How to Actually Grow Traffic to Your Food Blog

Starting a food blog can feel overwhelming. There’s no shortage of advice on how to grow traffic: be consistent, post great content, share on social media, improve your SEO… the list goes on. Even when you follow all the “rules,” you might find yourself asking:

Why isn’t my blog traffic growing faster?!

This post isn’t about the usual tips and tricks. Instead, it’s about shifting your mindset — from chasing traffic to understanding the why behind what drives it. When you see the internet through the right lens, things begin to click (pun intended). Let’s get right into it!

Traffic Starts With Links 🔗

When we think about blog traffic, we often think about numbers like pageviews, sessions, clicks. What exactly powers all of that?

Links.

Every single thing on the internet is powered by a link. Clicks come from links. Search engines rank pages based (in part) on links. Social media shares are, functionally, just links.

Want more traffic? You need more links to your blog. You may have heard this advice before:

• Commit to the long-term
• Create high-quality content
• Share your posts
• Take great photos
• Engage on social media
• Build an email list
• Practice good SEO

Phew. Did you catch all of that? All of this is helpful, but it’s even more useful when you understand how each tactic relates to links.

1. Commit to the Long-Term

One blog post equals one URL. Ten posts = ten links. One hundred posts = one hundred links.

If you’ve just started your blog, traffic might be slow simply because you don’t yet have enough linkable content. That’s totally normal and not something you have to stress about!

Think of your blog like a library. The more shelves you stock, the more chances people have to find (and link to) something they love. Of course, you don’t want to rush the process and churn out links for the sake of having more links out in the world. The key is to create valuable content, which leads us to our next point!

2. Create High-Quality Content

“Content is king” might be a cliché, but it’s so true, especially when we’re talking about links.

People tend to link to posts that are genuinely helpful, inspiring, or memorable. Think: the kind of recipe they’d bookmark, share on social, include in a roundup, or send to a friend. All of those actions? They’re links!

Check out all of the topics A Mindfull Mom’s Instant Pot Guide covers in one post — what a treasure trove of information! 🤩

When your content delivers real value, it earns links passively. Over time, that builds trust, authority, and yes, possibly traffic!

So before you think about SEO hacks or social strategies, ask yourself: Is this post worth linking to? Because good content spreads and when it does, your blog’s traffic will thank you for it!

Have you heard of Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines and how they can help you craft high-quality content?

Check out our blog post on the E-E-A-T principles here!

3. Share Your Content (and Let Others Share It, Too!)

This might sound obvious, but too many bloggers are hesitant to promote their own work — or let others share it. Big mistake.

When you share your post on social, that’s a link. When someone includes your post in a roundup, that’s a link. When your post is in an email newsletter? Yep, you guessed it.

If you allow people to use a snippet of your content with a link back (with proper attribution, of course!), it’s another way to expand your reach. Don’t underestimate the power of backlinks!

4. Grow Your Email List

Your email subscribers are your most engaged and loyal audience. Unlike social media followers, who are at the mercy of ever-changing algorithms, your email list is 100% yours. You control when and how you communicate with them, and you’re not competing with memes or viral dance trends in their inbox.

Each email you send contains at least one thing that matters most in your traffic strategy: a link.

Whether you’re sending out a weekly newsletter, promoting a new recipe, or sharing your favorite kitchen tools, you’re guiding your readers back to your site through direct, trackable, high-quality links. These clicks aren’t just numbers — they’re people who chose to hear from you and want to engage with your content.

So if you’re not already investing time in growing and nurturing your email list, now is the time to start. It’s one of the most direct and effective ways to increase meaningful traffic — link by link, reader by reader.

Ready to learn the fundamentals of email marketing?

Check out our Email Marketing 101 Course!

5. Practice Good SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) is often simplified down to just using the right keywords. And while keywords are important, they’re just one piece of a much bigger puzzle.

At the heart of SEO, especially in today’s landscape, is the powerful concept of trust and one of the clearest signals of trust to search engines like Google is backlinks — links from other websites pointing to your content.

You can write the most incredible vegan mac and cheese recipe on the internet, but if no one links to it, it may never rank on page one. Meanwhile, another post with more backlinks could dominate the search results, simply because other sites have vouched for it.

So how do you go about building backlinks?

• Create truly useful, unique, or shareable content
• Build relationships with other bloggers and collaborate on content
• Pitch your recipes for roundups or resource guides
• Write guest posts or do interviews
• Submit to curated food platforms or directories (e.g., Spillt)

SEO is so much more than schema and keywords; it’s about building a content ecosystem that others want to connect with through links.

A New Way to See the Internet as a Blogger

Most people see the surface of the internet: posts, images, videos, recipes. Beneath it all is a structure made almost entirely of links.

When you start thinking like a digital creator and not just a writer or photographer, you’ll see that traffic isn’t random. It’s built on a foundation of link pathways. Social shares, Google search results, newsletter links, and mentions from other bloggers are all links.

So the next time you’re working on a post, ask yourself:

• How link-worthy is this content?
• How can I encourage others to share or reference this post?
• Where else can I strategically build links?

Final thoughts: Focus on the System, Not Just the Surface

When you understand how the web works, you stop seeing traffic as a mysterious number and start seeing it as the result of intentional link-building. So yes, keep creating amazing content, engaging on social, and showing up consistently, but do it with this mindset:

Every smart move you make online should help build another path back to your blog.

That’s how traffic grows! Not just from a strong presence on social media or SEO-optimized content (all good things!), but from the systems that power the internet itself.

How has your thinking changed around traffic and link-building? What’s worked best for you in building up backlinks and growing your audience? Leave a comment or share your thoughts! We’d love to hear what’s working in today’s blogging world.