How I Made $38k in 3 Months as a Food Blogger

I want to share with you how I made nearly $40k in 3 months as a food blogger! My hope is to inspire you, show you what’s possible, and give you some specific tips and strategies that will help you grow your own blog! You can read my older income reports here and also this post on How I Made it to Mediavine in One Year!

When I hit this income level as a food blogger (Q2 2023), I had been blogging for less than two years. I started my blog in January of 2021 (Covid blog!) and hit Mediavine levels (50,000 sessions) around December 2021. You can read about that journey here.

In this post, I want to give you an idea of where my income comes from, what my traffic and income breakdown is, the steps I took to get to this income level, some actionable blogging tips for you, and why all of this matters!

Simplify the blogging process with practical, actionable steps to explode your blog! Grab Smart Strategies for Food Bloggers!

Traffic Breakdown

This will give you a rough idea of the traffic levels needed to achieve this income. Note that ad income can vary greatly from site to site.

April

Pageviews: 353,219

Sessions: 303,207

May

Pageviews: 383,780

Sessions: 335,618

June

Pageviews: 415,099

Sessions: 364,100

Total 3-Month Traffic

Pageviews: 1,152,098

Sessions: 1,002,925

Traffic Sources

My traffic is mainly organic at this point. I am really trying to move toward diversifying a bit more and getting more Pinterest and direct/email traffic vs. relying so much on Google!

Organic: 76%

Social (mostly Pinterest): 11%

Direct/Webstories: 11%

Other: 2%

Overwhelmed by the blogging process? Let’s simplify it! Grab my Smart Strategies for Food Bloggers course!

Income Breakdown

Here is exactly where my blogging income came from for these three months. You can see Mediavine ads made up the vast majority of my income.

Mediavine Ads: $34,217

Affiliate Income (Amazon Associates, Cooking With Keywords, and Rank IQ): $2,205

1:1 Blog Coaching: $1,993

Digital Product Sales: $141

How I reached this income level

My blog was NOT an overnight success. Behind all of these numbers, there is/was a lot of blood, sweat, and tears! 🙂

Here are the top five things that I attribute to these traffic and income levels:

1. Having a workflow: I had a clear, streamlined workflow that I stuck with for over 1.5 years. I found out what tasks were important, and I repeated those tasks over and over and over! Learn how to create your own workflow here.
   
2. Focusing on content creation: My workflow was mostly focused on CONTENT CREATION, especially during the first year. I posted 2-3 times per week.
   
3. Not giving up on Pinterest and Web Stories: While people “followed the mob” and gave up on Pinterest and Web Stories in droves, I stayed the course. It’s paid off in dividends and my Pinterest traffic is better than it’s ever been and web stories continue to bring decent traffic.
   
4. Staying out of “drama”: Facebook groups can be SO HELPFUL but they can also stir up so much angst and drama with people complaining–it seems like all doom and gloom sometimes. I steer clear of those groups except maybe 1-2x/week to check-in.
   
5. Adopting a growth mindset/diversifying: This is HUGE, you guys! This blogging/content creation business is constantly changing and if you don’t embrace this change…things will get hard realllll fast! It’s so important to stay positive and adapt.

Learn the exact processes I have used to grow my blog! Grab my Smart Strategies for Food Bloggers course!

Actionable steps you can take to grow your blog

1. Create a workflow: Learn how to create your perfect workflow here and don’t forget to focus on CONTENT CREATION!
   
2. Be CONSISTENT: Repeat, repeat, repeat tasks that move your blog forward.
   
3. Learn SEO and be comfortable with it: I highly recommend Aleka’s Cooking for Keywords (food blogging) or Blogging with Keywords (other niches). Her course was the foundation of SEO for my blog.
   
4. Start an email list: DO NOT WAIT to do this! I started with Mailerlite and it’s free for the first 1,000 subscribers.
   
5. Learn Pinterest or hire a reputable Pinterest manager: Pinterest and SEO are the two main traffic drivers to my blog. Both are SO IMPORTANT. I use Allison Lancaster for my Pinterest management. She also has a few super helpful Pinterest courses if you want to do it yourself!

Why this matters

I originally started my blog during Covid so I could have a creative outlet and something to call my own. When I started, never in my wildest dreams did I believe I could make this type of income.

This blog has been so important to me personally, but now it has grown into something truly special for my entire family.

We love to travel and blogging has given me the income and flexibility to do that for my family.

Last summer, we went to Big Sur, Tahoe, Italy, and England to watch my son play in a soccer tournament! None of this would be possible without the flexibility (and $$$) blogging has given me.

So that is why blogging matters to ME. Find out what blogging means to YOU. why does it matter? Maybe it is just that “thing” to call your own. Maybe it’s to help your family pay certain expenses. Do you need a creative outlet? Are you saving money for something important?

Figure those things out because THAT is what will keep you motivated when things get tough!