Episode 785: The Smarter Way to Grow in 2026 (That Has Nothing to Do with Google) With Zhen Zhou

EBT785 – Zhen Zhou

Intro 00:00

Food bloggers. Hi, how are you today? Thank you so much for tuning in to the Eat Blog Talk podcast. This is the place for food bloggers to get information and inspiration to accelerate your blog’s growth, and ultimately help you to achieve your freedom. Whether that’s financial, personal, or professional. I’m Megan Porta. I have been a food blogger for 13 years, so I understand how isolating food blogging can be. I’m on a mission to motivate, inspire, and most importantly, let each and every food blogger, including you, know that you are heard and supported. 

[00:00:00]  Megan Porta 

If you have felt the roller coaster of blogging lately, this episode will feel like a deep breath and a strategy session all in one. Zhen Zhou of Greedy Girl Gourmet shares how she went from a 200,000 traffic crash to rebuilding stronger. With multiple blogs, a new platform focus, and a brilliant system for creator collaboration, she opens up about life post HCU.

She talks about smart ways to diversify traffic and drops a powerful mindset shift around AI that completely changed my outlook for 2026. Stay tuned to the end to hear this awesome nugget. This episode is filled with practical tips and real encouragement.

[00:00:46]  Intro

Hi food bloggers, I’m Megan Porta and this is Eat Blog Talk. Your space for support, inspiration, and strategies to grow your blog and your freedom.Whether that’s personal, professional, or financial, you are not alone on this journey. 

[00:00:53] Megan Porta

Hello, Zhen. So grateful to have you back on the podcast. How have you been? How are you today?

[00:01:05]  Zhen Zhou 

Hi, Megan. Thanks for having me back. It’s really great to be back. It’s been a while. I think three years.

[00:01:11]  Megan Porta 

Yes, it has been a while. Yeah. Different topic today. Much different topic. And I am…

[00:01:19]  Zhen Zhou 

Different times.

[00:01:20]  Megan Porta 

Yes, different times. I’m so excited to learn from your journey. Like, I feel like the past two years has brought such a different journey for every single food blogger. It’s been so individualized and different for each person. So we’re gonna get your journey today, what happened during the HCU and after and all of that.But before we get into that, what pain point would you say this episode is solving for people?

[00:01:48]  Zhen Zhou 

So I think this episode will be about how blogging is like a real roller coaster these days. You know, one minute you’re up, one minute you’re down. And the updates are just so frequent these days. But I’m not sure I have a solution for anyone. I mean, I’m happy to talk about how I have written or tried to ride the wave, but I do think in these times, if anyone can tell you, oh, I have a solution for this, I think to me it seems a bit inauthentic because I don’t think anyone has any solution.

[00:02:14]  Megan Porta 

Right. But we do have one.

[00:02:16]  Zhen Zhou 

Science fits all. Yes, right, right, right.

[00:02:18]  Megan Porta 

But we do have journeys that we can share, which you are doing today, and we appreciate that so much. So, to kind of frame our talk, will you tell us a little bit about your blog?

[00:02:27]  Zhen Zhou 

So my blog is an Asian food blog. When we met in 2022 or something like that, I had just sort of gotten serious and, you know, end of 2021, then I made it into MediaVine 2022 and, you know, things were going, I mean, in the right direction, so I was quite happy with it.

[00:02:46]   

And then we all know what happened in 2023. And then since then, I’ve had to sort of relook at how I blog, but. And it’s actually shifting away from Asian recipes. It’s not so obvious on the site yet, but I have sort of. I am rebranding.

[00:03:05]  Megan Porta 

Okay, so what’s your rebrand going to be?

[00:03:08]  Zhen Zhou 

Okay, so actually, my corporate background before the blog was in branding communications. So, you know, you have thought that when I started the blog, I would be all about the brand, but in those days, there was so much nice, easy Google traffic that paid really well when you went off brand. So it was about Asian recipes, but it wasn’t really very on brand all the time.

[00:03:28]   

And I think with the HCU, we now know that we cannot depend on this nice, easy traffic. So we really need to know our reason for being here and also having a reason that other people can connect to. It’s not just about, I want to make an Asian recipe and you’ve given me the recipe, but I think it’s more about a connection and a community.

[00:03:46]   

So my blog, so. Sorry, this. That was a very long winded answer. But my blog is about Cooking for One. So because I’m single, so I often cook for one person myself. And, you know, I like to help all the other people who cook just for themselves, you know, find easy to cook nutritious recipes.

[00:04:03]   

Because I think when you just cook for yourself, you kind of get quite tired and you sometimes just don’t make any effort, and it’s just like really easy, but unhealthy meals. Yeah, yeah. And also, I think by knowing that there are lots of other people like you out there, it helps with this feeling that you’re not alone, which people can struggle with if they’re cooking for one.

[00:04:23]  Megan Porta 

Right. Oh, I love that. And are your Cooking for One recipes mostly Asian inspired, or do you go outside of that now?

[00:04:29]  Zhen Zhou 

So I’m still in this sort of rebranding process because now I have to go through all the recipes to make sure they can be cooked for one. So the first step would be to obviously repurpose what’s on the blog so it will be more Asian focused, but then eventually it would move out to encompass other recipes because, you know, the focus would be about a community of people just cooking for themselves.

[00:04:50]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:04:51]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah. Thank you.

[00:04:52]  Megan Porta 

Good for you. I think that. I think it’s really brave to do this right now because it feels so scary. Right. Like, I had my brand, I had my niche, and now I have to change. That just feels like such an undertaking.

[00:05:05]  Zhen Zhou 

Scary. But I’m quite fun as well.

[00:05:09]  Megan Porta 

Yes.

[00:05:10]  Zhen Zhou 

It’s a different direction.

[00:05:11]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, no, it’s fun to see that it’s working and that you’re actually serving people and there’s a connection point. Right. So that’s great. Well, thank you for giving us that background. And now you mentioned the HCU. So how heavily did your blog get hit by the HCU?

[00:05:30]  Zhen Zhou 

So, initially, I wasn’t sure if I was hit. And I think, you know, what? If you’re not sure if you hit, you were not hit. Because when I got hit, I knew I was hit.

[00:05:40]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:05:40]  Zhen Zhou 

So I think the hit came in around March 2024. Okay. Yeah. And it was hit pretty bad, I think. I mean, I really stopped looking at numbers because, you know, Google just keeps updating so often it’s kind of lost its meaning. So I just kind of look at income now. So my income was, like, went down 70% for quite a while and, you know, was just, like, meandering, and it didn’t seem to have much hope.

[00:06:01]   

The good thing was that I think. I don’t know if I had really done this when we spoke, but before hdu, I kind of planned to diversify because I was worried that, you know, about having my eggs in one basket. So I’d started a travel blog. So actually, I now have three blogs. And the reason for doing that was I felt that recipes might be a bit more hit by updates in AI.

[00:06:23]   

And so the good news was that when the food blog was hit, the travel blog went up. Not stratospherically, but enough that at least it helped to offset some of that loss of income. And then, so the blog was hit, and then it slowly started recovering. But to be honest, by the time I was kind of off the food blog, so I wasn’t really paying attention, but I was just like, you know, I was just doing the minimum to keep it running, but without much direction because I wasn’t really sure what was working.

[00:06:50]   

And then this year, I actually decided to move to Raptive. So they had actually approached me back in 2023. But at that time, I was so grateful to MediaVine, you know, and they’re so wonderful that I just wanted to stay with them and whatnot. But then by. By this year, I was like, you know, my income is just so low.

[00:07:08]   

You know, I should just see what. What I can do to switch it up. And so at that time I couldn’t qualify for the real Raptive. There was a, I think, was it 25,000 or something? Like, you know, that was a lower requirement.

[00:07:21]  Megan Porta 

50, I think. Well, 100 is the normal.

[00:07:24]  Zhen Zhou 

Okay. Yeah. So it was. So I had the 50 and I applied. But I guess in the process what I was doing sort of worked because suddenly they told me actually I have hit the real Raptive requirements. Okay. So because, you know, I told you I wasn’t tracking, so I didn’t even realize.

[00:07:38]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:07:40]  Zhen Zhou 

And so I mean, I count that as a semi recovery, I guess.

[00:07:44]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. Yeah. So you fell back quite a bit and then you gained enough to get on to Raptive and so.

[00:07:51]  Zhen Zhou 

And then they cut the requirements so you don’t need it anyway.

[00:07:54]  Megan Porta 

Right. So you’re. How long ago was that and where are you today? Are you. Obviously you’re kind of digging into your niche more. So you’re more active. Are you giving as much attention to your travel, your other blogs, travel blog and your other one as you are to your food blog?

[00:08:12]  Zhen Zhou 

So I can’t remember when I reached out to Raptive again because there were some tech issues with getting my, my site vetted. So actually I wanted to to move the other one as well because the other one qualified. But you know, like, you know, they need to look at your site but the stats weren’t showing up.So there was some time before when I emailed them and when I onboarded, but I joined them 3rd of October.

[00:08:34]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:08:34]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah. And regarding attention. Oh, thank you. Regarding attention. It’s a bit hard. So one tip I do have for people who would want to start more than one blog is that if I could do it again, even though, I mean, I think I did hit my goal with the diversification, it does take a lot more to have blogs in different niches because it’s a totally different set of skills.

[00:08:57]   

You monetize differently, you do your Pinterest differently. So it’s actually might be more efficient and effective to just have the second blog in the same niche but diversify the way you earn money.

[00:09:07]  Megan Porta 

Right.

[00:09:07]  Zhen Zhou 

If that makes sense. Or the way you get traffic.

[00:09:10]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, yeah. So if you could go back, you would have more food blogs probably. So your third blog. Is your third blog also a travel blog or what is that one?

[00:09:18]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah.

[00:09:18]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:09:19]  Zhen Zhou 

The third blog is also travel. Just because I happen to be spending time in the UK and I was just like, I’m here so often, I should really do something with this. And it’s well, it’s. It’s sort of about the uk, But I’m also using it sort of like a testing blog. So I’m actually.

[00:09:34]   

I’ve actually. Okay. Launched some digital products. And so the third blog is kind of like I’m using it to test using Pinterest to get traffic for the digital products.

[00:09:45]  Megan Porta 

Okay, so you’re kind of testing different things.

[00:09:48]  Zhen Zhou 

All over the place.

[00:09:49]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. You’re doing different things on different blogs to see what works. And then if something works on one, like if the digital product experiment works on that one blog, do you then carry it over to your others?

[00:10:03]  Zhen Zhou 

I think it would depend because some things you. You can’t quite carry over. But if it’s something that could be carried over, then I would. But I. I mean, I guess one thing that we all know is that, you know, what I do for the travel blog is that if something’s working, I just double down on that. And, you know, I obviously do that for my food blog as well.

[00:10:21]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. Right. Okay. So HCU hit. I mean, that was devastating for a lot of people, you included. So now you have three blogs that you’re running. How did the traffic go? Like, as far as I know, you were probably getting Google traffic. So how did you deal with that? Did you diversify platforms?

[00:10:42]  Zhen Zhou 

This is for the food blog, right? Yes, yes. So actually, I had been planning to diversify to Pinterest for quite a long time, but it wasn’t really pressing because I was still getting Google traffic, and then it became pressing. So I think in, you know, the questionnaire we fill out to for this podcast, I mentioned that I took seven Pinterest courses or mastermind group things.So I, you know, really double, you know, I waffled with this idea and then I doubled down on it.

[00:11:09]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. And how did that go? Did you come away just learning a ton about Pinterest?

[00:11:15]  Zhen Zhou 

I think I’ve learned a lot more about it. Not as much as I would have hoped. Not that I didn’t learn much, but as in, you know, obviously we all learn. Go for these things and hope that tomorrow we’re going to be a 10 million Pinterest blogger. I am not. Yeah. But I do think I know more.

[00:11:32]   

So before that, I think Pinterest was just like throwing spaghetti at a wall. And it still is to me, like throwing spaghetti at a wall. But now it’s a controlled wall, so at least we’re throwing at specific parts of the wall rather than just, you know, everywhere. The ceiling, the floor, and just not sure what’s Working.

[00:11:46]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. So are you willing to share some pieces of what you learned from your Pinterest experiments?

[00:11:55]  Zhen Zhou 

Happy to. But, like, you know, I have to preface this by saying I’m not a Pinterest expert. In fact, my account is a bit anemic at the moment, but that’s actually related to the tip that I want to share, which is I think, you know, everyone always says it’s about the niche, which is true, but in a way, to me, that was a bit too general.

[00:12:13]   

It’s also about, like, your sub niche. So, like, when you think recipes, everyone thinks that, oh, Q4, we should all do do amazingly. Right. But actually my blog always does terribly in December for Christmas. And then it didn’t really make sense to me until after I took the courses and I started, you know, committing and delving down. 

And then I realized that if you look at trends for Asian recipes, they’re very, you know, it’s on the downward line to Christmas. So that kind of makes sense that, well, my blog is on the downward line to Christmas. And then I sort of fact check this by checking some other people in the Asian space.
 

And I noticed, well, okay, everyone is down during this time zone.

[00:12:47]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:12:48]  Zhen Zhou 

So I don’t know if that’s a tip, but I guess, you know, what I’m just trying to say is that you need to be more niche down than just, oh, I am a food blog.

[00:12:55]  Megan Porta 

Right, right. And other people’s paths, even if it’s a common path, doesn’t mean that it should be your path. Yeah. Okay. So what did you learn that you feel could maybe benefit other food bloggers listening about Pinterest?

[00:13:11]  Zhen Zhou 

I think another thing that I learned was that, well, two things. One, it’s so important to have a system. It might not be important if you are naturally very organized. I am not naturally very organized, as you might have gathered from this chat. So, you know, building a system really helped me with being consistent on Pinterest.

[00:13:32]   

And, you know, the courses I took helped with that. And this leads to the other point, which I think is you need to know what you’re struggling with with Pinterest. Are you struggling that you don’t know what makes Pinterest tick? You know, you don’t know how it works, or, you know, you don’t know how to build a system that makes you consistent.

[00:13:47]   

So. Oh, I’m sorry. I’m going to do a little plug here and you can cut it out if it’s not allowed. So I do have a review post on the seven courses I took, which obviously is an affiliate post. But I’m also very honest about what did not work, because I think not every course works for everyone because different.

[00:14:01]   

All the teachers kind of say similar things, but focusing on different things that, you know, different people struggle with. So some are more about the qualitative, like understanding how Pinterest works, and others are more like data and factual. So then it’s more about how to build your system and scale up.

[00:14:17]  Megan Porta 

Okay, and you. So you have a resource for this? Is that what you said?

[00:14:21]  Zhen Zhou 

Oh, I have a blog post for this.

[00:14:22]  Megan Porta 

Oh, you have a blog post. Yeah, we’d love to share that. We’ll put that in the show notes. Just send it our way and we can. I think anything that can help people with Pinterest right now because what you said earlier, throwing spaghetti at the wall, a lot of people feel like that, and a lot of people don’t feel that control that you mentioned.

[00:14:38]   

Like, oh, at least the wall’s controlled. I think that’s hit or miss. So anything that can help.

[00:14:45]  Zhen Zhou 

Well, I do have to preface this. Like, you know, I said to people, I cannot promise that tomorrow everyone’s going to hit millions of views. I think what works for me is that now I can sort of minimize the effort that goes into Pinterest. Like, I think I’ve sort of planned out to June and then, you know, so, like, less work.

[00:15:00]   

I’m okay willing to accept that I don’t get as many clicks, but at least I’m getting. I have like three or four times more clicks than I used to before I started this, and less of effort, which is really okay.

[00:15:10]  Megan Porta 

So you’ve mentioned systems a few times. What exactly do you mean by that when it comes to Pinterest? Like, are you talking about just batching and getting things ready, doing research? What kind of systems do you have in place?

[00:15:23]  Zhen Zhou 

I mean, all that is part of a system. But I also do things like, I mean, so before that, my. I had no system with Pinterest. And so, like, you know, some posts were never pinned. Some posts were pinned multiple times. Most pins did not have. Most posts did not have any pins.

[00:15:40]   

So, I mean, for me, a system was really starting from ground zero, but with hundreds of posts. So, you know, making sure that every post that can do well on Pinterest has a grow, you know, has a grow pin. You know, that pin that you can pin from your post and also, like, checking that, you know, have I given this post enough time, enough chances to be successful, or is it.

[00:16:02]   

I just pinned it Once and then it didn’t work and I forgot about it. And then also like, if it is a performing post. So I have this, I built this system now where when the pin is, you know, when the last pin scheduled pin is coming in like two weeks, it will send me a reminder so that I don’t have to keep checking, if that makes sense.

[00:16:18]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:16:18]  Zhen Zhou 

So every week it just sends me like next month all these posts will, will expire and I just look and see which ones I want to continue pinning and which ones I don’t.

[00:16:27]  Megan Porta 

So if a pin starts doing really well for you, takes off and maybe gives you a lot of traffic, do you double down on that in any way?

[00:16:37]  Zhen Zhou 

I do double down on that, yeah.

[00:16:39]  Megan Porta 

And how, how do you do that? Do you just create other pins or what do you do?

[00:16:44]  Zhen Zhou 

So a couple of ways. But again, I want to tell everyone, you know, I’m not a Pinterest expert.

[00:16:48]  Megan Porta 

So you don’t need to be. You’re just a content creator utilizing Pinterest. We get it. Yeah.

[00:16:56]  Zhen Zhou 

So what I do is, yeah, if it is doing well, I make sure that, you know, it is scheduled out for the foreseeable future. And also then I kind of look at the themes of the performing posts and then try and identify other posts on this theme and then, you know, pin those.

[00:17:09]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Yeah, that’s, that’s a great strategy. Just if something is doing well, it’s doing well for a reason. And it could be the category of food or the type of recipe, it could be a one person meal or whatever. So doing expanding.

[00:17:24]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah, there’s all that variability with interest. So that’s part of the system as well. So I kind of need to make sure I know what I was testing for so then I know when it worked because, you know, I might have tested that this was a chicken recipe or it was an appetizer recipe.

[00:17:36]   

And then I pinned all the chicken, but the chicken didn’t take off. But I pinned all the appetizers and the appetizers just took off, if you know what I mean.

[00:17:42]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, right. Okay. I love that. And then is there. Okay, I was going to ask you about Google, but first I want to make sure we get as much juice out of Pinterest as possible. Is there anything else about Pinterest that you think would be helpful for others to hear?

[00:17:58]  Zhen Zhou 

I think it’s about the funnel. So, you know, I think when I hear a lot of bloggers and myself also talk about Pinterest, it’s just like we want all these clicks, clicks, clicks. Of course, I’m not complaining if they give me tons of clicks, but actually if you have a funnel, the value of just 10 pills clicks might be so much more to you than, you know, 10,000 clicks to someone else.

[00:18:16]   

And, you know, a funnel by which I mean, you know, obviously we capture that email and hopefully we sell them something so that, you know. Because I think we all know that the ad money is sort of not what it used to be.

[00:18:30]  Megan Porta 

Yes. So talk us through a funnel example.

[00:18:35]  Zhen Zhou 

So I mean, I have. This is quite new to me. I’ve just sort of, you know, started it because I with my digital products thing. So it’s kind of getting people interest, you know, using Pinterest to get the people target the people interested in the theme of my digital products. So if it’s okay to share about those digital products.

[00:18:54]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, definitely. Yep.

[00:18:56]  Zhen Zhou 

Because it’s kind of related. So. So I chat three. So one is this food blogger motivational sticker quotes, whatever line. And this is just like a friend project. I really don’t think it’s going to sell much, but it’s just like a stress reliever, you know, so it might be like a, you know, a I can’t cook, you know, which is like a pun on I can’t cook kind of sticker for.

[00:19:16]   

Because I think a lot of food bloggers are really pissed at the moment.

[00:19:18]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:19:19]  Zhen Zhou 

You know, so like I have one on my computer, that kind of thing. And then my other line is like, because my background’s in literature, so it’s about literary digital products. And then the third one is the third and fourth about Asian food and Singapore related products.

[00:19:33]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:19:34]  Zhen Zhou 

So the literal literature one’s kind of tied to the English travel blog. So for example, with the English travel blog, I might do like a travel itinerary for Jane Austen fans. So then, you know, I’ve sort of, you know, targeted people who are interested in Jane Austen. So then, you know, hopefully when they come to the blog, they might sign up for my email list and then I can send them products about Jane Austen.

[00:19:55]  Megan Porta 

Gotcha. Okay. So giving, I mean, you really do have to give it some forethought. I mean, all funnels require a little bit of forethought, like what is leading to what and why. And not just throwing things up on Pinterest like we did for so long. Right. Like giving it sitting down and giving it a little bit of thought.

[00:20:14]  Zhen Zhou 

I mean, we could still do that. It’s just not gonna bring as much money as it used to. And if we, you know, give the thought and do it with a funnel. I mean, like a product. Maybe I could earn, like, 10 to 30 bucks in one click. I get, like, I don’t know, 1000 of my RPM.

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[00:21:38]  Megan Porta

Anything else for Pinterest you want to mention?

[00:21:42]  Zhen Zhou 

I have, like, so many. So I really went really obsessive with Pinterest and I have so many books and binders when I was going through, and now I’ve kind of just, like, taken a step back because I’ve got the running, so I can’t think of anything specific. But if you ask questions, I might have something.

[00:21:55]  Megan Porta 

Okay, I guess. Let’s see. What’s a common question? What if somebody is kind of doing the same pin creation over and over and not putting forethought into it, just kind of putting up those wild pins like we talked about, and they’re just not seeing any traction. Is there something to look at with this, the pins and descriptions and the way they’re putting them onto Pinterest specifically, that they can change?

[00:22:24]  Zhen Zhou 

Well, so, I mean, if we are doing the same thing over and over again and it’s not seeing results. So my horse riding instructor always used to tell me, you know, if you keep pressing the switch and the light doesn’t turn on, you have to stop pressing the switch and change the light bulb.

[00:22:36]   

So do something different. So, I mean, if it was me, the first thing I would look at, I think, is the content. Is the content really suitable for Pinterest? Like, I think this default is that we think a recipe is suitable for Pinterest. But not all recipes are really going to do well on Pinterest because with Google we could be a bit lazy and like, even if it wasn’t like a US targeted recipe, it could still get traffic.

[00:22:58]   

But with Pinterest, if your recipe doesn’t, isn’t, you know, targeting us, the US audience, you really are not going to, you’re not going to see that much traffic. You’ll see some, but not the numbers that make Pinterest worth it.

[00:23:12]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, yeah. I mean that’s a good concept just to have on our radar. Is like if, if it’s not working, do something that’s different. Like change up the way your pin looks, change the way. Like you mentioned, maybe it’s the wrong content. I always. Here’s something I used to do all the time was I would take a photo and put it on a pin and if it didn’t work, I would zoom way, way in.

[00:23:34]   

Because Pinterest users love that super, super close, almost uncomfortably close food shot. And I would zoom way in, like, oh, this feels so weird. But people would actually like that sometimes, depending on the food. So try, just try something different. Right?

[00:23:54]  Zhen Zhou 

Yep.

[00:23:54]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:23:56]  Zhen Zhou 

Of what you were trying.

[00:23:57]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, yeah, right, right. Yes. I love that. Let’s see what other Pinterest questions. I think that’s one that I hear a lot is just, I’m doing the same thing over and over and it’s not working. And then outside of just getting Pinterest traffic, you kind of covered that maybe thinking through a funnel and freebies and digital products.

[00:24:19]   

So I don’t know. I think that’s. That’s about it.

[00:24:25]  Zhen Zhou 

Another that is.

[00:24:26]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, go ahead.

[00:24:27]  Zhen Zhou 

I don’t know if it’s a tip or whatever, but like, so I think when I first started Pinterest, I sort of followed this sort of guru. She’s not one of the people I bought a course for and she is actually very knowledgeable and a lot of people have done well with her, but it didn’t work for me.

[00:24:41]   

And I think she’s probably doesn’t have much experience with recipes on Pinterest. So I think if you are going to follow guru or pay for a course, make sure that they have an experience in your niche. So to be concrete, like, so for the. So when I started Pinterest I thought, well, I mean, it seems to me quite intuitive that roundups would do well on Pinterest.

[00:24:58]   

So I asked her this question and she was like, well, you know, let’s do a search and check Which I agree with. Do a search and check what’s ranking. Okay. I don’t see roundups, so I don’t think you should do roundups. So for the longest time I didn’t do any roundups on Pinterest.

[00:25:08]   

Yeah. And then someone asked her. So sometime after someone asked her, you know, was complaining about this AI and she was like, I don’t see any AI recipes on Pinterest. So. And we all know.

[00:25:18]  Megan Porta 

Wow, you know. Yeah.

[00:25:20]  Zhen Zhou 

So I think, yeah, make sure that whoever you are following has experience in that niche that you’re in.

[00:25:24]  Megan Porta 

I think that is solid advice because. Yeah, like what? No AI and oh my gosh. Okay, I want to ask about Google. So obviously your Google traffic went down. What is your focus like now for Google? Are you giving it any attention at all?

[00:25:43]  Zhen Zhou 

So for my third blog, I have not even set up Google Analytics yet. So no, I have not. I’m not really giving Google much thought. I mean I still do, you know, because we all got into sort of a way of doing things. So I’m sure I still unconsciously do some stuff but I’m not subscribed to any keywords programs or anything at the moment.

[00:26:01]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:26:01]  Zhen Zhou 

And I do still go for events though because ahrefs the basis in Singapore so they do hold seminars. So I do go for them.

[00:26:08]  Megan Porta 

Oh good. And do you, I mean do you take away much from those? What do you learn from them?

[00:26:14]  Zhen Zhou 

Yes and no. It depends on the, the quality can vary quite widely. But the last one they did a collaboration with HubSpot which I thought was, you know, which was very interesting. If you want I can briefly share what’s about. I actually did.

[00:26:28]  Megan Porta 

Amazing, that would be great.

[00:26:29]  Zhen Zhou 

Share a post on this on Facebook about what’s about. But so I think basically they were talking obviously about, you know, Geo AEO and they were talking about fan out queries. So they were saying like we have to go really, really long tail and answer and that’s how we get into the aeogo and answer those really, you know, detailed ones and then, you know, get on the radar.

[00:26:52]   

But I think, and it was mentioned during the web the, the conference that you know, if you, you, if you used to produce content for ad money, you might not find it so worthwhile doing that now.

[00:27:04]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Yeah. And then how often do, do they host these events regularly or is. Was this like a one time or. You said multiple times, right? You’ve been to a few.

[00:27:17]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah, so they do hold them several times a year but it’s not like on the regular schedule. So some are paid, some are free. I know they have a conference coming up this year.

[00:27:27]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:27:27]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah, but it’s not like I could tell you they do it, you know, first week of every month or something like that.

[00:27:31]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. What is your attention to social media? Have you given that any attention after the hcu?

[00:27:40]  Zhen Zhou 

Not really.

[00:27:41]  Megan Porta 

Okay.

[00:27:41]  Zhen Zhou 

Not much. But I do think that, you know, for this cooking for one, I think Instagram is like a natural place to be doing these. I cook for one and then cook along and whatnot kind of videos. So I will have to start doing something there.

[00:27:53]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Yeah. And what about YouTube and video in general?

[00:27:57]  Zhen Zhou 

I started a YouTube channel a while back because I. And I did think it was a very good fit for. For travel, but I wasn’t really consistent. I haven’t really been posting any good content there, but I obviously will plan to this year. I did actually start on Facebook this year, so that’s actually related to the Mastermind that I was telling you about in the interview form.

[00:28:18]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:28:19]  Zhen Zhou 

Should I talk the readers through this?

[00:28:20]  Megan Porta 

Yes, let’s do that. Yes, absolutely. Go for it.

[00:28:24]  Zhen Zhou 

Cool. So, you know, as I’m sure all the bloggers out there know, blogging can be very lonely. And you’re just by yourself at home all day and you have no one to talk to and none of your friends understand what you’re talking about. Like, one of my friends was like, why don’t you go and be a teacher?

[00:28:35]   

I’m like, this even related to blogging?

[00:28:38]  Megan Porta 

What? Yeah, yeah.

[00:28:41]  Zhen Zhou 

So to combat this, I started this Facebook group called I Can’t even remember what it’s called. Connecting. Connecting bloggers or something like that. And then we used to do these zoom calls where we would talk through a topic and whatnot. It’s just nice to talk to people and discuss some stuff. But then after hcu, I did notice that the interest in the calls were going down, so I haven’t helped them as often.

[00:29:05]   

But I’ve been doing a lot of in person meets in the UK and I plan to do a conference, a retreat in the uk, so something we can talk about later. Because you asked me about the Mastermind. So anyway, in this Facebook group I asked about this Mastermind thing. So this was actually inspired by Carly Campbell.

[00:29:22]   

So on one of her podcast interviews she kind of shared how she got into Pinterest, which was that, I think. And Karlie, if you do listen and I have misphrased you, please forgive me. But what I took away from your interview was that you bought a course and you know, after that, you and your classmates decided to each master one platform and then teach each other.

[00:29:42]   

And I thought this was such a great way, especially, you know, in 25, 2025, when we’re all trying to minimize our expenditure. So then I asked in this Facebook group, you know, would anyone like to do this, where we all pick a platform and then we just meet regularly to teach each other.

[00:29:54]   

So as is usual with these kind of things, like 10 people signed up, and then obviously they all dropped by the wayside. But I was very lucky and I got two committed people and, you know, and they were amazing people, and they’ve shown up every week. So that’s three of us. And one lady teaches about Facebook and she gets like 20,000 Facebook clicks organically with minimal effort.

[00:30:12]   

So she’s been sharing about that. So I have tried, I’ve experimented with Facebook, but I haven’t really worked out a system to track, you know, my clicks or whatnot. But I have noticed that I am getting a little bit of money from Facebook, so I guess something is working.

[00:30:27]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Wow. I love that structure. Just having one person dedicated to learning a specific platform and then sharing it with everyone else, that is so smart. And you guys are still meeting, Is that right?

[00:30:40]  Zhen Zhou 

The three of you yesterday.

[00:30:42]  Megan Porta 

Oh, you did? Okay, so what is your platform of choice? Is it Pinterest?

[00:30:47]  Zhen Zhou 

No, mine was email. So that’s the other thing I was focusing on last year.

[00:30:52]  Megan Porta 

Okay, that’s amazing. So what have you learned about email that you can shed light on for us?

[00:30:58]  Zhen Zhou 

So personally, for me, I found email very technical. So when I was setting it up, I had a lot of problems. Like I had an automation that couldn’t get sent, and I, you know, I don’t know what was happening. So I think with email, you have to be quite systematic. And in the beginning, don’t be too ambitious.

[00:31:16]   

Don’t have so many automations going out, and then you get confused about which ones have gone to which subscribers. So right now what I do is I kind of jot down what’s happening. Like, you know, lead magnet one goes into which group, and then after that welcome sequence ends, it goes into a forever sequence.

[00:31:31]   

So that way I can make sure that, you know, this group is not getting multiple emails on the same day. And then to expedite things, what I do is so I have a forever series, let’s say 13 emails, and then I just duplicate it for Forever Series 2. So when Forever Series 1, they just go back to Forever Series 2, which is essentially the same content but just pruned out of the non performing links and also with new titles, if that makes sense.So that for me helped me expedite the email creation.

[00:32:01]  Megan Porta 

Yeah, streamlining. It seems like you’re really efficient with the way you move through things and learn, which is.

[00:32:07]  Zhen Zhou 

I’m not efficient at all. I’m trying to be efficient.

[00:32:10]  Megan Porta 

Well, you sound efficient. I think give yourself a little bit of credit for that because that’s, that’s efficient working. What you just described.

[00:32:19]  Zhen Zhou 

I’m trying to be. Because I’m not naturally efficient. So we have to work very hard to be efficient.

[00:32:22]  Megan Porta 

Yeah. Food bloggers do. Because there’s too much to manage. Right. I had another question for you. So email, I guess just is there anything, I mean, obviously if email was your subject, you know a lot about it, but is there anything overarching that you just feel like could help people? Regarding email, aside from what you just mentioned.

[00:32:42]  Zhen Zhou 

One thing that has worked for me was like doing an email challenge. So for example, for my travel site, it’s not download my lead magnet, you know, and give me your email. It’s do you want to plan a holiday together? You know, and then I drip them the email. The emails over five days or 10 days or you know, however long this challenge runs and the doing. Running it that way actually tripled my open. No, my click through rate.

[00:33:09]  Megan Porta 

Oh my gosh. Yeah, tripled. That’s.

[00:33:12]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah, tripled. Yeah. And there were no unsubscribes, unlike two when I did it the other way. And you know, so with the food, I tried print pass and you know, other ways of getting email addresses, which I think is killing my unsubscribe rate.

[00:33:24]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Amazing. So it seems like since HCU you’ve just been thinking a little bit differently. Like obviously Google is not your one stop shop anymore. You’re thinking outside the box. Not just with platforms but with the ways that you learn and strategies and just experimenting and trying new things. Is that right?

[00:33:48]  Zhen Zhou 

Yeah, I guess. You know, when things are moving in the right direction, you’re working very hard, but you can get bit complacent as well.

[00:33:54]  Megan Porta 

Yeah.

[00:33:55]  Zhen Zhou 

And now I feel like nobody can ever be complacent. And to me, I feel like you kind of need to have like 10 side hustles now because it seems like every stream is going to bring in less than it used to. So for me, I want to have as many side hustles as possible and.

[00:34:08]  Megan Porta 

Maybe one of those side hustles will unexpectedly take off. You just don’t know. Right. So yes, yeah, the experimenting is huge going into 2026. I think just having that mindset, like not relying on one or two even things anymore. Those days are gone, sadly. What else have you learned from your experience with the HCU? Anything that we haven’t touched on that you think would be really helpful for people?

[00:34:35]  Zhen Zhou 

Well, I mean, I don’t know if it’s, you know, that I won’t have learned about it pre HCU, but that, you know, it might have not been imperative with before HCU, which was, I think we discussed, which was about the branding. I think now more than ever, you know, you really need to know because you need people to come to you.

[00:34:53]   

You can’t just wait for them to find you on Google. You need people to actively type your name in the browser or whatnot. So you need to know why your blog exists beyond just I’m giving you a recipe. So you know, for example, for myself, it was not just Asian recipe but like, you know, the act of eating isn’t for Asian people, is an act of community. And so that’s my community in cooking for one angle.

[00:35:17]  Megan Porta 

Okay. Yeah, yeah. I think that is so important too right now, just getting to the bottom of it. You’re not just throwing out recipes for Google traffic anymore. You have to understand why you’re doing this. Like what is the ultimate reason? Right.

[00:35:32]  Zhen Zhou 

Oh, and can I just say something about this branding thing? I think like when a lot of people talk about branding in blogging, I sometimes not to be roll my eyes a bit because they will talk about the logo and the colors and whatnot and that is still not what a brand is about.

[00:35:45]   

I mean, that’s how your brand is expressed. But you kind of need to know what your brand stands for before you think about am I a yellow color or blue color? I think you need to think about yourself and your audience. What can you authentically promise your customers that they will come to you?

[00:36:01]   

For for example, I’m not a mom, so it’s no use saying I’m going to do 30 minute family recipes because no one’s going to buy that. Right? Yeah, right.

[00:36:09]  Megan Porta 

Exactly. Yes. Well, I think this has been really helpful for me just to think through, you know, what these last few years have looked like and what the landscape is like now and kind of how to move forward in a successful way. And I just have to give you props too. Good job.

[00:36:27]   

Nice work for keeping at it and staying in the game and not letting everything break you because it’s been really easy to crumble. These last few years, I’ve seen people just, just, oh, my gosh, lose steam and want to throw it in, throw in the towel. And people have thrown in the towel. So nice work figuring it out. I think you’re amazing.

[00:36:50]  Zhen Zhou 

Thank you. And I would say that actually I think you have one of the strongest brands in the food blogging space. You know, your blog’s all about, I mean, your brand’s all about, you know, to me, connecting people. You know, you have the retreat, you have the podcast, you have the mastermind. You know, it’s about helping, building this community of people and whatnot. So, yeah, to me, I’ve always looked up to your brand in this space.

[00:37:09]  Megan Porta 

Oh, thank you. Goodness, that was. That was really sweet. I really appreciate that. Well, on that sweet note, we must say goodbye. Zhen, it was lovely to talk to you today. So grateful for your words and for your value that you shared today. So thank you for joining us. We appreciate you so much.

[00:37:30]  Zhen Zhou 

Thank you for having me.

[00:37:31]  Megan Porta 

So, to end, if you had to give people listening food bloggers mostly one piece of advice or tip, what would it be?

[00:37:41]  Zhen Zhou 

So when I was last on this call, we had this quote. So I had prepared this quote and that would be my tip, which is that let your actions be decided by your hopes and not your fears. Because I think this is a very fearful time for bloggers.

[00:37:55]  Megan Porta 

Yes, I love that. Hopes, not fears. It’s not always easy, but you can do it. You guys can do it. You’re listening. You’re here listening, showing up. So we have faith in you, right, Jen?

[00:38:06]  Zhen Zhou 

And not to be a Pollyanna, but also, I mean, I do get very annoyed and like, you know, I bitch to everyone. But then when you think about it, AI is going to go after everyone’s jobs. And in a way, we’re lucky that it came after ours first because now we have more time to think about how we are going to exist in this new world.You know, more time than other people to get ready.

[00:38:26]  Megan Porta 

I love that perspective. Oh, gosh, I’m going to carry that through my year. I absolutely loved that. Okay, well, on that note, we’re going to put together a show notes page for you, Jen. And we did mention a URL in the middle of the episode. We’ll include that and everything else we talked about today.

[00:38:44]   

If you go to eatblogtalk.com/greedygirlgourmet2 because this is your second interview here, you can get all of that information. So on that note, tell everyone where they can find you, Jen.

[00:38:59]  Zhen Zhou 

So you can find me at, well, greedygirlgourmet.com or, you know, on Instagram or Pinterest, wherever, as greedygirlgourmet.

[00:39:08]  Megan Porta 

All right, everyone, go check Zhen out. And again, thank you so much. We appreciate you, and thank you for listening food bloggers. Truly, I’m so grateful you’re here. I will see you next time. 

[00:39:19] Outro

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Eat Blog Talk. If today’s episode sparked an idea for us, you snap a screenshot, post it on Instagram Stories, and tag me at Eat Blog talk. I love seeing what resonates with you. I will see you next time.