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Episode 275: 4 Tips for Quick Growth and Long-Term Success with Casey Rooney

In episode 275, Megan chats with Casey of Get On My Plate, a blogger new to the business side of blogging about how she grew from 0 to 55K monthly sessions with just a few strategies.

We cover information about how important it is to lean into SEO and keyword research, why social media shouldn’t overwhelm you but don’t discount it completely and how publishing non-recipe content is a game changer with a focus on modifiers and low competition keywords.

Listen on the player below or on iTunes, TuneIn, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast player. Or scroll down to read a full transcript.

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Guest Details

Connect with Get On My Plate
Website | Facebook | Instagram

Bio

Casey is a mom of three, teacher, wife and blogger at Get On My Plate. She started her food blog on January 1, 2021 and hit over 50k sessions in November 2021.She has a passion for cooking and loves teaching other busy moms how to uncomplicate cooking at home. On her blog, she provides quick and simple, yet flavorful meals the whole family can enjoy. When she’s not in the kitchen or photographing food, Casey enjoys spending time with her family, camping, traveling and red wine.

Takeaways

  • Dive into podcasts and free information online about SEO to help build your knowledge and to keep learning what’s new and next as well.
  • Courses like Cooking with Keywords can help you up your knowledge and get more technical about SEO in respect to your own business.
  • Modifiers help you find content you can rank for that is also food you want to prepare and share.
  • Do not discount value in social media altogether. Vet the groups that support your niche but traffic and exposure to your site can be earned from these groups.
  • Some platforms you might now know what return you’ll get but stay consistent with it – Pinterest and Google Web Stories. They offer a way to show tasty recipes with great photography to your audience .
  • Make Web stories and Pinterest idea pins part of your work flow.
  • Repurpose content and streamline your processes to make it easier on yourself.
  • Gain some traction and offer your audience value by creating some non recipe posts. You can then interlink to build authority.
  • Be willing to adapt, change and pivot.
  • Bloggers don’t think of themselves as a small business owner, but they need to have this mindset at all times – they are small business owners.

Resources Mentioned

Cooking with Keywords course
Top Hat Rank
Mediavine Podcast

Get On My Plate Blogging Resources

Transcript

Click for full text.

275 Casey Rooney

Casey Rooney: Hi, this is Casey Rooney from Get On My Plate and you are listening to the Eat Blog Talk podcast. 

Megan Porta: Hey, food bloggers. Welcome to Eat Blog Talk, sponsored by RankIQ. I am your host, Megan Porta, and you’re listening to episode number 275. Today, Casey is going to tell us all about her journey and how she went from zero to 55 thousand sessions in 11 months. Casey Rooney is a mom of three, teacher, wife, and blogger at Get On My Plate. She started her food blog on January 1st, 2021 and hit over 50,000 sessions in November, 2021. She has a passion for cooking and loves teaching other busy moms how to uncomplicate cooking at home. On her blog, she provides quick and simple yet flavorful meals the whole family can enjoy. When she is not in the kitchen or photographing food, Casey enjoys spending time with her family, camping, traveling, and red wine. Oh my gosh. We would be fast friends, Casey. Or we are fast friends because all of that is stuff that I love as well. So happy to have you here today. 

Casey Rooney: Thanks so much for having me. 

Megan Porta: Yes. And before we’ve talked about your amazingly fast journey, I would love to hear what your fun fact is. 

Casey Rooney: Okay. So my fun fact actually just changed about 15 minutes ago. So, 15 minutes ago actually Mediavine ads went live on my site right before I jumped on this podcast. So I thought that was fitting.

Megan Porta: That is so fitting. Oh my gosh. Congratulations. That is awesome news. You should give yourself a huge pat on the back. Nice work. 

Casey Rooney: Yeah. So you apply and then it takes some time for them to actually launch, but today was actually launch day. 

Megan Porta: Oh, I love that it aligns with our chat today. So perfect fun fact. Okay. So we alluded to your story. It’s very quick. I think a lot of people would hear that and be like, what, how did she do that? So can you just talk us through, like we mentioned, you started on January 1st. Why did you start blogging and just talk us through how you got that many sessions in an overview, and then we’ll get more into like your actionable tips.

Casey Rooney: Yeah, sure. The funny thing is that I wrote my very first blog post on July 18th, 2008. If you even knew blogging existed in 2008. It was on blogher. It was just like my Facebook. I would post funny pictures of my kids crawling or whatever. My family and friends knew that I had this blog and they would go and they would comment and that I would comment back. So it was old-school Facebook, I guess. That’s what I use my blog for. I’m a teacher, so I love teaching. I love sharing. So I’ve had a blogger blog on blogger.com for a long time. It’s not live there anymore, but I just always liked sharing things with people. Here’s this great sweater I found on Amazon or here’s this fun recipe. So I’ve actually been a blogger for a long time, but never, ever knew anything about making money or SEO or anything like that. 

Megan Porta: Yeah, I’m the same. I trudged along right with you, Casey, as far as not knowing what I was doing, but yet being a quote blogger. So I think a lot of people can relate to that because we have that pivotal moment where we just decide. We are going to take this from a journal type experience to an actual business. So you decided that this year, earlier this year.

Casey Rooney: It was 2020 on black Friday when I bought my theme and I bought the domain name. I’m like, I’m going to do this on January 1st. Still knowing nothing about SEO or anything. So I launched my site. I had always had a passion for food. So I’m like, I’m gonna make this a food blog and I’m going to make it work. But I still didn’t know anything. 

Megan Porta: Okay, which leads us perfectly to your tips. So you have put together a list of very helpful tips. You have four of them for other food bloggers listening who might want to speed up their own journeys and get into an ad network. So why don’t you start with tip number one, which is a focus on SEO.

Casey Rooney: Yes. Okay. So focused on SEO. So it wasn’t until March. So I launched my food blog on January 1st and the name of my very first post was Five Recipes Your Family Will Love. So if you know anything about SEO, you know that no one is searching that on Google. You just don’t do that. But I kept writing posts like that. Another one was the best pumpkin recipe ever. I didn’t know what I was doing. 

Megan Porta: Sorry, I’m laughing with you, you know this, right? This is a common theme. I just want you to know that. It’s funny because I can relate to it.

Casey Rooney: I hope people can relate to that. I hope that they are inspired by this and know that you can turn it around really quickly.

Megan Porta: Right. Yes. 

Casey Rooney: So I finally figured out SEO, or I finally learned about SEO. I’d never heard those three letters together ever in my life and until March of 2021. So I think it was from one of the Top Hat Rank podcasts. I was diving into that. I joined Food Blogger Central on Facebook. I just started really learning about SEO and how to monetize. It started to become one of my goals. So I have KeySearch. I still use KeySearch to this day. How I did my keyword research was I typed something in and I looked for blues and I looked for light greens. I think a lot of people do that. It wasn’t until September of 2021, now just a couple of months ago where I took Cooking with Keywords and that just skyrocketed my SEO. My keyword research. 

Megan Porta: Oh, that’s so I’ve heard so many people say that. So what were the highlights that you took away from Cooking with Keywords?

Casey Rooney: Yeah, this course is keyword research on crack. It is so intense and it’s time consuming, but it’s so worth it. I think the main takeaway that I got from it was when you look for the blues and light greens in KeySearch, and if you keep searching, I was so tired of making those things. I don’t want to make tater tots in the air fryer just because I can rank for it. It was fine. I was ranking for some of those things, but I didn’t, I wanted to make things that I wanted to make. In her course, she really teaches you how to customize your recipes and your posts. So you’re making things that you want to rank, that you want to make and that you can rank for. The main thing is, she talked about using modifiers. So for example, lasagna recipe. Noone’s going to rank for lasagna recipe as a new blogger. But for example, you might be able to rank for lasagna recipe without ricotta or lasagna recipe with spinach and ricotta. So adding those modifiers on to narrow the search volume can help a lot of new bloggers rank quickly. 

Megan Porta: Oh, that’s so great. Okay. Just to back up a little bit, if people are not on KeySearch, they might not know what you mean when you say looking for blue and light green. So can you explain that a little bit?

Casey Rooney: Yeah. It’s just looking for things that you can easily rank for where a lot of big bloggers or a lot of big websites don’t currently have posts for that. So the keyword difficulty, for instance, how to make tater tots in the air fryer is lower, then it’s easier to rank for that than the lasagna recipe. Yeah. 

Megan Porta: No, that makes sense now. Thank you. Then as far as the Cooking with Keywords, that is a course, correct?

Casey Rooney: Yes, it’s a course. Aleka is a blogger. I think that’s how you pronounce it. She’s a food blogger herself. 

Megan Porta: Okay. So I don’t know if you are familiar with RankIQ, but I love RankIQ.

Casey Rooney: I listen to all his podcasts. So they’re the best. 

Megan Porta: He has a tool RankIQ, Brandon is the founder. He put together this tool that focuses on exactly what you just said about modifiers. So every keyword inside of his tool has a low competition score. Also a lot of them have those modifiers you’re talking about. So you can find really anything you like and use it to align with your content in a way that’s actually real and genuine. So exactly what you were saying, like you can have a cornbread recipe, for example, and cornbread is going to be a huge search term that everyone’s searching for. But I found one that was like cornbread without buttermilk. So I didn’t have buttermilk in my cornbread recipes. So I was able to use that, modify an existing recipe and then get really good traction for it. So I think that is such a smart strategy. I love that Cooking With Keywords dives into that modifier thing as well. 

Casey Rooney: I love that. You have to want to make your recipes.

Megan Porta: Exactly. If you have a lot of content like I do, and I know a lot of other bloggers are in the same boat, it’s a really good way to comb through your existing stuff and just make it work because obviously you’ve made it, you probably have the recipe, and trust it. So just tweaking the words that you use a little bit. It doesn’t go astray. So you’re still aligning with your content, but it can really do worlds of difference. 

Casey Rooney: Yup, it’s amazing. 

Megan Porta: Okay. So anything else on SEO before we move on to your second tip? 

Casey Rooney: I just think it’s really important for long-term growth and actually Mediavine does prefer traffic from Google over traffic from social media sites. So it’s very, it’s good for Mediavine and it’s just good for long-term growth too. 

Megan Porta: Yeah, I definitely agree with that. So what is tip number two? 

Casey Rooney: Okay, right after I said social media, I said, focus on SEO, but do not discount social media. So I would say that posting in Facebook groups and Google web stories are really what pushed my blog to that 50,000 level from being stagnant at around 30 or 40. Facebook groups and Web stories. So if you can find good Facebook groups to post, and I have a few tips about that, they can really push you to that mark. 

Megan Porta: Yeah. What are your couple of tips? 

Casey Rooney: So in finding groups, you just want to start with, and I know a lot of people have said, oh, I’ve tried Facebook groups. They just don’t work for me. You just have to keep trying. It’s one of those things like trial and error things. So you’re going to go on and you’re going to look for a Facebook group in your niche. So if it’s whatever, paleo instant pot, easy recipes. So go on your laptop and find groups in that niche. If you’re on your laptop or your desktop, Facebook will give you suggestions with other groups that are similar to that. So that’s also another way to find groups and then you have to vet them. So the way that I vet my Facebook groups is at least 50,000 members and also they have to be highly engaged. So go in there and look and study the posts. Are people liking and commenting? Are they sharing? Are there real people in there that actually want recipes and not just a bunch of bloggers dropping links?

The thing is, in a lot of these Facebook groups, it’s just a lot of link trapping. You want the ones with real people and very few bloggers. Then go in and look at the posts that are going viral. By viral, I mean a lot of likes and shares and things like that. Look at the photography and look at the types of recipes that are doing well. Nine times out of 10, we’ll probably 10 times out of 10, it’s not going to be these beautiful stylized images. It’s going to be food that looks delicious. Try to tailor when you post in there, try to tailor your posts to what these people like. You want to stay in your lane obviously, but you have to look at what people are liking and what people are sharing. 

Megan Porta: Oh, that’s such great advice. You found a lot of traction through the Facebook groups or a little bit, or how much?

Casey Rooney: Yes. I’ve had several posts go viral in Facebook groups. The thing is you want to look for a lot of shares. If you get a lot of shares and people are sharing that to their Facebook page, some of their friends are also seeing it too. 

Sponsor: Food bloggers. Let’s take a really quick break. I’d love to tell you about just a few things going on at Eat Blog Talk that might benefit you and your business.

First of all, if you would take the time to go to your favorite podcast player to subscribe or follow rate and review Eat Blog Talk, I would be so grateful and it adds so much value to this podcast. Also go to the free discussion forum at forum.eatblogtalk.com to get in on the conversations going on over there with other food bloggers, like minded peers, you can ask questions, answer questions, and just contribute to great discussions.

Lastly, if you would like to get in on the next mastermind group, that will be put together in spring of 2022. Be sure to get on the waitlist now. Go to eatblogtalk.com and follow the buttons for mastermind. We’ll be in touch as spring draws closer. Now, back to the episode. 

Casey Rooney: Yeah, I probably have maybe five or six groups. I’m constantly looking for new groups but I have about five or six groups that things will do really well in. I always say that, when you’re looking at photography and like what you’re going to write for your post, when someone comments or tags somebody, I need to make this right now, or that looks so amazing. I have to make it tonight. Then, you’ve made a good post because you want people to make it because that’s why they’re going to go to your website and click over. 

Megan Porta: Do you have any tips about which types of content to post? 

Casey Rooney: It has to go along with what the group is about. You also have to stay true to yourself too, because if you go into a group where bright colorful salads, for example, are doing really well, but you are a comfort food blogger, then you don’t want to do that. You want to do something that’s true to yourself. Posts that do really well are ones that are easy usually, well, in the groups that I’m in. They’re just down-home good recipes that with photography makes people want to eat them. Photography is my weakness by the way. So this is actually really great news to anyone who feels like photography is your weakness because your photos don’t have to be beautiful. They just have to look yummy. Your food just has to look delicious.

Megan Porta: So it really depends on the group. Just like you said earlier, feel it out, go in, vet it a little bit, see what people are liking and then try to align with the most viral posts you see in there. 

Casey Rooney: Exactly. 

Megan Porta: Okay. Perfect. I love that tip. I know a handful of other food bloggers who have really tapped into some significant traffic doing this. So this is worth checking out and looking into. Okay, Casey, so you also mentioned Web stories. Can you expand on that a little bit? 

Casey Rooney: Yeah. I learned pretty much everything about Web stories from when you had Sandra from She’s Not Cooking on and that’s where I learned web stories. So whoever hasn’t listened to that one should definitely go back and listen to that. But web stories have done tons for me. It’s one of those things that you just have to stick with. So I have a template that I use and it’s so simple. Ridiculously simple. I just pop my process photos into it. The thing that takes the longest is to actually make the template, because now I can just pop my process photos in, change the wordage and I can make one in like 10 to 15 minutes.

So I make making a web story part of my workflow when I write a blog post. So of course, we make pins, we write our blog posts. We post to social media. Making a web story is just in my workflow. I just know that’s one thing that I’m going to have to do. 

Megan Porta: So right now I feel like Web stories have gotten really popular. So as we’re recording, it’s the end of December. Have you noticed this too? The traction is slowly waning?

Casey Rooney: For my seasonal recipes that I have on Web stories that I probably posted. I don’t know. I think I started doing seasonal Christmas type posts about three weeks ago. They’re just this week gaining traction. I’m not sure if this is true or not, but I think it has a lot to do with what people are searching for. So say someone’s searching for a Christmas tree charcuterie board. The next time they open their Google app, they’re going to see my Christmas tree Charcuterie board Web story because they were already searching for it. So I think that has a lot to do with it.

Megan Porta: It just seems to me very random and all over the place. Maybe you’ve experienced something different, but I’ve experimented a little bit too with my own content and putting up Web stories. For a while, I was seeing just tons of traffic and traction, like my impressions would go way up and then down for a couple of days and then back way up. Now it’s just been flat-lined.

Casey Rooney: That’s the thing with any of these things. You obviously know about Pinterest and it can be so fickle and Web stories. I always say not to count on a certain social media platform because things can change overnight so you can never count on it. But I feel like if you’re consistent and you just make this part of your workflow, just like I make pinning part of my workflow that you will get some of it. Some of the first Web stories that I created, the very first ones they’re still running. It’s just a mystery and it’s a puzzle, but I just stay consistent. 

Megan Porta: See, that’s the perfect way to say it. So it is a mystery. I feel like to all of us, nobody has got it exactly. But it’s worthwhile, especially if you’re consistent. You stick with it and just keep producing them, it will benefit you I feel like in the end.

Casey Rooney: I always say if you’re on the Mediavine hamster wheel, you’re like clawing your way to Mediavine, you want to do everything that you can. Obviously SEO is a long-term gain. But you want to do everything that you can to get traffic.

Megan Porta: Okay. That’s great. Do you have anything else about Web stories before we move on to everyone’s favorite, Pinterest? 

Casey Rooney: Oh, gosh. The only thing too about web stories, if you have one that does really well, you can also do multiple stories with the same, like you can duplicate web stories with the same post. You just have to change the URL. So if you know your Christmas tree charcuterie board is doing really well, you can redo that in a different way. I have one that’s in video and then one that’s not a video. So you can duplicate those. Just don’t make them exactly the same.

Megan Porta: So it’s a different URL, different title. Is that what you’re saying?

Casey Rooney: If it’s a different title, the URL for your web story will automatically change, but it can be for the same post is what I’m saying.

Megan Porta: Gotcha. Yes. Great advice there. Okay. On to Pinterest, what are your thoughts about Pinterest? 

Casey Rooney: Pinterest. I don’t really have a rhyme or reason. I just stay consistent with it. I stay consistent with pinning all of my content. I don’t go overboard, just when I have a new post, I pin it to a couple of boards and I do have it part of my workflow to do a Pinterest idea pin for every post that I do. People poo poo these but I really feel that they bring not only direct traffic, I’ve gotten so many more Pinterest followers and the more Pinterest followers you have, the more people will see or other stuff that you’re pinning. So for me, I think it’s completely worth it.

Megan Porta: I agree with that. I know a lot of people disagree, but I say it doesn’t hurt, certainly. Especially as someone who produces such visual content like food bloggers do, why not keep your mouth watering photos on Pinterest circulating? It’s such a small time requirement that I feel like you might as well do it.

Casey Rooney: I have a little hack for doing Pinterest stories. So I always do an Instagram story that just takes people step-by-step through my process of photos. I’ll have the hero image north say let’s make lasagna or whatever. Then I’ll just take them through these steps. I do that on Instagram stories, the day that I post my new post. So all I do is every time I do a story frame in Instagram stories, I go over to the three dots in the top and I hit save. So I saved that frame to my camera roll. Then I just immediately go back over. So I save every single frame from my camera roll. Then I just go over to Pinterest stories and I use those Instagram frames for the frames on my Pinterest idea pin. 

Megan Porta: That is efficiency that I love. Anything you can do to streamline like that. Oh, I love it. That’s a great tip. 

Casey Rooney: Repurposing content is the best. 

Megan Porta: Repurposing is so powerful. So I love that. Okay. So tip two, basically in a nutshell, don’t discount social media. Don’t sell your soul to it and spend all of your time there, but there is power in there if you can learn how to utilize it efficiently. So let’s move on.

Casey Rooney: So tip number three is write some non recipe.posts. So some of my non many of my non recipe posts are my highest ranking number one, two, and three posts. This is so important for your blog because it not only helps your blog, but it can help you. They’re easier to rank for. So some ideas for non recipe posts would be how tos. So for example, if you have a lot of Southwestern or Mexican food on your blog, for example, you can do how to cook black beans in an instant pot, for example. Then every one of those posts that had black beans in it, you could link back to it saying you can have black beans from the can or here’s my recipe for how to cook them really quickly in the Instapot. So all that interlinking that Google loves is there. Plus you can probably find some keywords or some key how tos that will be easier to rank for then a recipe. Again, you have to go back to keyword research. You might not want to do something super popular. But how tos are really good. 

Megan Porta: So I learned the power of this year in 2021, when I was introduced to, again, RankIQ. I was on a call with the founder and he introduced this idea to me. I was like blown away by what? You think we should write non recipe posts? He said, yes, I do. I can’t believe this. I had never considered that concept before, which now looking back, I’m like how ridiculous that I didn’t even entertain that as an idea. But I immediately started doing it using the RankIQ tool. I can’t even tell you Casey, how effective this is in getting traction through Google. I don’t have numbers off the top of my head, but I’ve gotten so much traffic this year by writing about how long spaghetti sauce lasts in the fridge. Then I take those and do exactly what you just said and link to those posts from all of my spaghetti sauce related content and create this giant web of value. 

Casey Rooney: Google loves you now. 

Megan Porta: My gosh. Yeah. Google favors that big time. So that’s actually what I’m doing right now, 100%. I’m not writing new recipe content. I’m doing all of the non recipe posts that I find on RankIQ that are really low competition, that get ranked on Google, like almost immediately.

Casey Rooney: It’s amazing. Yes. Those posts rank immediately. 

Megan Porta: They do. I know. I’ve had bloggers who, because I talk about this all the time, the strategy. I have some bloggers who do not fight me, but question it. Like, really? Well, maybe it’s because your domain authority is high, Megan. I’m like no. I think that’s the point is that anyone can do this. If it’s a really low competition keyword, you can get on page one within a couple of weeks, honestly, for some of the key phrases I’ve been using.

Casey Rooney: I tell you that my domain authority is 12 right now, and I have outranked a lot of bigger sites by just having better posts. You have to look at the posts that are ranking on number one and write better posts than they’re writing. 

Megan Porta: Yeah, because sometimes I do look just to see what’s there and it’s a really thin post about the topic, but it’s not good at all. I immediately know, okay, I can write better posts than this, and I put my best out there and it goes up to the top, like quicker than you would believe.

Casey Rooney: Another great one too, is side dishes. It’s great for Google. It’s also great for your blog. So side dish posts, if you can find one that you can rank for, are great. For instance, 20 chili recipes on your blog, if you want to do side dishes for chili, you can interlink all those plus in the roundups because the side dish post is basically a roundup, you can put a lot of your recipes like your cornbread in there. You can put a salad, you can put a lot of your own posts in there. So that’s also great. A lot of my side dish posts rank high as well. 

Megan Porta: Same. I have actually tapped into that as well this year. It’s a good way to be able to share your favorite bloggers’ content too. So if you are wondering what to serve with chili, for example, and you know that you have a blogger friend who produces really good quality content, and she has a side dish or two that would go well in your roundup, you can promote their content as well. So, yes. I love that tip. Okay. Is there anything more about that before we move on to your next tip?

Casey Rooney: I think that’s it.

Megan Porta: Okay. So tell us about tip number four. 

Casey Rooney: Number four is probably the hardest one and it’s being willing to adapt, change and pivot. So if you think of us as bloggers and what industry we’re in, we’re in the technology side, the side that everyone doesn’t like, but it is technology-based and we’re also in marketing. How are we going to promote our content and get the word out there? So if you think about those two industries as a whole, they are two of the most volatile dynamic industries. So we just have to be able to change and pivot with the times. I think one of the problems is there’s a lot of bloggers, we don’t think of ourselves as small business owners because we’re in the kitchen with flour on our hands and taking pictures and you’re doing 45 different things. We don’t think of ourselves as a small business owner, but we have to have this mindset at all times that we are a small business owner. For instance, if you had a restaurant and something changed, for instance, there was a beef shortage. You can’t just sit there and cry about it. You have to learn how to adapt and change your menu. Because you can cry about it for a little while, but the next day, you have to wake up and you have to do your job. I think it’s just really important to have that mindset that we just have to be able to change and to expect change and to lean into it. 

Megan Porta: That is the baseline foundation for this entire job, I feel like. Something that a lot of people miss, unfortunately. They get into it a couple of years into it and get so frustrated about an update or a pandemic hits and flips our industry. What are we going to do now? Or what are we focused on now? So I feel like you just touched on something that’s really deep, that if you’re going to start out as a food blogger, it’s something you have to absolutely 100% in your core understand and know in order to move forward and expect success. Because if you have any other expectations, you are going to be disappointed, let down, frustrated and ultimately give up. 

Casey Rooney: Yes, exactly. I always remember you talking about the whole Pinterest thing when you got so much traffic from Pinterest and then almost overnight it changed and I know something like that’s going to happen to me someday. I do know. That’s why we always have to think ahead and think of different income streams and look at you now. If you would’ve just sat there and just given up, you wouldn’t have been here today. 

Megan Porta: Oh gosh. Yeah. Not to say that it’s not frustrating. It is frustrating and you have the permission to feel it and sit with it and be sad and upset, but then you dust yourself off and you move on and you keep moving forward step by step because you will get there. You will find that success you want. But you can’t wallow. 

Casey Rooney: Exactly. Because things can change all the time. Just like we were talking about with social media. Social media is very volatile and things can change all the time. So if you’re relying just on Facebook groups for your traffic and then all of a sudden, for instance, that Facebook group goes away, then if you have nothing else, if you don’t have SEO or Web stories or anything to back you up, then you might throw in the towel.

Megan Porta: I know. It’s so great. Everything you’re talking about today tells me that you were being really proactive and you’re diversifying as far as your focus is, but you’re not spending too much time on any one thing, which I think is so smart. I think you’re going about this in a really smart way. So good for you for seeing all of this and being a relatively new business blogger and doing it anyway. So yes, I just want to give you a virtual high five. You’re amazing. I love your story, Casey. These tips have all been so great. So now, a year later after you just decided to dig in and make this a business and make it work. You’re on Mediavine. So many people are like, Casey, this is amazing and inspiring. What are your last words of inspiration for people who want the same? 

Casey Rooney: I think it’s a quote that it’s from Steve Jobs and he said, “the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” So if you’re a food blogger because you just want to monetize it. I didn’t start wanting to monetize. I started because I love to cook. I love to share. I love to write. That’s why I started, I didn’t start to make money. At the core, we’re not going to love everything we do, obviously everyday as food bloggers, but you have to love the process and you have to love what you do, because if you don’t, things are going to get really hard, really fast. 

Megan Porta: That was so great. What a great way to end. Thank you for sharing your story and just being an example for us and inspiring fellow bloggers. We just appreciate having you and your positivity and your drive in this space. So I just love knowing that you are a part of this community, Casey.

Casey Rooney: You are so welcome and thank you for all your inspiration as well, Megan. 

Megan Porta: Aw, I love that. Thanks for joining me today. We will put together a show notes page for you, Casey. If anyone wants to go look at those, you can go to eatblogtalk.com/getonmyplate. Do you want to share with everyone where they can find you online and on social media?

Casey Rooney: I have a blogging resources guide on my website at getonmyplate.com. There’s just a little tab that says blogging resources, and you can go there or you can find me on Instagram, Get On My Plate. 

Megan Porta: Awesome. Since I did mention RankIQ so much in the episode, you guys can also learn how to sign up for RankIQ through my resources page. So that would be eatblogtalk.com/resources and sign up for RankIQ. You can go month to month. It’s $49 a month, I believe. So worth it, in my opinion. I could go on and on about all of the success and page views I’ve gotten in 2021 because of that tool. So 100% worthwhile checking that out. So again, thank you, Casey. Have a wonderful rest of your day. Thanks for joining me. Thank you for listening today, food bloggers. I will see you in the next episode. 

Outro: We’re glad you could join us on this episode of Eat Blog Talk. For more resources based on today’s discussion, as well as show notes and an opportunity to be on a future episode of the show, be sure to head to eatblogtalk.com. If you feel that hunger for information, we’ll be here to feed you on Eat Blog Talk. 


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Megan
Megan

Megan started her food blog Pip and Ebby in 2010 and food blogging has been her full-time career since 2013. Her passion for blogging has grown into an intense desire to help fellow food bloggers find the information, insight, and community they need in order to find success.

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