318: FBP Rewind – How Food Bloggers Can Make the Most Out of Q4

An image of a cassette and the title of Jenna Arend's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'FBP Rewind.'

Welcome to episode 318 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, we’re rewinding back to a Q&A we held last year where Food Blogger Pro members asked Bjork and Pinch of Yum’s General Manager, Jenna, questions about preparing for Q4.

It’s another FBP Rewind episode today, and we’re so excited to revisit our October 2020 Q&A with Jenna Arend from the Pinch of Yum team!

We hold these live Q&As every single month for our Food Blogger Pro members. Sometimes we focus on a specific topic (like this one), and other times it’s an excuse to pick Bjork’s brain on any blogging topic under the sun. It’s so fun to connect, answer our members’ toughest questions, and have an hour to intentionally work on getting a tiny bit better.

And in this Q&A, we focused on all the ways that food bloggers can make the most out of Q4!

Q4 is made up of the last three months of the year (October, November, and December), and it’s a big deal for food bloggers. Not only are people hungry for recipes, but advertising spending also goes up during these three months, and sponsors are looking for bloggers and content creators who can create seasonal content.

We hope that you enjoy this Q&A and that it leaves you feeling inspired and motivated as we get closer and closer to Q4.

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311: Finding Your Why – Creating Intentional Content as a Creative Outlet with Katie Olsen

An image of a compass and the title of Katie Olsen's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Finding Your Why.'

Welcome to episode 311 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Katie Olsen from Katiebird Bakes about how she has grown her blog by focusing on creating intentional content.

Katie is a full-time attorney and food blogger, and she’s here on the podcast today to talk about her blogging journey and philosophy when it comes to sharing content online.

She talks about how starting a blog is inherently vulnerable, why she likes balancing both her blog and her full-time job, and how she has shifted her content strategy over the years.

As her blog Katiebird Bakes has grown over time, Katie has found a sense of purpose and enjoyment in blogging as a creative outlet, and you’ll learn more about her mindset in this episode.

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306: Core Web Vitals – What Food Bloggers Need to Know About User Experience and Google with Andrew Wilder

An image of a laptop on a desk with code on the screen and the title of Andrew Wilder's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Core Web Vitals.'

Welcome to episode 306 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, we’re sharing part of our most recent member Q&A with Andrew Wilder from NerdPress where he talks about Core Web Vitals.

Google has already started using things like mobile friendliness, security, and intrusive popups to impact search rankings, and the big news on the block is that Core Web Vitals, a way to quantify user experience on a website, will impact rankings soon as well.

There are three signals that measure “good” user experience:

  • Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)
  • First input Delay (FID)
  • Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)

Google wants readers to have a good experience on the sites that are ranking in the first few spots in search results, and Core Web Vitals are one of the ways they’re tracking that.

If this all sounds confusing, don’t worry –– you’ve come to the right place! In this episode, we’re sharing part of our most recent member Q&A with our incredible WordPress and Site Speed Expert, Andrew Wilder, where he covered the ins and outs of page experience and Core Web Vitals.

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301: Less Work, More Traffic – A Free Workshop (+ 7 Ways to Strategically Use Google Search Console!)

An image of traffic and the title of Bjork Ostrom's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Less Work, More Traffic.'

Welcome to episode 301 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast!

We’re holding a FREE event next week on Tuesday, April 27 at 1pm ET / 12pm CT called Less Work, More Traffic. In this workshop, we’ll teach you how to think strategically about the content that’s already on your site in order to build your audience and get more traffic.

You can register for free here, and if you want a bit of a preview of what we’re going to share during the workshop, you’re in the right place!

In this episode of the podcast, Bjork talks about the event and then shares seven different ways you can use Google Search Console to optimize your site for search traffic.

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296: Web Stories – An Informal, Intentional Way to Engage Your Audience and Reach New People with Kingston Duffie

An image of a girl on her phone and the title of Kingston Duffie's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Web Stories.'

Welcome to episode 296 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Kingston Duffie from Slickstream about Google Web Stories.

Have you heard of Google Web Stories? Are you creating them for your content right now? Do you know how they work?

Slickstream’s Kingston Duffie is here on the podcast to talk about how creators can utilize them today! He’ll chat about his top tips for creating engaging Web Stories and getting the most value out of the Web Stories you create for your blog, as well as the ins and outs of how these Web Stories work within search results.

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294: Bake Offs – Producing a Different Kind of Recipe Content for a Food Blog with Erika Kwee

An image of baking utensils on a table and the title of Erika Kwee's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Bake Offs.'

Welcome to episode 294 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Alexa interviews Erika Kwee from The Pancake Princess about the Bake Off series on her blog.

Erika has a food blog, The Pancake Princess, but her most popular posts aren’t about recipes that she has developed herself.

Instead, her most popular posts are from her Bake Off series where she tries multiple recipes for the same food from around the internet and breaks them down by what makes them similar, what makes them different, and which are her and her taste testers’ favorites.

In today’s episode, we’re diving deep into Erika’s Bake Off posts and taking about how she produces this comprehensive and unique content for her blog.

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291: Going Live – How to Inspire Your Audience Through Live Events with Angel Marie

An image of a microphone and the title of Angel Marie's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Going Live.'

Welcome to episode 291 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Angel Marie about planning and hosting webinars.

Webinars or live events can be a great way to communicate with your audience, sell a product or service, or switch up the way you produce content online.

That said, presenting information to your audience in a live event may seem a bit overwhelming. There’s the marketing piece, the “getting ready to go live” piece, the actual presentation piece, and the post-event follow-up piece, and they all have to work together to effectively communicate your ideas and advice.

It can feel like… a lot. But there are ways you can streamline the process to help you teach and inspire your audience through these live events.

Angel, the Content Educator over at ConvertKit, is a pro at hosting and facilitating live events, and she’s here on the podcast to help you become more confident in presenting your ideas in a live setting. She’s an incredible communicator, presenter, and motivator, and her tips and ideas will help you overcome any doubts or uncertainties you have about going live in front of your audience.

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288: Email for Bloggers – Maximizing the Value of Your Email List with Allea Grummert

An image of a computer desk and the title of Allea Grummert's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Email for Bloggers.'

Welcome to episode 288 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Allea Grummert about marketing your blog to your email list.

How would you describe your email marketing strategy?

Solid? Not quite? Not even close?

Regardless of how much time and effort you’ve spent building and maintaining your email list, this interview with Allea Grummert from Duett will help you grow, refine, and nurture the email subscribers you have for your blog. She talks about welcome sequences, segmentation, opt-ins, and more –– enjoy!

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280: A New Recipe Experience – Getting Started with SideChef with Sandie Markle

An image of cup of coffee on a desk and the title of Sandie Markle's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'A New Recipe Experience.'

Welcome to episode 280 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Sandie Markle from SideChef about how their platform helps foodies and creators.

Let’s talk about SideChef, a platform that’s aimed at making the cooking experience easier. With a custom app, tailored cooking experiences, and dynamic recipe guidance, SideChef wants to make the whole cooking journey easier for its users.

Sandie Markle, SideChef’s Director of Content Partnerships, will share how SideChef helps their users with meal planning, grocery delivery, and smart kitchen connectivity, as well as how bloggers, content creators, and influencers can get involved with their Micro-Influencer Program.

It’s a really cool platform, and we’re excited to help you learn more about it in today’s episode!

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278: Lessons from a Veteran Food Blogger – How to Overcome a 60% Dip in Traffic with Carrie Forrest

An image of an office and the title of Carrie Forrest's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Lessons from a Veteran Food Blogger.'

Welcome to episode 278 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Carrie Forrest about some of the SEO enhancement she has made to her blog this year.

Do you know which of your posts are performing the best? Do you know which ones aren’t getting any search traffic?

That’s what Carrie is back on the podcast to talk about today!

Carrie has been blogging for over 10 years, and in that time, she has published a lot of content. But not all content performs equally.

As the result of an SEO audit after she experienced a large dip in traffic, Carrie decided to refresh and delete nearly 2/3 of the content on her site. Through that process of learning about the health of her site as a whole, Carrie now better understands how her content performs and how her content supports the mission of her blog.

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