a reflection/review/update kind of post periodically, ie every 2/3 months.

The purpose of these posts would simply be to share my thoughts, what I’m doing with my finances, etc.

I wanted to have some posts where I could get a bit more personal with you guys, and I figured this is one way to go about it.

I’m also open to suggestions for what kind of posts you guys would like to see in 2022 – more details on this in my giveaway!

$50 Giveaway

This giveaway is my way of thanking you guys for all the support you’ve shown me in 2021.

This is the first time I’m doing something like this, so please bear with me if I miss out on any details.

How To Participate

Step 1: Join The Frugal Class by subscribing to my newsletter (it’s free!) and confirming your subscription. If you’ve already subscribed previously, you can skip this step.

Step 2: Leave a comment on this post about what kind of posts you would like to see on my blog in 2022 using the same email from Step 1.

Giveaway Details + Terms & Conditions

• Eligibility period: 6 pm 14 Jan 2022 (GMT+8) – 6 pm 28 Jan 2022 (GMT+8)
• This giveaway is open to both new and existing subscribers
• To be eligible for the giveaway, you need to complete both Step 1 & Step 2 by the end of the eligibility period, ie 6 pm 28 Jan 2022 (GMT+8)
• Only participants who have confirmed their subscription (email should be sent to you after subscribing – check Junk/Spam!) will be considered as a subscriber who is eligible for the giveaway
• 5 winners will be randomly selected to win 1x S$10 voucher each
• The reward, subject to availability, will be a choice of:
  • S$10 Shopee voucher, or
  • S$10 GrabFood voucher
• The rewards are intended for use in Singapore only and may or may not be valid outside of Singapore
• Winners will be notified via email (sent to the same email used in Steps 1 & 2) by 1159 pm 28 Jan 2022 (GMT+8)
• Each participant is only allowed to enter the giveaway once – duplicate comments will be removed
• By taking part in this giveaway, you agree to our privacy policy
• We reserve the right to amend the details of the giveaway without prior notice

Final Thoughts

2021 has been a hectic year, but it’s also been packed with learning and growth.

While my blog is still very much in its infancy, the growth it has experienced over the past year has definitely exceeded my expectations.

I’m thankful for my hard work paying off, but I’m even more thankful for each of you who spends time reading my content.

I wanted to do something to thank all of you for your support, and that’s why I’m hosting this giveaway.

Feel free to share this giveaway with your friends and family – all are welcome to participate!

While you’re at it, if you’ve found my posts helpful, go ahead and link them to your favourite post so far.

This will go a long way in helping me out, and I’d really appreciate it!

Thank you once again for making this blog possible, and here’s to another awesome year together!