Why Jeanelle Castro Thinks YouTube Is the Most Powerful Social Platform for Food Creators

Disclaimer: this transcript was generated using AI.

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Bjork Ostrom: Jeanelle, welcome to the podcast.

Jeanelle Castro: Thanks for having me. It’s so crazy to be on this side because I’ve been listening to you guys forever.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, well, that’s super fun. We’ve been doing this long enough that we’ve had people like yourself who you can come along and say, Hey, I’ve been listening to this forever, but you also have now a career as a creator. It’s not like you’re new to this. this goes back almost like 10 years. Did you start around 2016 as a creator? And at that moment when you started, did you know you wanted to pursue doing this full time or was it more of an experiment and you were just kind of posting videos for fun?

Jeanelle Castro: it was so there’s always that hope, right, for me when I first posted. I was posting when I was still working my nine to five. and it’s it was like a really good place, but I’ve always, always wanted to be an entrepreneur of some sort. And, you know, talking through it with my friends, with coaches, I realized that the one thing I really loved to do is make videos. So back in 2016, I started posting YouTube videos because I had seen another food creator do it and I was never like I was never a social media consumer. Even the people around me were. I was like, I it’s not for me. But when I saw the food video, it was Emmy Maid, I saw her snack videos, I was like, hey, this is kind of fun. Let me see if I could do something similar. And so I uploaded my first video. It was really difficult. And I was like, let me just not do that. Then I ended up coming back to it because it’s just been like in the back of my head. And I knew that eventually

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. It’s like an idea you couldn’t shake.

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah, exactly. And eventually I knew that I I wasn’t going to work in a corporate job forever. It just wasn’t gonna be for me. So I try to do more videos. It’s really difficult doing long form because back then it was all long long form. There was no TikTok, no Instagram reels, no YouTube shorts. And so I would try to do this just like week by week. nothing was really happening. I gave up at one point and

Bjork Ostrom: What how far how long into it after doing it each week with your nine to five job did you have this point where you kind of were like, This isn’t worth it?

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah, I’m like, forget this. I would say like in the beginning it was a little more sporadic. So back twenty sixteen. Twenty sixteen is when I started my channel, but it wasn’t very consistent. Maybe I did it for like a year, twenty seventeen ish. maybe a year. Or maybe not. You know what? There’s another story after this where I’m like, This is why I started tracking it because it just felt so long. It was such a slog and

Bjork Ostrom: What do you mean started tracking it?

Jeanelle Castro: That’s how my career in content creation ended up taking off is because I finally started tracking to see how many videos I actually did. Because the first ones they were just like like I said, it was kind of a slog and eventually I gave up. And then I got an email saying that my video it was how to do a bootle fight, you know, like the Kamayan feast, the Filipino, kind of like a banquet with banana leaves and everyone eats their hands. Started taking off. Yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And we we lived in the we were talking about this before, we lived in the Philippines, so I can visualize that when you’re talking about it. Yeah.

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah. I yeah, so like that video started gaining subscribers and I was like, wait, okay, maybe this is a sign, let me go back, let me try this again. Still nothing. Like it just wasn’t doing very well. And then COVID hit, YouTube Shorts came along and I have a friend, Lisa Wynn. She’s an amazing friend, amazing person. She is the one that told me to start posting on YouTube Shorts. And she said, you know, just post three a day. Three videos a day. And at this point I had been just trying the video thing, picking up contracting jobs, you know, doing marketing and stuff like that. And I’ll Yeah. yeah. Yeah. Yes.

Bjork Ostrom: So you you had left your corporate job at this point and you were kind of doing freelance here and there and then working as a creator, trying to get things to catch. Yeah.

Jeanelle Castro: Yes, I’m like I’ve got that personality where I like have to quit cold turkey. Otherwise I know the temptation will always be there to just kind of fall back on my job. So I was like, let me be crazy. Let me just make this kind of difficult for myself and not do the job and just pick up it was so stressful, but eventually it worked out. I started it was kind of like my

Bjork Ostrom: Yep. Burn the bridges.

Jeanelle Castro: I was kind of cornered, like my back was to the wall and I was like, Okay, well, if she tells me posting three a day is gonna help, let me just do it. And so that’s where the tracker came along because let me tell you, after just like three days of looking up that tracker, I had like a physical tracker, like a paper tracker, and I would highlight how many I made. It was like three or four days. I looked up and I was like, my god, it’s only been through four days.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, I’m exhausted.

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah. So if you asked me the question how long were you doing it for, if I hadn’t been tracking it, I’d be like, I’ve been doing it for weeks. But it was literally three days. And so I think at like two, like two and a half month mark of doing that, it my channel started taking off. Like it was crazy. And the payout for shorts back then was like really, really good. and so that Yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Do you mean like the actual monetization from YouTube, the payout?

Jeanelle Castro: The AdSense. So I was like, wow, okay, well, here’s a career because the dashboard was showing me. And and so I think that’s where it started and just staying consistent has helped bring upon more opportunities. Even if the AdSense for shorts isn’t as good as it was in the beginning, I would say it’s brought so many opportunities. Just like being known in the space, you know, brand deals come along. it helps when I post a blog post on our website, people funnel in from YouTube Shorts and go there. So it’s been very, very rewarding.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. It sounds like there is this period, twenty sixteen to twenty twenty, where you were trying to figure it out. Like how how often do I post? What do I post? It was a little bit sporadic. You knew you wanted to do it. And one of the things I love in a story is finding that like inflection point. And there’s all different versions of it. Oftentimes it’s a conversation. Like I can think of a handful of examples where some friends sat down with some other friends and they showed them how to use like an SEO tool. And suddenly it like it was a one-hour conversation that maybe resulted in like hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars that they earned because it just opened this door that suddenly they were able to just really get after it. And it was like, okay, awesome. think of another example of a friend, different world. He’s not a creator, but he was sitting next to somebody on a plane and he was a speaker trainer, and she talked about how the difference between charging per session, like $2,000 per session, versus per seat. And she said, almost everybody else charges per seat. And so instead of thirty people and, you know, getting two thousand dollars for a speaker fee or whatever or training fee, you get sixty thousand because you charge per seat. And that changed his life in terms of how he approach business. But it sounds like for you that inflection point was this conversation, was it with Lisa that you said? And her saying, hey, it’s at this stage for what you’re doing, it’s around volume and and you’re kind of at this point where you’re like, okay, I’ll try anything. If you say volume, I’ll try volume. I’ll try posting three pieces of content a day. You did it for two and a half months. And my guess is there was multiple different things. You had been in the lab for four years as a video creator figuring things out. So there’s that component. You had been training. It’s kind of like learning an instrument or learning skill, like you’d been doing a version of that for four years. COVID, I think there is some version of that timing, would be interested in your thoughts on that for a lot of creators. The shorts, like short form video being at the right time, but also just like the work. Like you put in the work, you had developed skills, you had probably learned a lot. And so all of those things, it sounds like hit an inflection point. That suddenly paid off. And I think the reason that I say that, I want to hear your reflections on if you feel like that’s true or push back if there’s anything you don’t feel like is true. The reason I say that is because I think for a lot of people listening, they’re maybe in that similar stage of grinding a little bit, trying to figure it out. It feels like you’re kind of floating and you don’t know where you’re going. And so much of it is continuing to show up, continuing to try new things, listen to advice, try that advice. What are your reflections on that? What feels true in that? Things you’d add and maybe things you’d push back on.

Jeanelle Castro: For sure. I mean, I feel like you hit all the points because I’m glad I didn’t have to like say it for myself because it’s exactly how it is. Like and it’s all like all the cliches that you hear about, right? You know, pi you know, just don’t give up, do this, do that, and then try everything you can because it really is a max a a mix of luck and just skill like you honing your skill because imagine if I had started there were a few people that we had also talked to that had not done video as much as we had and of course they try to do three a day. It’s just a mixture of all these other things. Like first of all they didn’t have the grit or the determination to do it because why should they right? They hadn’t been trying for this long. The other thing was they just weren’t as versed in video and like creating videos for other people. It was always about like what they wanted to make for themselves. And it’s just all these things come together, and like it’s as corny as it sounds, when your time comes, it comes.

you just really have to put yourself out there. Again, it I don’t think I would have had these conversations if I didn’t try all these different things and just put myself out there. And it’s funny that you say you feel kind of lost, like floating around. That’s how I felt. I was listening to, you know, all these including the Food Blogger Pro podcast. I was just like taking in all this information, most importantly put it into action, I would say, because do I don’t want to look at my first video? You guys can look at my first videos, but I’m not looking at those first shorts because it is so hard to watch. But just the fact that I was making three a day, I got it was kind of like a shortcut. You’re kind of speeding your way through to figure out what works and what doesn’t. Yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: It yeah. It you’re compri i I’ve heard this idea that like for startups, when you have a startup and you’re working on a startup, you’re comp I I talked about this w with friends who built a wedding venue and it felt like, you know, they have kids and they were working like fifty, sixty hours a week and like trying to like make it all work. And what I was talking about to them and they’re like, that really resonates with me. And I’ve heard other people talk about is this idea that when you’re working on a startup, you’re compressing your work career into like seven to eight years. And I think what I hear you saying is that when you are posting three times a day, it’s not like that’s some algorithm hack that then allows you to grow faster. It might help, but it the the number purely doesn’t make a difference. But what does make a difference is that you’re compressing the feedback loop. in order to better understand what works and what doesn’t work. Similarly, on the extreme end, if you only posted once a month, that feedback loop would be much longer and you wouldn’t be able to understand as quickly what works and what doesn’t work. So when you started posting more frequently, you’re keeping track of that. My guess is you also then were able to see, hey, this one did really well. This piece of content did really well to sit with it and say, like, could I reproduce whatever that was? to try and do it again and let’s see if that works again. it did. What if I remix that and then have it with a different type of food or a different type of travel? Is that what was happening in that period?

Jeanelle Castro: Yes, absolutely. it’s honestly insane. Like I don’t realize how much information about this I know until I talk to just an ordinary person or maybe another creator who’s just starting out. Like for me it’s so obvious, but it’s because I like how you said that. You’re compressing the feedback loop because that’s exactly what it is. Because otherwise it would take you so much longer. And you know, basically it’s like I had I gave myself no other option. I was like, please, this has to work as I really don’t want to do anything else. I keep coming back to this video thing. It’s been years, like, you know what I mean? I’m like, clearly this is what I wanna do. So for me it was a lot of people say, you know, you kinda have to sacrifice, but for me at this point, I was like, There it’s all or nothing. I’ve done everything else and I’m good. Like this is what I really want to do. And I think for whoever’s listening, once you find that and you’re done kind of like, you know, stepping in with one foot and not the other, I think things move really fast for you. But it’s just Yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. You make your mind up and this is what you’re gonna do and that’s the direction you’re going. and I do think that there’s something really hard about being in the middle ground where you’re kind of dabbling, because of like you said, there’s that you’re kind of extending that feedback loop. similarly I think, you know, sometimes people will reach out to us and they’ll say, like, man, you know, it’s like I feel like I’m not making a lot of progress. And this I’m thinking more so maybe this was a while back when Lindsay and I were first getting started. And one of the things I reminded them of was like, hey, this is both like Lindsay and me. Like we are both working on this, both doing it full time. This was like pre kids for us. It might have been like forty, fifty hours a week, maybe more sometimes. Like, okay, this is the equivalent of like eighty to a hundred hours that we’re spending trying to figure this out. And for somebody who’s working it’s not bad to do it as like a side hustle. I think it’s just important to remember if you have 10 hours a week, 20 hours a week, you know, that’s you know, when we’re working on full time, it’s like eight times as much kind of effort that you’re putting into it and moving it forward. Again, it’s not bad. I think it’s just important to remember if you don’t have the bandwidth to not be as hard on yourself. In your case, you decided to make the bandwidth. could probably place some of those bets and take some of that risk and say, like, okay, I’m gonna do this because I really want to do it. What did you learn that was helpful when you were compressing the feedback loop? So you talked about this idea that like you know now some of this stuff that you don’t even realize you know until you talk to somebody, you know, a normie out on the streets and it suddenly you realize like you know a lot about YouTube and how to rank videos and what’s important. So what did you learn in that period of time? Maybe that still applies today. as it relates to creating video and getting reach with that content.

Jeanelle Castro: For sure. I think definitely looking at the big picture and I thought well, you can correct me if I’m wrong, because you probably talk to other people outside of like the just strictly the food sorry, the video space. but I wonder if people are still obsessed over the minutia of description, you know, the hashtags, things like that.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, kind of like the tactics around video. Is that what you mean? Like, yeah. I’ve always I mean my quick answer with it is any of the tactic type stuff, when do you post? Like how long should a video be? you know, any stuff like that, I think there probably is some of that that’s important and that becomes a multiplier, but but it’s only a multiplier on the base and the base is the video itself. How engaging is it? How interesting is it? But I do think if you double click on the base, the video, that there are probably things that could be categorized as like quote unquote tactics or like best practice, like you’re gonna have to move really quick. You’re gonna you’re gonna have to have something that engages people really quick. There’s probably some long form content, there’s some consideration around thumbnail. That’s probably not as important for short form. Like, so I think there probably are some of those things, but I think like if you were to spend if if you were to s if you had ten hours, spend nine and a half on creating a really compelling video, both from the shoot and the edit, and then spend the last half hour to an hour on some of the like tactics that you wrap around it. But I’m not a video creator. that would just be my like commentary as an observer. does that resonate and feel accurate? Is that a little bit of what you’re getting at?

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah, a little bit. It’s it’s also just like I want people to like if if you wanted to create videos consistently to like sift through all that noise and really focus on, like you mentioned, it’s like the meat of the video. Like what is it that you’re putting out? Because it’s interesting. There are people I I’ve since then consumed so many different types of videos and there’s people who you could tell they’re not here to do the hooks and they’re not calculating any of that stuff. They’re just posting the thing and people eat it up. There there have been some like grandmas that post stuff up on accident because I don’t think they thought that they were gonna post up a reel, but it they post it and everyone is eating it up, which is so funny. You know? So it’s like you really have to just this is why I think it’s so important to just post and the overthinking gets in the way because like I think the dumbest video that I had posted was the one that started taking off, which lifted all of my other videos. And it was like, is carrots and peas still a thing? I was literally just talking about is carrots and peas still a thing. Like I don’t know. Like it’s just I was like, let me I needed to post three videos, right? That was the point. And then you find there is a pattern on the ones. I know which ones are gonna do well, depending on the type of title and the type of video that I put out, but there are still those surprising ones where I’m like, Why do people like this one? It’s ridiculous, you know? for that particular one, it’s because I was so tired and I said is pe peas and carrots still a thing, but it was I was cooking peas and corn. And everyone’s like, ha ha it’s that’s that’s all these know you guys like here’s the thing. I I was so tired, like I had no idea, but you know what? It made me that money, so it’s fine.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. But yeah. But point your point in it is that if you maybe lead with tactics where it’s like, I’m gonna try and figure out how to structure the perfect video versus leading with the desire to create and share. that the desire to create and share is going to win in the long run versus creating based on tactics. Like you could create every you could check all of the tactics boxes of how to succeed with short form video in YouTube. but if you don’t have that like just pure desire to share, even like the expertise, the entertainment factor, whatever it is that you’re going after, then it’s probably not worth doing it. And we see we see that with like all different types of creators where it’s somebody who likes the idea of like being a YouTuber or being a blogger or creating short form video more than they like actually creating a video. And I think when that happens, you’re gonna find yourself in a tough spot because you’re pursuing this idea of like work from home or like have your own business, have your own job, as opposed to what you’re actually gonna be doing 95% of the time, which is like shooting video and capturing video. Potentially editing video. and if you are naturally drawn to do that, I think of Lindsay, she has like a personal Instagram for like just our close family and friends, and she will still like shoot a video when we go on vacation and edit it and like share it for 37 people. and it’s not and it’s good, like, and it’s engaging and it’s interesting, but it’s like she’s not there’s no like strategy behind it. That’s just like she’s naturally drawn to create and share. and that should be probably a core component of how you exist if this is gonna be the work that you’re gonna do. Is that what you’re getting at?

Jeanelle Castro: Actually, I I think Lindsay is a natural video creator f you know, so maybe she sh if she’s not already, is she already doing food videos or

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, I think sh I wouldn’t consider I I don’t think she would consider herself like a video forward creator, but kind of this mix of like short form video on Instagram, you know, primarily, but definitely not YouTube. but how about for yourself? When you think of what you’re doing, and I know that you’re within the last season here have started focusing on blogging more as a monetization tool and a content creation tool for what you’re doing. how have you approached the world of video creation and content creation from a business perspective? you alluded a little bit too early on, short from video, YouTube, it paid really well. That’s I think shifted. it’s not necessarily the most like lucrative endeavor, but it’s great for awareness. You can do brand deals, you can point people to blog posts. How do you view what you’re doing right now, kind of from the business perspective?

Jeanelle Castro: For sure. so I think you make a really good point there where you said you kinda at the core have to like to share and create these videos because part of the game is you are kind of my friend texted me this the other day. She said, feed the algorithm beast. And we’re like, Yeah, this is just part of the game, right? This is part of the business, is that you continue to feed YouTube or Instagram or TikTok because they need to be aware that you’re an active creator and you know, they’re they’re trying to keep people on their platform, first and foremost. Like that’s something you have to remember. And so now I’ll be putting out a mixture of things, maybe something small. Like I think I just posted a video of my unc of my great-grand uncle’s painting. and it’s you know of the Philippines and it’s from my family. So it’s still it’s still kind of has value in that people are getting to know me and my family, which is to me super important when I post my videos, but I also post some food stuff. So maybe some like instructions on like, you know, tips on making a rice cake or this this rice cake. You know, I think the way I title my videos really helps where I’m like, this rice cake nobody no one ever dislikes this rice cake or or everybody loves this rice cake. You know, that’s the way that I try to do my videos because I want to bring people in. I’m not tricking them or anything. I’m just repackaging it in a different way. And then I bring them to the blog because I’m not saying there’s no space for SEO where you’re you know, if I posted that video, it would be caramelized sticky rice cake recipe. Yeah. Yeah. Or if it’s in the galogue, it would be bico recipe. and then for me, that’s actually part of the first few years that I was doing this. That was what I was doing because of all the information out there, right? This is how you do video. It was always SEO. And for me, something just wasn’t sitting right. And I think that’s where shorts came in and all the short form videos because then it allowed us to be a little bit more creative and it allowed us to do more output without having to always do the same SEO title. And so that’s how I approached my videos.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. We totally. It they are and I think it’s so smart, especially in this world where SEO’s shifting. For anybody who’s new to creating content, like there’s, you know, thousands of creators who are kind of competing for these keywords and have historically. But there’s all of these platforms where people are creating content that some of them do have a component of SEO. Pinterest maybe would be an example. you know, long form YouTube content would maybe have some like SEO considerations with it. But like that looks very different now with short form video content. and it’s more about how engaging in it is it, how interesting is it? Do people continue to watch it? You know, there’s obviously like there’s this shift that has been happening that people are well aware of from like social platforms to content platforms. And they are prioritizing not necessarily based on who you’re following or your social connections. They’re prioritizing based on topic, on interest, on and then from that, what content in that pool is most engaging or interesting. And so the downstream effects of that is if you get that attention, then what do you do with it? It sounds like in your case you’ve said, how do I get people then to my site? I think one of the things that’s really freeing for people who feel like the, you know, process of doing SEO is soul sucking, is that you don’t have to if you have the ability to reach people on other platforms through other means, in this case, short form video. So what does that look like to send people to your site? you know, we you you are freed from having to have this like really rote like keyword that you’re trying to rank for. You can be creative with it. It’s interesting. people discover it through social and then you point them to your site. What are the mechanics that you’re using to help people get to the site once they see the video?

Jeanelle Castro: Th this is funny that you mentioned this because I think a lot of people I’ve also done talks at food blogger conferences and this is the one thing that they’re all concerned about. I think okay, so on Instagram I use Linked DM. It’s very basic. That’s it’s easy, you know. I’m like, comment this to get the recipe. on other places like YouTube Shorts, that’s not a thing. Links are not clickable on YouTube Shorts. And it was once upon a time, which was great, but now it’s gone. But what’s funny is that even if I just post on YouTube Shorts and I say, you know, go here, go to the Janelle Eats blog, Janelleats.com, for the recipe. People still go. So for me, I think, you know, it’s crazy that I would see a spike in traffic when I post that. Not Instagram yet, right? Like just YouTube Shorts. So nobody’s clicking like on the link DM stuff. Just YouTube Shorts. People are still visiting the site, even though they have to physically go there themselves. Whether they I don’t know if they’re typing it in. They’re probably typing it in because it’s YouTube Shorts, right? Like there’s no other way to link it.

But I think it’s because the way that I made the video was so, I like to say it’s enticing enough for them to wanna go visit the website, make the recipe, to go out of your way, to actually like leave the platform and go on the website. For me, I was just like, okay, well I’m doing something right. I guess it might be because the video was so captivating and so enticing for them to actually leave and visit. That’s h that’s how it is on YouTube Shorts though. There’s no way they can click the link. So I’m just for me I’m still surprised that people actually go through all that because I know a lot of people are obsessed with making it as easy as possible for people to just like click one link and then go. Right. So

Bjork Ostrom: Uh-huh. Yeah. But your point is that if you include a prompt, like are you saying that in the voiceover and then does it show it in the caption?

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah. I actually do yeah. So captions is another tactic that I like to put up because it keeps people engaged in reading. and I will put in, you know, Janelle Eats.com. And yeah, I guess it’s also that on top of just the frequency of me being in front of these people, they are aware I have a website, they are aware that I make this food for them to, you know, make. So yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Yep. Yeah. This is one of the things that we did recently. We sat down. It was me, Lindsay, Jenna. We had a meeting and we were looking at I don’t even remember how we got around to it, but it was like what are the in the last year, I think we’re this is what it was. We’re trying to we we set up like an this is a little bit nerding out, but we set up an automation in Slack that r reports like the previous year’s earning for a single post. And then we’re like, hey, I wonder what that looks like. So if one post had 365 days, like what would the list of all the different pieces of content look like for Pinch of Yum through the years, you know, over the last year or whatever, or I forget what the range was. But just to get a sense for like how much does a post earn? And as a quick aside, I think Raptive has recently released the ability to do API access. I don’t know if it’s API or MCP. Also, for any Clarity users, you can get on the waiting list if you email me. We have an MCP for Clarity that allows you to do some of this stuff. But essentially, it’s starting to use your Claude, ChatGPT to interact with a piece of content and umor these data databases to get information around them. And what we found was that, and this makes sense, but like there’s a direct correlation to the pieces of content that performed the best on social and the content that earned the most on the blog. And that that came up by like looking at the top three or four earners for the past year. Not the like not the ones that are like these you know anchors that have been around for six years and like really performing well, but like the relatively new ones. And they all had kind of a direct correlation to performing well on social. Sounds really obvious, but I think it was a reminder for us around the significance of social. and then what we did is we drilled down and we saw that like there was also a correlation to search and specifically branded search. So like the name of the recipe plus pinch of yum. And I think that you’re on to something when you talk about this idea of like creating a piece of content that is compelling enough, interesting enough, captivating enough that people are motivated then to go and make it. How they do that, how they access it will depend on how you’re directing people and what the process is. You talked about LinkDM. We use grow.co, some people use many chat. but a huge thing, huge impact that we can have is like directing people or even just hinting at going and just like finding it, going to the website, searching for it.

Bjork Ostrom: If you’ve ever opened Google Analytics or Google Search Console and then just looked at it for a little bit and closed the tab because it felt overwhelming, this is for you. And here’s the thing, it’s not just analytics or search console, it’s also WordPress. Maybe you’re trying to find a post quickly, understand how it’s performing. And after a while, you’re jumping from tab to tab trying to piece together information about how your content is doing. It really is one of the hardest parts about growing a contents business. It’s getting clarity. It’s not always necessarily effort, it’s just knowing what you should do next because your data is scattered, your priorities are getting fuzzy, and you’re staying busy, but you’re not confident that you’re working on the right things. That’s why we created Clariti. It’s C-L-A-R-I-T-I. Clariti is a content organization and optimization platform that pulls all that messy data into one clear place so you can audit your content, understand performance and see real opportunities instead of just guessing.

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Bjork Ostrom: What has that been like for you as you had a strong social following, now starting to focus on the blog as the main kind of driver of revenue? has that been more difficult than you thought it would be, easier than you thought it would be? what has that looked like? And is that the main thing? Is that primarily what you focus on right now? Is like how do we get people to the site? Monetize via ads.

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah. So full disclosure, we have been going through a renovation for the past six months. And for us before that renovation, the focus was to get people to home renovation. So and we will be going through a website renovation. So it’s just a whole thing.

Bjork Ostrom: Website renovation or home renovation? Okay. Yeah. Okay. We did the home we did a kitchen ren renovation last year, like this time last year, so

Jeanelle Castro: That’s what we’re doing right now. We just moved back in, like literally like yesterday. And so I’m just like, so the reason why I bring that up is because when we were actually bringing people to the blog six months ago, we were still kind of doing it sporadically in between, but it’s been really difficult living in my parents’ house to try to make content and bring them to the blog. It’s just it’s different. But I did notice that when we did push people to the blog, it seemed easier than we thought. You asked if was it harder or easier? It was easier than we thought to actually rank these specific recipes. So let’s say I’ll bring people to like like a ch like a Filipino pork adobo recipe.

once they go there and and let’s say like I push them out, I can’t give you like a a specific number. I don’t really know how many times I’ve pushed them there, but it seems like when I push people there, the ranking, you can see the ranking go up and you can see it kind of stabilize and our blog is still growing. It’s not, you know, it’s nothing crazy. Like you know, all the other established food blogs, but we did notice that the once I do push out a video and the video does well and people go and make the recipe, it seems to kind of like push up and stabilize in rankings and, you know, it’ll drop and stuff like that. But if I just like push out a video, I’m like, cool. Like it actually like directly affects the rank and maybe it’s ’cause YouTube is owned by Google and they like that symbiotic relationship between the two, but imagine if I actually focused on it like crazy, right?

Bjork Ostrom: Sure. Yeah. Well, it’s one of the it’s one of the th things that’s hard to do as a creator is figure out like where do you focus, like what is gonna be the greatest return. If you only did, this is the hard part, if you only did the your blog or your website, we are now in an era of content creation, of website building, of blog building, where you really can’t do that. You can’t just if you’re gonna if you’ve started a site within the last three or four years. It’s gonna be really, really hard if the only thing that you’re working on is the blog, is the website itself. So you have to have some other mechanism for promoting it. And so there has to be kind of this balance. I think generally it’s gonna be better if your social platforms have a larger following because then it’s gonna be easier to promote downstream the places that you wanna direct people, whether that be a website or other places. What does that look like for you as as a creator right now? Like if you think of the revenue pie chart for your business, how does that divide out right now? And where do you focus on kind of revenue for the business?

Jeanelle Castro: So right now I think we’re still focusing on brand deals and yeah, I would say like brand deals and I would say like our AdSense for our YouTube is just about the same as the blog, or I think maybe the blog is just getting, you know, a little bit bigger now, which is nice because the blog for sure is much more stable in revenue than AdSense on YouTube because you again Yeah, like more.

Bjork Ostrom: Stable meaning predictable, like you know month month it’s just generally going to be pretty similar.

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah, yeah. Because with shorts, and again, this is a short team. This isn’t long form game, which is totally different. from my friends who actually do create long form videos and from what I’ve seen from my own long form videos, the ones that I post, it’s very few. they are more stable in gaining that revenue. But the power of shorts is that visibility and you the ability to push people to your products. So when I was really pushing out our our Moose to be molds, people were going to the site. Like we were making a good amount of sales for just like passively posting about it. And so I think it’s a really, really good driver to awareness, like what you’re working on, bring people to the blog, purchase your product and for yeah, so that’s kind of how we’re looking at things. And of course having that awareness, having that visibility online is always going to attract brands. And so for us we’re like, Okay, well this is easy where I get to post what I want and these brands come and like can we integrate in your content? I’m like, Yeah, sure. You know, like a short video and then Yeah. So I mean

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, you would be creating it otherwise. what what does that look like in the world of shorts and what what types of brands are reaching out? Do you have an agent that you work with? Talk a little bit about what you’ve learned partnering with brands as you’re doing brand partnerships for short form content.

Jeanelle Castro: For sure. So a lot of in the beginning I was working with a few management companies. They were helping me bring in some brand deals. And I think after a while, I know that I think some earlier on people were still looking for long-form integration. And so we still had some good brand deals for shorts, but it’s just not that much. So eventually we just were like, okay. we’ll probably just like go on our own. And so now we don’t work with anybody. We’ve kind of worked with multiple people through the years, but it’s always just kind of like on and off, right? Like on and off. Okay, cool.

Nowadays it’s just all inbound, which is nice because I think the longer you establish yourself in the space, people find you, people are aware of you. I would say I definitely don’t post as many videos as I did before, but I wasn’t getting as many brand deals inbound because I was new, right? And so now that people know your reputation, they know of you, or they’ve worked with you in the past or worked with maybe one somebody that you know, they’re more willing to reach out because you’re known, right? That’s the other thing about like showing your face. I a lot of food bloggers don’t want to show their face, but showing your face and personality, it it really helps. And you don’t have to be another person, by the way. You could just be yourself. People like that. There will be people out there who like you.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. so can you talk a little bit about the different platforms? We talked about YouTube. You have almost two million followers there. You know, obviously Instagram, TikTok, there’s these other platforms. How do you view those different platforms kind of in your portfolio as a content creator? Maybe like their personalities, the platform personalities, and then also maybe their value to you as a creator. And maybe the way you could do it is like start with the most valuable and then describe a little bit about what you like about it and its personality a little bit as a platform.

Jeanelle Castro: I like that because I do feel like they have personalities. So YouTube is has always been like my number one. I started on YouTube. I love my YouTube audience. There’s I would say there’s a lot more of them, as you mentioned, almost two million, compared to Instagram and TikTok. But YouTube has just always been it’s always felt more robust. Like it feels like there’s so much that you could do on YouTube as a creator. you can now do posts, you can do long form videos, short form videos, and it it just feels like it still feels like there’s so many possibilities. You could do a lot of things on YouTube. So YouTube is is always my focus. So I’m always posting on YouTube first and everything else gets reposted to Instagram and TikTok. And for anyone listening, that’s how I keep focused, you know, because you can’t spread yourself thin. You can only do so much.

And Instagram is I would say Instagram’s so valuable. It’s just mm, you know, you’re not gonna get ad sense from Instagram, but a lot of brands are looking at Instagram and TikTok.

Bjork Ostrom: Sure. That was going to be my second question was for the brand deals that you’re doing, is there leading interest Instagram usually and then TikTok and YouTube as a bonus?

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah, which is funny, right? Because I’m I would say my presence is is much bigger on YouTube. And I think people still hear about me because of YouTube, but I still get brands being like, All right, let’s post on Instagram. Instagram and TikTok. Yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, like that’s their primary interest. And is part of that that they’re whitelisting and then putting paid behind it, or do you know do they give you any insight as to like why Instagram over YouTube?

Jeanelle Castro: I would say I think you mentioned it, like whitelisting is a big part of it. and also it might also be the price because the audience on YouTube is just so large. Some of them are like, you know, let’s just do Instagram and TikTok. But I’m still I still get people who want to post on YouTube. It’s just sometimes it’s like YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok. Right? They want to post them on all three. But there are a lot more that are like just Instagram or Instagram and TikTok. and TikTok I don’t pay attention to so much.

Bjork Ostrom: Sure. Yep. yeah. Sure. Sure. Yeah, it’s interesting. I feel like similar to the conversations we have, I feel like a lot of people are generally interested in Instagram, potentially Facebook. do you post to Facebook, shorts to Facebook?

Jeanelle Castro: Yeah. So actually my husband works with me and he is the one that posts on Facebook and Facebook does generate some revenue. It’s it’s kind of like it fluctuates, but we still try to post because we’re just reposting. It’s it’s still time. It still takes time and which is why he’s the one that does it, not me. but yeah, we we are just repurposing the content that I make on YouTube because there’s so much of it.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. And how about frequency on those platforms? Are you posting all new content and then going to the next thing and then creating a new video and then posting that? Are you repurposing anything? If something does well in Instagram, do you post it again the next year? Facebook, are you posting multiple times a day? what does that look like in terms of your kind of posting strategy for each of the platforms?

Jeanelle Castro: Right, so I I feel like I should be posting, reposting more often. I don’t do it as often as I should. I there is there’s times when I will and I’ll remember, yeah, I can repost, but I think it’s just because my brain is always on and I’m like, there’s all this stuff that I could post. It’s all new. Yeah, that’s I feel like that’s I’m not gonna say every content creator, every video content creator is like this, but my friends, I feel like, you know, we all kind of post new stuff. But when I take a step back and somebody tells me, usually, you know, like my YouTube partner manager or like somebody else, like why don’t, you know, do you ever just repost it or put it together into like a new video with like maybe five videos that I stitched together? I’m like, yeah, you’re right, I could do that. And then I’ll you know, I’ll do that.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah, right. But you’re so it’s one of the reasons why you’re successful is because you are thinking about the next thing. You’re thinking about what can I create, what’s the next thing that could be you know, useful for people, as opposed to thinking about how can I go back in my, you know, catalog and repost something. that’s great. last question for anybody who’s kind of interested in it, they want to figure it out, they’re maybe in that, you know, one, two, three year slog where they’re in the middle of it and kind of grinding it out. What would your advice be for somebody who is interested in doing this? They want to figure it out, but maybe they’re still in the weeds a little bit, and haven’t really broken out yet?

Jeanelle Castro: I guess like be honest with yourself and be like it you really want to do this because if you really want to do this and you actually give it your all it will work out but I I really think just taking from my own experience I think there’s still that doubt there and you’re not putting all of all of your focus and energy into it because I feel like once you do that, it actually takes so much less time than you think it will. but also like sift through the noise, right? Like do what you can because I know talking to other food bloggers too, they feel like it’s a big thing that they have to do to post a video. And I’m like, have you been on Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts? If people post the most simple basic things, and especially if we’re talking to food bloggers, I’m like, you have a camera. You have the nicest camera with the nicest settings. If you just press the record button, I don’t think it would hurt. Like you have the composition. and everything like I feel like food bloggers have so much talent and if they just press the record button versus the the shutter button like you can make so many videos out of that

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. That’s great. Yeah. And it’s almost like being less precious about it and saying, okay, how can I press record? How can I get something out there? and the what you said originally, a little bit of the difference between like dabbling and being a professional. And what does it mean to be a professional at something? And it’s like you take it really seriously. And then it’s like there’s people who like make furniture for fun, and then there’s like furniture makers. you know, there’s people who play music for fun, and then there’s professional musicians. And you think about the level of dedication to the craft that exists for professionals. we understand that when we look at other industries. and I think it’s a good reminder when we look at this industry to say, hey, if you’re gonna be a professional, it’s gonna require a lot. and there’s gonna be effort and time, and it can’t just be like a little something that you’re doing on the side. It it can be if that’s what you want it to be. That’s not bad. But if you want it to be your full time thing, if you want to be a professional, to treat it as as that, which I think is a super good reminder for people. if people want to follow along with you, Chanel, where do they do that? And we’ll be sure to link to it in the show notes as well.

Jeanelle Castro: Jeanelle Eats on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok if you want to, but YouTube, Instagram.

Bjork Ostrom: Everywhere. Will you be doing a kitchen reveal when it’s all done? Good. Yeah. The greatest reward is just gonna be able to be back in your own kitchen. Like what a great feeling that’ll be.

Jeanelle Castro: Actually yes, this I I can’t wait, honestly. I’m like please. Yeah. I’m like, watch out. All the videos I make. Just watch out. Like you think I was on a little break these last few months, but yeah.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. Yeah. That’s great. Well, thanks so much for coming on. and thanks for listening through the years too. it’s so great to be able to have conversations with people who have been figuring it out, but then are also willing to share stuff like this. So really appreciate it. Thanks for coming on.

Jeanelle Castro: Of course. Thanks for allowing me to share my knowledge with. I’m giving back basically for all the information you’ve g all given me.

Bjork Ostrom: Yeah. Well it’s great. It’s great. well we love it. Thanks for coming on, Jeanelle.

Jeanelle Castro: Thank you.