Building Traffic and Growing Your Audience Podcasts

337: Shifting Your Mindset – Leaning into SEO and Learning from Industry Experts with Ali Stafford

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Dec 28, 2021 in ,
An image of smiley faces and the title of Ali Stafford's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Shifting Your Mindset.'

Welcome to episode 337 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Ali Stafford from Alexandra’s Kitchen about how she’s grown her traffic by leaning into SEO and learning from industry experts.

We’re really excited to be chatting with Ali from Alexandra’s Kitchen in today’s episode! She’s a seasoned food blogger who has been sharing her recipes online since 2006.

But over the past few years, she has been shifting her mindset to focus on growing her traffic and leveling up her content strategy. In this episode, you’ll hear what changes she’s been implementing to focus on SEO, how she has strategically worked with consultants to grow her business, and more.

Whether you just launched your blog or you’ve been blogging for years, we know you will have a lot of great takeaways from this episode. Enjoy!

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333: Serving Your Audience – How Emma Duckworth Doubled Her Pageviews by Focusing on SEO

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Nov 30, 2021 in ,
An image of a concert audience and the title of Emma Duckworth's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Serving Your Audience.'

Welcome to episode 333 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Emma Duckworth from Emma Duckworth Bakes about how she’s grown her blog by focusing on SEO.

SEO: love it or hate it, it’s undoubtedly an important area for food bloggers to focus their time and energy on. And that’s why we’re chatting about it with Emma Duckworth in this episode!

This year, Emma decided to double down on her blog and hired a mentor to help her out with SEO. You’ll hear how she used the avatar exercise to understand her audience, how she optimized her homepage and recipe categories, and what she’s doing to focus on SEO moving forward.

It’s a fantastic interview that will encourage you to reflect on your own SEO strategy. We hope you enjoy it!

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327: Understanding the Google Algorithm – Tracking Google Updates and Analyzing Traffic Drops with Casey Markee

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Oct 19, 2021 in , ,
An image of a person using Google Search Console on a laptop and the title of Casey Markee's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Understanding the Google Algorithm.'

Welcome to episode 327 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Casey Markee, our FBP SEO Expert, about understanding the Google algorithm.

We’re so excited to welcome Food Blogger Pro expert Casey Markee back to the podcast today!

As our resident SEO wizard, he has helped countless FBP members out by answering their toughest SEO questions over the years. And at his company Media Wyse, Casey handles site audits for algorithm and rank issues, spammy structured markup actions, unnatural link issues for food blogs, and more.

In this episode, he’s chatting with Bjork all about what food bloggers need to know about the Google algorithm. You’ll hear Casey’s insights on how to understand Google updates, how to effectively use Google Search Console, how to get the most out of your ads, and more.

If you’re looking to increase your traffic, or you’re just curious and want to learn more about the Google algorithm, we know you’ll enjoy this interview!

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325: Bilingual Blogging – How Alejandra Graf Shares Recipes on Her Blog in English and Spanish

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Oct 5, 2021 in ,
An image of flags from different countries and the title of Alejandra Graf's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Bilingual Blogging.'

Welcome to episode 325 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Alejandra Graf from BrownSugar&Vanilla about how she shares recipes on her blog in both English and Spanish.

We’re so excited to share this episode with Alejandra with you today! Her story is really fascinating, and the way that she shares content is a bit unique compared to other content creators.

After immigrating to the United States from Mexico, she launched her food blog, BrownSugar&Vanilla, where she shares family-friendly vegan recipes. But she also has another version of her site called Piloncillo&Vainilla where she shares all the same recipes — but in Spanish!

In this episode, you’ll learn how she uses a plugin to share content in both languages, how the traffic compares on the two versions of her blog, and more. It’s a really fascinating, inspiring interview that demonstrates the unique ways you can share content with different audiences.

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322: Going All In – How Sarah Cook Went From 17k to 600k Monthly Pageviews

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Sep 14, 2021 in ,
An image of poker chips and the title of Sarah Cook's episode on the Food Blogger Pro Podcast, 'Going All In.'

Welcome to episode 322 of The Food Blogger Pro Podcast! This week on the podcast, Bjork interviews Sarah Cook from Sustainable Cooks about what specific strategies she implemented to grow her blog’s traffic and increase her revenue.

A few years ago, Sarah Cook was feeling burnt out and ready to call it quits on her blog. But after listening to some food blogging podcasts, she decided to switch up her blogging strategy and see if she could turn it into a thriving business.

And today on the podcast, she’s sharing everything she’s done along the way to go from 17k to 600k monthly pageviews with her blog, Sustainable Cooks! She explains some of the unique ways she has invested in her blog, why she decided to delete hundreds of posts, why she loves having a blogging accountability partner, and more.

It’s a really inspiring interview, and we know it’ll leave you feeling motivated and excited to make progress on your blogging goals.

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

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Aug 17, 2021 in , ,
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

Leslie Jeon
by Leslie Jeon on Jun 29, 2021 in ,
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

Alexa @ FBP
by Alexa @ FBP on May 25, 2021 in ,
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!)

Alexa @ FBP
by Alexa @ FBP on Apr 20, 2021 in ,
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

Alexa @ FBP
by Alexa @ FBP on Mar 16, 2021 in ,
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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