Eat Blog Talk

In episode 391, Megan chats to Taryn Scarfone about the advantages of starting a second food blog. Taryn is a happily married, busy mom of 6. She began her blogging journey as a hobby in 2015 and it took off pretty quickly. Joy Filled Eats concentrates on low carb and keto recipes that are easy to make and suitable for the whole family. Since starting her blog, Taryn has launched two more food websites. In this episode, Taryn talks about how her second food blog allowed her to expand into a different niche and do everything better from the start, getting a lot of organic traffic quickly. - How do you decide on a second niche? - What should you do differently in a second blog? - Approach SEO and keywords carefully before you launch. - How much do you post on social media for new food blogs? - Time management tips for managing multiple food blogs. - A new blog can add new inspiration to your blogging journey. - How much effort should you put into logos and branding? Connect with Taryn Scarfone Website | Instagram

In episode 390, Megan chats to Rob Finkelstein about why it's important for food bloggers and photographers to have contracts and understanding important legal terms. Rob is a lawyer, practicing for over 20 years in NYC. In 2017, Rob decided to pursue his passion of baking and went to culinary school for pastry arts. After graduating, not wanting to leave the law, Rob got started blogging at Cinnamon Shtick, which was also his entry into food photography. He worked with a number of brands and came to represent lots of food photographers in connection with their contracts and business set ups. They all inspired Rob to create an online course about contracts specifically for food photographers. In this episode, you learn how to set up a contract, what kind of clauses you need to include, tips for copyright and licensing terms and why this can make a massive difference in your business. - Difficult legal terms put people off drawing up contracts. - It doesn't seem important until there's an issue. - It defines your relationship with your client. - Do you have a business entity name? - What should you do if you don't agree with the contract terms? - Get a basic education about legal terms. - What should you know about copyright law and licensing? - What if a brand asks for revisions of your photography work? - Define which country and state's laws apply. Connect with Rob Finkelstein Website | Instagram

In episode 389, Megan chats to Christina Jolam about why Christina was held back from blogging and how she overcame doubt, perfectionism and other obstacles that stood in her way. Christina Jolam is a communications consultant turned food writer and founder of the blog Weekday Pescatarian. She creates easy and impressive fish-forward recipes and shares tips for incorporating more seafood into your diet, all from her tiny sea-side flat in Portugal. In this episode, you'll be able to explore common reasons why we put off starting a blog, including perfectionism and doubts of whether we'll succeed. Christina shares her blogging journey and how she overcame her fear of failure. - Perfectionism often stand in our way to start something new. - Perfectionists fear criticism. - Perfectionists feel like nothing is good enough. - Perfectionists tend to avoid risks. - Address your doubts, instead of ignoring them. - Dread leads to procrastination. - Use journaling as a way to navigate your feelings. - Listening to other bloggers' stories will help you realize you're not alone. Connect with Christina Jolam Website | Instagram

In episode 388, Ruth Grindeland teaches us how to find international resources for effective and cost-efficient outsourcing. Ruth started Sinful Kitchen in 2020, during the Covid pandemic. After binge watching 9 seasons of The Great British Baking show, Ruth knew she needed to find a better way to connect with the world. Hence, Sinful Kitchen was created. It's a vegan and vegetarian blog that shares recipes from all around the world, while occasionally trying to recreate Baking Show challenges. In this episode, Ruth explains why she wanted to outsource her blog tasks to women overseas with less opportunities using platforms like Fiverr and Upwork. She delves into the details of finding the right people, quality-control, mediating with sellers when things go wrong and the benefits of outsourcing. - Decide if you want to hire per job or per post. - How do you decide if someone is a good fit for the job? - Come up with a system of operation that makes it easy to work together. - What happens when you get poor quality work back? - Tips to mediate with sellers on Fiverr. - What kind of jobs can you hire out? - Save time and focus on developing other parts of your business. Connect with Ruth Grindeland Website | Instagram

In episode 387, Olena Osipov teaches us how to batch produce YouTube content for increased growth and efficiency. Olena of iFoodReal has been blogging for 11 years. While blogging, she tried to grow her YouTube channel, however she stopped a few times as she did not have the right strategy amongst other reasons. In 2021, Olena needed a break because she recognized that she was burnt out. She came back in 2022 with a new strategy to produce video content more efficiently for YouTube and she's here to share her strategy with us. In this episode, you'll learn her process for batch producing YouTube content, everything from finding a reasonably priced videographer to the most efficient way to film and edit videos and how to look your best on film. - Batch filming to get as many recipes done as possible in one session. - Prepare all utensils and ingredients before a filming day. - Batch record intros and outros and cooking processes. - Use YouTube analytics to find the ideal video length (normally around 5 minutes). - How do you deal with comments on YouTube? - Tips for how to streamline the editing process. - Film short vertical videos too for TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts. - Make-up, outfit and posture tips to look good on film. Connect with Olena Osipov Website | Instagram

In episode 386, Megan chats to Erin Gierhart about getting clarity on what is essential in order to grow your blog and how to let go of everything else so that you can get more done by doing less. Erin founded her blog, State of Dinner, in 2020, after almost 20 years in the food and beverage industry. She enjoys developing mostly from scratch recipes that bring comfort to her family, without spending all day in the kitchen. She quadrupled her blog traffic year over year by getting clear on what was essential and letting go of everything else. In this episode, you'll learn how to decide on tasks that will help increase your traffic most, which tasks are less important and using discipline and time management techniques to stay on track. - Are you getting the right things done to move the needle in your business? - Decide which skills you need to develop most to increase your traffic. - Make a list of things that you will NOT do. - Can you use outsourcing to help free up your time? - Have discipline to stay on track by knowing your WHY. - How do you plan your week to align with your priorities? - Set time boundaries to complete your priorities for the week. - How to deal with distractions. Connect with Erin Gierhart Website | Instagram

In episode 385, Megan chats to Katalin Nagy about extra revenue streams for our blogs, specifically how to monetize online baking classes and other skills. Katalin started her food blog, Spatula Desserts, in spring 2020 during the lockdown. She loved baking and teaching people how to bake, but at the start, she didn't know anything about SEO, search consoles, or the importance of keywords. She quickly picked up an avid desire to learn more about the industry in 2021. She began to monetize her blog in October 2021 via Mediavine. From there, Katalin found joy in creating live and pre-recorded baking classes in 2022 to further showcase her passion for baking with her audience and create a new revenue stream, all while working full-time for a corporate company. In this episode, you'll learn more about how we can monetize our skills by teaching them to others, for example through online baking classes, and why this is good for our blogging careers. - Gain more traffic through online baking courses. - What are the advantages of live baking classes versus pre-recorded? - When you record live classes, you can resell those to generate passive income. - What should you do if you're afraid of public speaking? - It is more secure to have at least two sources of income. - Discipline over motivation will bring you closer to your goal each day. Connect with Katalin Nagy Website | Instagram

In episode 384, Caro Jensen teaches us four easy steps to build a strong food brand, stand out from the crowd and offer maximum value to our readers. Caro is a seasoned marketing professional who has worked in the food and wine space for over a decade. As a Brand and PR Manager in the wine industry she's worked with bloggers directly and via agencies. She's also connected bloggers and brands as a marketing consultant and works as a food and wine content creator to build her own brand and channels. In this episode, you'll find out what branding is, why it is important for business growth and how to build a strong, identifiable and likable brand. - Branding is not just your logo. - With SEO being popular, individuality is more important than ever. - Find your brand mission and create a vision board. - How do you want to serve your reader? - Why did you start your blog? - A tag line helps others to understand quickly what you do. - Create a mood board for your brand. - Formalize your brand feel in a style guide. - Decide what photography and videography style you want to use. - What writing style will you use? - Being on brand should allow you to be yourself. - Be consistent with your branding on all platforms. Connect with Caro Jensen Website | Instagram

In episode 383, Sarah Holt teaches us how to make a full-time income creating recipes, making videos and doing photography for food brands while blogging. Sarah has been a food blogger for almost 3 years at Real Food with Sarah. After years of struggling with keyword research and SEO, she is excited to be close to reaching her goal of qualifying for Mediavine in the next few months. While Sarah's blog is growing, she was successful in focusing a lot on freelance and sponsored brand work this year and has so far made 15x more than she made in 2021. Sarah only has a following of 2200 on Instagram so she's showing it can be done. In this episode, you will learn how Sarah selects brands she wants to collaborate with, how she pitches them and tips for pricing yourself that will make you feel valued as a freelancer. - Find a brand's gaps when planning your pitch. - Decide on the brand's individual needs before working out pricing. - What are red flags when it comes to pricing and when should you walk away? - Should you let go of brand work that you don't enjoy? - Will brands work with you if you have a small following on Instagram? - Follow up on any pitches you've sent. - Don't be scared to invest in your business. Connect with Sarah Holt Website | Instagram

In episode 382, Megan chats to Bobbie Blue about why investing in ourselves and our business from the beginning will help us reach our goals quicker and with less stress. Bobbie Blue lives in Florida with her husband and step-daughter. She started the blog, Blue's Best Life in 2018, however it had no focus and she wrote about everything from fitness, being a step-mom to healthy recipes. Bobbie's ears perked up and she finally took the advice from the blogging community and niched down. But it wasn't until 2020 that it became clear that food blogging was her true passion. She fell in love with recipe development and food photography and dove into that. Bobbie shares her blogging journey, exploring some of the key mistakes she made at the start and how she invested in herself and her business to turn her blog into a money-making business. - What game-changing improvements can you make in your blogging kit (e.g. photography equipment, photography courses)? - How can you create a second source of income? - Is there a way to improve your writing style? - Have you niched down? - Find a like-minded community of people who can support you. - Learn from the blogging mistakes you make at the start. - Who can you contact to be a blogging mentor? Connect with Bobbie Blue Website | Instagram