How Christina Leopold of Addicted to Dates Turned Content into Community and Hit 550K Followers

Disclaimer: This transcript was generated using AI.

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Ann Morrissey: Hello there, and welcome back to another episode of the Food Blogger Pro podcast. This week we’re joined by Christina Leopold, the powerhouse behind the food blog, Addicted to Dates, Christina’s journey from passion project to full-time hustle is packed with insights for anyone trying to grow their online gig while maintaining their sanity. We’ll talk about consistency, but more importantly, how to work smarter with your content so you don’t burn out. Christina also gets real about the nitty gritty — learning, SEO, monetizing her brand and stepping into her worth as a creator, plus leading into the magic of community and why connecting with fellow creators is one of the smartest moves you can make for your brand. So grab your favorite snack, settle in, and let’s get into it. Take it away, Bjork.

Bjork Ostrom: Christina, welcome to the podcast.

Christina Leopold: Thank you so much for having me, Bjork.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, I don’t know, was this, it might’ve been my audio, but I heard birds chirping in the background. Is that true for you? Yeah. Are there birds? Yeah, always. Is it like a window open birds or is it like birds in your house?

Christina Leopold: No, they’re all outside and all the windows are closed, but it’s,

Bjork Ostrom: It’s beautiful.

Christina Leopold: They’re always in the background of my videos as well, so

Bjork Ostrom: That’s quite relaxing.

Christina Leopold: So great.

Bjork Ostrom: I’ve been listening to this like lo-fi girl. Have you ever heard, do you know Lo-Fi Girl? Have you ever heard, it’s like a continual YouTube channel. It’s just always running and it’s Lofi music, but there’s a couple artists on there and they’ll have birds as a part of the background of their music, and I just find it just the best work music to listen to because it’s so calming and soothing. I love that. I love that. Where’s home for you? Where are you calling in from?

Christina Leopold: Well, I’m based in Spain now, but I’m originally Irish, but I’ve been living here for the last two years.

Bjork Ostrom: Okay, great. Because sure that people will hear your accent and they’ll wonder, where is Christina? Where is she calling in from? Living in Spain and born and raised in Ireland and creating content that is accessed around the world, which is what we’re going to talk about today. That’s my transition into talking about Instagram. So one of the things that we found on this podcast, it’s really common now, is people are creating an Instagram account. The great thing about, well, or TikTok, the great thing about these social platforms, really it’s Instagram and TikTok, is that they are so frictionless. It’s really easy to create an account and to start publishing content. It’s not as easy to get that content actually found, discovered to build a following to gain attention. But if you’re able to do that on these platforms, you have a little bit of a proof of concept that what you’re doing, there is a market there for that. So let’s start with Instagram. It sounds like in your career as a content creator, you started there and started posting content and started to gain a little bit of a following there. Tell us about how you initially built up your following on Instagram.

Christina Leopold: Yeah, so I started my Instagram account back in 2016, and originally I was kind of searching for a creative outlet and for a community because I had recently become vegan. So I was just casually sharing my meals and my breakfast on there and people were starting to respond to it and it built up to be nice community quite fast.

Bjork Ostrom: Can you talk about that? What were the little checkpoints along the way after you started? How long did it get to say get to 10,000 and then a hundred thousand? Do you remember those general markers?

Christina Leopold: Not particularly, but I think within the first year it had definitely reached the 50,000 mark and then it just snowballed every year from there. And I think the maybe three or four years, it was around the a hundred and 150,000 mark, and I don’t remember the exact points of each, but that was kind of the rough timeline.

Bjork Ostrom: So those first three, four years, you’re building it up. You get to this point where you have a hundred, 150,000 followers. Is there anything that you could point back to in that first chapter of those handful of years that was helpful for you to gain that initial following? Because I know that there are a lot of people who maybe feel like they’re in a content like hamster wheel, they’re producing content, they’re trying to grow a following, they’re not getting that following, but for you, and today, 550,000, over 550,000 followers, we’ll talk about that second chapter from 2020 to today, but for those who feel like they’re in that hamster wheel, you were able to escape out of that and get some kind of trajectory with growing a following. So what was that like and what could you point to that was helpful in those early years?

Christina Leopold: I think in a way it’s hard to compare how things are now with back then because Instagram and also so different social media was a completely different ballgame and it was, I’ll admit a lot easier to gain traction back then. But I did post every single day without fail for about four years, and I made it my mission to reply to almost every single comment as well. So I think that did happen a lot along the way. Maybe it wasn’t necessary and I wouldn’t recommend that in this day and age to do the same on Instagram because it’s changed so much.

Bjork Ostrom: So when you think of it changing, I’d be curious to know what’s different between then and now?

Christina Leopold: Well, yeah. For example, last December I just did a personal challenge to post every day for 25 days in a row, and my reach actually went down in comparison to the previous month. So I don’t think it’s the same as it was back then because it was almost like if you posted every day on Instagram back in 2018, 2019, you were going to reach more people, whereas now it’s not really going to turn into those results, not guaranteed anyway. So for me personally, I know some people have great success with posting every day and doing a 25-day series in the lead up to Christmas, but it wasn’t something that worked for me, and it actually worked for me better now to post less, still consistently, but at less frequency. So in that way it is completely different these days.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, that makes sense. I almost think of YouTube as example. There was a season, and there still is probably where you have people who are doing daily vlogs and people follow along, and that’s part of how they consume content is they have the vloggers that they follow, but really the massive channels are these channels that are producing infrequent but extremely compelling content. You think of Mark Rober, Robber, I don’t know. An example is he created this video that was, it’s a series, but a squirrel maze or something like that, but it’s like this thing that feels like it probably took months and months and months and he creates a 15 minute video out of it, whereas 10 years ago you might’ve had somebody who was building a really big following, doing a daily vlog, and it’s maybe not as edited or polished. There’s maybe not quite as much arc within the piece of content. And so it’s interesting how and super smart analysis for you to say almost we could talk about what I did four years ago, but it wouldn’t necessarily matter because it’s a completely different platform today what we’re working with is a different medium, it’s different algorithm, all of that is very different. So what’s been working for you today on Instagram and how are you approaching it?

Christina Leopold: Well, now it’s all about consistency, which I’m sure we hear a lot of, but it is truly just what works. Right now I’m posting between two to three times a week. I’m also repurposing content so I’m not putting too much pressure on myself because for me, it’s not realistic to have three new pieces of content a week as the person who is filming it all and writing the recipes and testing them. So that frequency is working well for me in maintaining kind a steady level of engagement reach and it’s sustainable for me as well. So it’s working out on all sides.

Bjork Ostrom: It’s really what it takes is how do you show up consistently and sustainably so you don’t get burnt out, and it’s so much better to do something that you can do for a year, two years, three years consistently than to have a sprint where you’re hustling like crazy for a month, but then you get burnt out and it’s not sustainable. One of the things you talked about was repurposing content. Can you talk about how you are doing that? Are you taking a piece of content you published two years ago and then publishing that again? Are you reedit it or remixing it in any way before you publish it? What does that look like?

Christina Leopold: Yeah, so to take the pressure off a bit, I’ve been reposting content. I’ll look at what has resonated with viewers in the past. I’ll look at the different analytics, the views, the followers, the engagement, and just see what the goal of the content is. It’s also very seasonal, so I’ll look back at this time last year and see what was resonating with people and then I’ll usually switch it up sometimes just very minor edits. I might just change the opening scene, add in a few more clips that I hadn’t originally posted or take some out. I might add a voiceover if I hadn’t done one initially or vice versa, I might just have a different style of caption or add captions, close captions and some text on the video. And mostly I’ll just go back to the content that I know has performed well in the past and try and really maximize what I can out of that.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, one of the great things that we have as creators in the recipe world is we’re not producing news, we’re not reviewing new tech. It’s the equivalent of these in the music world, it’s a song and you have these great songs and there is no downside with revisiting some of those if they are your hits. And I think sometimes we get skittish about going back to something and revisiting it, but there are number one billions of people who haven’t seen it. And number two, even for those who have seen it, I don’t think that there’s necessarily a downside with seeing something twice or three times. You think about how many times we have repeat exposure to content in other parts of our lives. I think of TV commercials as an example. If you’re watching a sports, a basketball game, there’ll be the same commercial maybe 10 times if you watch the entire game potentially. Not that you want to just create content or republish content ad nauseum, but to take the pressure off a little bit of revisiting a piece of content, republishing that into your point, allowing you to approach your content sustainably. So republishing content posting consistently is really important. Are you still engaging with people in the same way that you did before or what does that look like in terms of one-to-one type communication?

Christina Leopold: Yeah, I’m not replying to every comments anymore. Well, I try to, but it’s not the pressure that I used to put on myself in that sense. But I’ll always chat to people through direct messages and build rapport and community that way, but I’m not going to block off three or four hours in the day to sit there replying to comments because it’s not, again, it comes back to the sustainability factor. I don’t feel like that’s a good use of time. And if I see comments that come up that are asking questions, I try to answer and just try to prioritize time so I’m not spending too much time on social media outside of what I’m posting on there.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, that’s great. And there’s that balance between you have this community, you have these people who are part of the community, you want to engage with those people, but also time is the most valuable thing that we have and as much as possible, if you can be creating something that reaches one to many multiple people as opposed to one-to-one your time, potentially not always is better used as you can reach a greater audience. Talk about when you started to think about transitioning this into a business, because I know it’s at the point where my guess is that it’s your full-time job you shared in as we do kind of intro conversations and notes back and forth, that it’s 400,000 page views from your site, which we’re going to talk about making 10,000 a month. And so you have this consistent income, you have these consistent page views, but it started as kind of a hobby it sounds like, and then grew into this thing where you’re like, wait a minute, this is a really valuable thing that I’ve built. And then you’re able to then connect with people not just in a hobby fashion, but you’re able to connect with people and create a business out of it. So talk about what that transition was like and when did you start to think about it as a business?

Christina Leopold: Well, I was still working part-time in the background until 2020, and that’s when I decided to go. I quickly realized at that point I was relying fully on brand partnerships as an income source and that wasn’t going to be a sustainable business model. And it was actually around the same time that I started listening to this podcast And other podcasts as well, and I signed up to the community and I started to think, okay, there’s this whole other side to this industry that I know nothing about. I know that people have recipe blogs. I have one myself, which I didn’t know what I was doing with to be honest, but that was a real turning point in me realizing that there’s this whole other industry that I need to put the effort in to learn about. At that point, I had, my website was on Wix, which wasn’t optimized for SEO, so I had to switch that over to WordPress and sort of start from scratch. And the next few years was just building a foundation, learning, implementing what I’d learned, and it was around 2021 or 22 that I qualified for an ad network, and it wasn’t a huge income stream at the time, but it was helping to pay for some of the costs of running the website. And after that, I just kept trying to implement everything I was learning along the way. I had a website audit with Casey in 2022, and that was another turning point where I started to really get into the details and build a consistent workflow. And that was sort of when I saw the traffic starting to slowly build and taking a step back then looking at it at the end of every year, I was able to see that it was actually growing and the little things that I was learning and putting into place were starting to show at the end of every year when I sat down and analyzed everything.

Bjork Ostrom: And you’d mentioned three years of 70% growth, which is incredible. It’s easier to do when it’s smaller in those early stages, but then it gets a little bit harder to have that 70% growth when it’s hundreds of thousands instead of tens of thousands of page views. And my guess is now that’s a significant source of income for the business. Before we start talking about that, how you approach the different elements of business income, talk to me about, you talked about a system and a process, a workflow for creating content for your website. Can you talk about what’s been most helpful in that process, the things that you learned that you implemented as a process or procedure? Because it really is the hundred little things that we do over time repeatedly that start to add up the best practices along the way that result in that double digit percentage growth. But in order to do those consistently, we have to have it be part of our workflow. We have to have it be part of a process or a system. So what did you learn in those initial years that set you up for success with your site specifically?

Christina Leopold: Yeah, just from I guess the mindset side of it. As food bloggers, there’s so many different jobs that we have to do and it can be quite overwhelming, but doing those little things every day, even though we hear it all the time and it can feel quite mundane when you’re in the moment of doing things like keyword research, updating old posts, engaging with your community, listening to podcasts, taking courses, checking your analytics, working on your email list, they all feel like little things that you can question, is this actually worth my time? But those snowball over time and they’re what make your business something that’s sustainable. I also think the consistency side of it, for me, what really helped was trying not to focus on virality, but more on consistency. Because for me, being able to show up every week with consistent and reliable recipes that help people, that doesn’t mean that I’m able to create five new recipes every week. It means that I can commit to maybe six or eight recipes a month, but really focus on detailed recipe testing, taking the time to film them, photograph them, and just being really happy with them besides having the pressure of constantly putting out content like I was for the first few years. I also think that when it is a possibility, even if it’s just the smaller things, hiring out when possible, that’s really helpful because for example, my technical web development, that was a very early thing that I hired out because Tech completely overwhelms me and I could spend probably months trying to learn something, whereas somebody who already knows what they’re doing can take that off the table for me. And I think it’s important as well to try what works for you. So I tried working with writers with a VA and just kind of tested to see what help I was hiring was actually giving me back the time that I was able to do what was most productive and enjoyable. And now my partner works with me, so he does a lot of the side of things that kind of don’t make me feel as creative so I can focus on the creative side of things and that really helps to free up the bottlenecks in the business so that I can really commit to that consistent schedule.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, that’s great. Dan Martell has this book called Buy Back Your Time, and the premise is that as business owners, if our desire and our goal is to grow and scale, potentially create more income, one of the things we need to be really smart about is understanding how we’re using our time and seeing the places. Not only that we are least excited to spend our time on, but also the least valuable for us to do. And for all of us, we probably have things that are very low value and unenjoyable and those would be the things very quickly that we can look to someone else and say, Hey, what would it be like for you to come in and help do this thing? And a lot of times there are people always, I’d say there are people who love to do the thing that you don’t want to do or that you don’t isn’t the best use of your time. So I know you had mentioned some other intentional decisions that you’ve made around working smarter and even just kind of productivity hacks that you’ve used as you’ve continued to scale and grow your business. Is there anything else that you’d point to for other creators that has been helpful for you as you’ve been intentional with your time?

Christina Leopold: Definitely. So for me, in the vegan desserts and baking niche, what I’ve done is created categories for different elements of a recipe. So instead of hosting a cake with a lemon curd filling and a cream cheese frosting and a meringue topping, I’m going to treat those all as individual recipe posts. So in a sense then I’m almost creating four or five recipes with the one piece of content, but I’m able to dig deeper into those topics without creating a really long-winded post. And it also gives the reader the freedom then to say, well, I’m not going to make all of those elements, but maybe I can pick and choose around the website. So that’s really helped me to use my time a bit smarter with creating the different elements, making one recipe into several. And what helped me as well is just treating work almost like a clock in job, which doesn’t mean that you clock out at an exact time, but it’s more the mindset of having the discipline that when you’re during your work hours, you’re your work hours. I’m trying not to organize personal appointments and also within the workspace, having a dedicated area for filming instead of setting everything up and tearing it down every day. And I know that is a luxury, and at the beginning it’s not always possible, but when I was able to transition and move things for work and separate them from my personal space, it just really helped me to be more productive. I think I was almost able to create double the amount of content just by having that separation.

Bjork Ostrom: Well, to go back to that idea of buy back your time, part of what you’re doing in that is you’re saying, okay, how much time does it take for me to set everything up in order for me to do a shoot? And it’s going to be different for everybody, but it might be half an hour, it might be an hour, and let’s say you’re shooting three times a week, maybe you’re shooting every day, who knows what it is that’s 3, 4, 5 hours of setup and tear down time that you’re gaining back by creating that space that is permanently set up. And so for anybody doing that, as you think about it from a cost perspective, you could say, okay, what is my time worth? Maybe it’s worth $50 an hour or a hundred dollars an hour or $25 an hour. It’s going to be different for every creator and where they are at their journey. But you can look at that and say, what would it be like to get an apartment with two bedrooms if I only need one, one’s an actual bedroom, and then one is like a shoot space, okay, that’s going to cost an extra $400 a month. Well that’s a hundred dollars a week, I’m actually saving some money because there’s not going to be as much time that I’m using to set that up. So all of those little incremental things add up over time. It’s like the conversation around the blog and the website where it’s a hundred little things that you’re saving time on, you’re being more efficient on that result in you being able to produce more seamlessly with not as much effort, not as much lift, which is really great. Can you talk about the lay of the land within your business right now? So you have your Instagram following, you’re producing social content, you have your blog. How does that all play out in terms of where the most important revenue sources are from you? My guess is website is at the top, but anything else that you would point to in terms of the diversification within the revenue sources for your business?

Christina Leopold: So the website would be about 50% of the revenue at this stage with social media sponsorships, that would be about 30%. And then I also do freelance client work creating recipes and videos for businesses, which would be the other 20%. But I also see Instagram not just from the revenue side, it’s almost like where you’re building your brand and your community and you’re also putting yourself in front of the eyes of potential brands as well. So I think there’s a lot of value that’s untangible there to be said as well.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, it’s not as direct, but I think probably a lot of the growth of your website traffic has come from having a strong Instagram following. And I know a lot of people who only had a site, not even necessarily in the food space, they were just really good at SEO, but they didn’t have any support from a brand perspective, from social media or newsletter or whatever it might be. And they’ve really been impacted over the last few years because they haven’t had those other mechanisms supporting the site. And so I think people who have a strong social following have an advantage over those who don’t. Even when it comes to search on your site, like SEO, can you talk about the deals that you were getting? So you have these brand deals, you’re getting partnerships, somebody’s coming to you and saying, Hey, we would love to work with you. Are those inbound? Are those people coming to you? Are you working with an agency? What would your advice be for people who are interested in doing more brand deals? And what have you learned along the way with that?

Christina Leopold: At this stage, it is inbound. During the first few years when I was building up the website and I was doing this, I did a bit of outreach. I had a really good VA who was very good at reaching out at brands. And what I did find just through her efforts was that these outreach requests to brands weren’t necessarily immediate, but you are kind of just putting yourself in front of them for when they do have opportunities. And just to keep in mind as well that one of my biggest partners now is a result of her outreach, which happened about a year later, and it was only for the fact that she had built up a good rapport with them and we got to know the person in charge at the brand. So I think that’s something to keep in mind, but I always think it’s good to try and focus on long-term partnerships rather than just working with a ton of clients. And that’s what I try to do. I try to really look at brands that align with my values and the brand’s values and just try and build relationships with them that are longer term rather than just working with a brand once here and there. And I think on both sides, for the creator from our side of view, that’s a more consistent income. It means you have less figuring out how you can work together, but also for the brand because I think our job is to be consistent with brands and show people genuine relationships, and I think that works out better for them in the long run as well.

Bjork Ostrom: Can you talk about how you do that? So I think people love the idea of you have a brand, it feels aligned for you, feels aligned for them, and that turns into a long-term partnership. You’re not having to do as much of the one-off negotiation contract review type stuff, which is such a drag for people. How have you found success maintaining these long-term partnerships?

Christina Leopold: So I think when possible, if you can get on a call and chat to the person and build a rapport and just get to know them on a personal level as well, then I think they’re going to look at you more as the human behind the brand and not just another creator that they can replace. But I also think that making it more attractive for brands to work together long term. So if I’m working with somebody longer term, I’m always going to honor them with a better rate rather than if we were working together just as a one-off, because again, it is does mean there’s less figuring out. So I will always make that more attractive for them as well by doing more than they ask for throwing in an extra set of stories or giving a percentage off the price. And maybe that’s not always necessary, but that’s something that has personally worked for me just with the longer term partnerships that I have.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, it’s like you want to create that incentive. And then there’s the other piece of just being a good partner, responding on time, showing up. When you say you’re going to show up, delivering the content, when you say you’re going to deliver it, are there any tools that you use that make that easier? I’m always interested in hearing about, we have or my friend Bruno has a tool called InfluenceKit that we use that helps us send over reports. I know other people use Notion to keep track of contacts and things like that. Anything that you could point to that’s like a tool or a software or resource that’s made some of the brand partnership stuff easy for you or even like a resource, like a person or a service on that side of it?

Christina Leopold: I’m pretty old school. It’s all mainly through email, through email and through calls and even through WhatsApp. Yeah, there are certain platforms that I have worked with brands on before, but not consistently. The longer term partnerships are always more on a personal level and we communicate through email and WhatsApp in my experience anyway.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, sounds like a pretty organic connection, which is maybe one of the benefits. It’s not transactional, it’s like somebody you would shoot a quick email off to. Yeah. Cool. That’s great. How about as you look ahead, so you’ve been producing content since 2016, went full-time in 2020, you’ve been doing this now for five years. They talk about the percentage of businesses, small businesses that make it to five years and it’s a very small amount. So you’re in a small percentage of business owners who have not only a successful business, but a business that’s been around for five plus years. When you look ahead, so if today we’re in 2025 kind of mid-year, as you look ahead, what are the things that you are thinking about as a content creator that you’re trying to move into or evolve into in order to stay ahead of the curve or even with the curve as a content creator?

Christina Leopold: Well, I think at the moment my main focus is on the website and Instagram and I am on other platforms, but I’m definitely not as consistent or I don’t have a huge strategy around other platforms. So at the moment I’m just trying not to spread myself too thinly across too many platforms or areas. But I mean, ideally in the future I would be working with a bigger team and be able to look at expanding more into areas like video, YouTube, maybe having a bit more detailed strategy for other social media platforms like TikTok. But yeah, maybe there’s an opportunity for community. But right now I’m just happy doing what I do and if we can continue to grow and bring on a bigger team and look at different areas, I’m very happy with that. And yeah, just I think something that’s super important as well that I didn’t mention before was your community not only online but offline as well, and having peers that are in the same industry that you can share ideas with, that you can talk through problems with, that you can vent with a little bit. I think that’s super important as well, just to stay because it can be quite an isolating job. A lot of us work in our homes, we don’t get to talk to a lot of people in person every day. So I think it’s important to have a community of like-minded people doing the same thing so that you can really just drive each other, learn from each other’s mistakes rather than trying to figure everything out and just grow together as a community rather than just thinking, this is me, what am I doing? It’s more like looking at what are we doing and how can we help each other?

Bjork Ostrom: That’s great. It’s one of the things we do within the Food Blogger Pro membership is we have these things called Coaching Calls where I jump on with a member and we have a call anywhere from an hour to two hours talking through the top three problems that they have, things that they’re thinking about. And I was looking at, I have a couple of these coming up, I was looking at one of ’em and one of the questions that they had was, how do I find a mastermind group? How do I find a group to be a part of peers that essentially is exactly what you were talking about. So for that person, what would your advice be? How did you find that group of peers, creators that you could connect with? Because I think a lot of us want that and also we know that it’s beneficial because when we get together, naturally what’s happening is we’re sharing, here’s this thing that worked, here’s this problem that I have. Do you have any ideas? It’s just kind of human nature to do that when we’re with a group of people who are doing a similar thing to talk about what that thing is and to try and get better at it. But how did you actually form that group or become part of that group?

Christina Leopold: I think the underlying thing is to just look at approach other creators as if your, you are helping them. So share their work, support them without expecting anything in return. But those are kind of the relationships that have turned out to be the closest for me. Maybe we sent each other something and somebody sent me a cookbook and I shared it, or I asked somebody a question and we built up a rapport. It’s try not to be afraid to ask for the help. If you see somebody who is doing something that you are looking to do, just reach out to them and ask them the worst thing that can happen. Maybe you don’t hear back, maybe they, but at the end of the day, most people are very generous with their time and they’re in the same boat, they’re in the same industry, and I find that most people are willing to share that information. So just be willing to give the information, but also don’t be afraid to reach out to people. And those are the relationships that have become very close for me.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, that’s great. I was having a podcast interview with Brita from Food with Feeling. She’s an expert within the Food Blogger Pro community, knows video really well. She was talking about some of the things that’s worked really well for her with Instagram growth, and she talked about Facebook as well, and she quadrupled her Facebook following and she talked about the learnings that she had from somebody that she connected with was one of the biggest unlocks for her. And I think we can read articles, we can watch YouTube videos, we can even listen to podcasts, which I would encourage everybody to continue to do, but sometimes for whatever reason, having that conversation with a person just makes it more real, makes it more tangible and easier to understand then a digital one way conversation where we’re consuming information. So I would encourage anybody who’s listening to think about that, who could your group be? Who could your tribe be? The times that I’ve found most successful in my life where I’ve done that have been when I reach out to those people where I say, Hey, some fellow business owners, we have online businesses and we all live in Minnesota, would you guys be interested in getting lunch every couple months? And this was years ago, but everybody’s like, yeah, we’d love to do that. And it was super helpful and really insightful to get together with these fellow business owners and just talk shop a little bit. So I think that’s a huge takeaway and something that we should all be thinking about. Who are those people that we’re creating with and that are a part of our tribe. If you were to go back, this is one of the questions that we like to ask to round out an interview. If you were to go back and sit down with yourself in 2020 when you were starting to make that transition into working on this as your full-time business, knowing what you know now, what would’ve been the conversation that you would’ve had with yourself and the advice that you would’ve given yourself?

Christina Leopold: Okay, there would be a lot, but first I would say it’s okay if you don’t really know what you’re doing, if you’re enjoying what it is you do. As I was just looking back over my Instagram timeline to try and prepare for this, I came across one of my captions and it said, I don’t know where the road will lead to, but I know it’s going the right direction. So it’s like if you’re truly passionate about something and there’s a purpose behind what you’re doing and you don’t give up, you are going to find your way. You’re naturally going to seek the information that’s going to move things forward for you. And just don’t be so hard on yourself if you don’t think you haven’t got it figured out all at the start because nobody does. And yeah, just keep going with it and don’t give up.

Bjork Ostrom: That’s great. Christina, is there anything else that you feel like we didn’t cover that you’d be interested in talking through?

Christina Leopold: Just one thing that’s interesting, and I know it’s come up a few times in other interviews, but I think also if you’re feeling frustrated with a particular side of a social media platform, just don’t be afraid to try different things. Like for example, recently I’ve been testing, filming with my phone, and that has just taken a little bit of the pressure off. So instead of refilming a new video for TikTok, for example, when I’m finished with the final video, I’m just going to move over to a window with nice lighting, take a few clips with my phone and post those onto different channels. And sometimes they will get more traffic than on platforms where I have a bigger following. And the same goes, for example, Instagram stories. I know a lot of people are using tools like ManyChat. I’m using Grocers List, which is super helpful. So you can send links to people directly there. And because I think sometimes people don’t want to comment publicly on a post to get a link, so you’re actually getting this influx of different people to your stories. And for me, sometimes they’ll reach more people than a reel or a post. So don’t be afraid to try different things and experiment and not be so pressured to have everything perfect to try different things.

Bjork Ostrom: I love that. And there are things that we as creators, that you as creators for anybody listening that you could come up with that would be successful, that would be impactful that other people haven’t done before. And I think we need to remind ourselves of that, that there are these things that are new and creative that don’t have to be a remix of something that somebody else has already done. There’s opportunities for you to discover something that works really well that’s never been done before, and to be creative and to be kind of light on your feet as a creator and to not feel bogged down by just doing a similar thing to what you’ve seen other people do. This is a little bit of a spoiler. We have an upcoming series with Grocers List, which we’re really excited about just talking about how that works. We’re using it with Pinch of Yum as well. Can you talk about what’s been most helpful for you with that tool specifically and how you’ve been using it?

Christina Leopold: Yeah, so for me it’s been really helpful with sharing links to people and also for building an email list. So I think in the last month or two, I’ve grown around 5,000 subscribers on the email list, which has normally been quite slow. So it’s definitely helpful and I think people really do appreciate having the convenience of having the link in their inbox as well. Yeah, I really like it. I find it super easy to use because I was on a different platform before and had to set up each post manually, whereas now I just have my keywords, I add the link to the recipe to the post, and it’s automatically going to send that link to anybody who wants it. So that’s definitely been a huge time saver.

Bjork Ostrom: That’s great. Love that and excited about the series that we have coming up with them. So a little bit of a foreshadow we have. Christina, this has been great. If people want to follow along with you online, can you talk a little bit about where to connect with you?

Christina Leopold: Yeah, my handle is addictedtodates across everywhere. Email is [email protected] if anybody wants to reach out. And I’m quite active on Instagram as well. So those are probably the two best ways to find me.

Bjork Ostrom: Awesome. Christina, thanks so much for coming on the podcast. Really appreciate it.

Christina Leopold: Thanks so much, Bjork. It’s been a pleasure.

Emily Walker: Hello, Emily here from the Food Blogger Pro team. I wanted to pop in today and thank you for tuning into this episode of the Food Blogger Pro podcast. We are so grateful for you for listening. Before we sign off, I wanted to talk a little bit about the Food Blogger Pro Forum. In case you didn’t know how it works, if you are a Food Blogger Pro member, you get access to our amazing forum. It’s one of my favorite places on Food Blogger Pro. I spend a lot of time there myself. And on the forum, we have tons of different topics for you to explore. We have a building traffic section, a photography section. We have an essential tools section. We chat about generating income and essential plugins, all sorts of areas for you to ask questions and chat with your fellow Food Blogger Pro members. It’s a great place to connect with fellow members, troubleshoot any issues you’re having, and brainstorm together. Our industry experts are always popping into the forum to help members with their questions. Casey Markee and Andrew Wilder always popping in and so is Danielle Liss our legal expert. It’s a really great place to get access to these experts and have them help you with your concerns. The forum is also just a fantastic place to find a community in this food blogging space as you’re working to grow your site and your business. If you’re ready to join Food Blogger Pro and get access to our wonderful forum, head to foodbloggerpro.com/join to learn more about our membership. We really hope you enjoy this episode and can’t wait to see you next week for another great episode. Have an amazing week.