Voice of London

Instagram is predicted to soon pass Facebook in users, advertisers and revenue, so it’s no surprise bloggers are turning their attention to the social media platform. With 500 million daily active users – most of which are aged between 18-24 – and features such as your post making it to the explore page, blogger content is reaching more people all the time and helping them to gain a following at a rather rapid rate.

I spoke to Layla, 36, from North London who runs a somewhat anonymous blog about relationships, sex and dating in 2018 under the name of Lalalaletmeexplain. She knows what she’s talking about too having worked with victims of domestic violence, supported them through leaving bad situations, as well as helping prisoners to change their behaviour before they are released from prison.

Only four days after posting her first blog entry in February last year she turned to Instagram to deliver her message. Initially she only had her close friends reading the blog but fast forward to today and she has an impressive 28 thousand followers. Her blog has reached people all over the UK as well as users in America and Australia.

She feels people are attracted to her Instagram because she uses her own experience to talk about how hard dating is in today’s world. She makes the point in stating that her message is not anti-men but anti-fuckboy.

The Lalalaletmeexplain Instagram doesn’t only consist of links to the blog website, but posts with long captions for those who want a quick read, as well as ‘Instastories’ throughout the week and an ‘Instalive’ every Friday night at 9:30pm.

Her live shows are her favourite thing to do on Instagram. Layla, 35 said: “It feels like a family and everyone gets involved.” She uses the Friday night lives to answer issues that her followers send her during the week; regrettably she can’t answer them all, so she has set up a service for private sessions, which are very affordable.

It’s obvious she loves this blog and her followers from how much time she puts into it. She added that her favourite part of what she does is “just to receive a message from someone that I’ve helped and for them to say they’ve left a bad situation, that’s really what I get from it”.

I asked her about her anonymity because we know certain facts about her, which she reveals in her blog and on her stories from time-to-time. Her name, age, current occupation and that she’s a mum are what she has allowed us to know. So why all the secrecy about her identity?

The first thing she said was her son. It’s unfair for him to grow up with people talking about his mum because of the sensitive topics she covers. But her second thought was that it adds mystery – not knowing who she is makes her easier to talk to and listen to because she might not look how we want her to look.

Admittedly, the love guru does find it difficult not to approach her followers if she happens to see them out and about. Layla said: “It’s hard to just not say ‘Hey, insert Instagram username’ because I see people all the time – I saw someone on my road once, so I do really have to be careful”.

On Instagram when creating any account, you needn’t put your name in the username nor title of the page and as long as you don’t post pictures of yourself or tell anyone it’s you, there’s not really many ways of anyone finding out.

It’s obvious why her followers love her so much – she’s so relatable. She’s a mum, single, tired of the state of the dating scene, honest, shares her own personal experiences, is open minded and practices self-love. Lalalaletmeexplain blog and Instagram has created a secure and empowering “sisterhood” as Layla put it.

Words: Tabitha Durrant

Subbed: Amelia Richardson