218: How to generate blog traffic without being on social media ALL the time | Tonya Lawson

Can we take a minute to talk about a very underrated content channel? 

Yes - it is blogging. One of the low maintenance content channels that can keep on giving years after you have created a blog post (no we are not joking). 

If you have been thinking about starting a blog for your business or how to optimise what you already have, this episode with Tonya Lawson is for you! 

You will learn a lot more about blogging and have the knowledge to start or optimise (all while potentially spending less time on social media but generating more website traffic). 

If you LOVED this episode, make sure you share this on your Instagram stories and tag us @contentqueenmariah and @dr.tonyalawson. 

⁠⁠⁠✨ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠JOIN CONTENT BOOTCAMP FOR CONTENT STRATEGY ⁠⁠⁠⁠✨⁠

KEY EPISODE TAKEAWAYS 👇

  • How to start a blog 

  • How to create engaging blogs 

  • What Google looks for with blogs 

  • What you need to create a “converting” blog 

  • How blogs can generate traffic 

SHOW RESOURCES 👇

If you like this episode, don't forget to share it to your Instagram stories and tag me⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @contentqueenmariah⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!

Other than that, enjoy - chat next week 💕

ABOUT THE GUEST

Dr. Tonya Lawson is a musician, blogger, and SEO specialist whose mission is to empower musicians and other creatives to build out passive income streams so they have the financial freedom to live the life they want to live. 

She is a multi passionate entrepreneur who currently runs a private studio of over 50 students, has 3 blogs, a coaching business, a blogging membership, multiple courses, and teaches at Middle Tennessee State University.  When not working, Dr. Lawson enjoys gardening, running, reading, cuddling with her two cats (Dot and Biscuits), and playing with her dog Buster.

PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION

This is episode 218 and I'm talking to Tonya Lawson all about blogging and why we don't always have to rely on social media for blogging, but also why is blogging is something you might want to think about in your business. Welcome to the content queen podcast. I'm your host, Mariah entrepreneur, storyteller, digital nomad.

Creative content bootcamp and founder of content queen. I'm here to teach you how to share your unique story, create content and market your business with strategy through the channels that work for you. Each week I'll deliver a story to help you connect to a powerful strategy around marketing, business, and content creation.

I'll also be joined by amazing souls and entrepreneurs who are here to share their own journey along with actual steps to help you take your business to a whole new level through amazing storytelling, powerful land marketing, and content strategy. Let's do it. Hello, gang. Hope you're having an amazing week.

doing all the things that you enjoy, including podcasting. Love to know where you're listening from. I used to binge business podcasting on my commute to and from work every day. And that was the main, you know, I actually used to have a little notepad in my car and everyone's like, that is so dangerous. I was like, yeah, it's not when you're in Melbourne.

And, you know, it's a busy city, so you're never really driving that fast, but only when I stopped, I just wanted to quickly jot down my notes because I was always listening to great podcasts and I needed to get the notes down. And then because we need to do something with those notes every week, I would go through them and try and make sense of my messy handwriting and then create action steps.

That's how my brain works. Okay, guys, that's  so weird. I know, but you know what? It was, I loved, I loved listening to podcasts. In the car. Um, now I listen to podcasts when I'm packing, when we're getting ready to go to a new destination, I listen to podcasts, but I, yeah, I'd love to know where you listen to podcasts and what ones you love.

I love recommendations.  Anyway, this week we're talking blogging. Now,  if you have followed my journey, you know, blogging, I have a soft spot for blogging. I love writing. Um, but I started my first blog in 2014, Travelers Antics, and I would write about my holiday adventures and then it turned into a little bit more of a weekly podcast, uh, weekly blog, sorry.

And then the blog, I kind of, Create a podcast, but it wasn't necessarily on the blog wasn't very good at my content strategy back then  But I've seen the power of it and how it can bring people together but also how it can improve your business and your SEO  and I blogged as soon as I started content Queen and I Yep, I have a very healthy SEO.

I was actually looking at it today on Ubersuggest, a platform where you can type in your website and it'll tell you where your SEO is at. And a lot of audience find me through my blog. So  blogging is very like, I'm very fond of blogging.  I do love it. I think it's not dead and there's so much power in it.

So we have Dr. Tonya Lawson, who is a musician, blogger, and SEO specialist, whose mission is to empower musicians and other creatives to build out passive income streams so they can have financial freedom to live the life they want to live. She's a multi passionate entrepreneur who currently runs a private studio of over 50 clients, has three blogs, a coaching business, a blogging membership, multiple courses, and teaches a middle Tennessee state teachers at a middle Tennessee state university.

When she's not working, Dr. Lawson enjoys gardening, running, reading, cuddling her two cats, dot and biscuits, and playing with her dog Buster. So let's hear from Tonya. She has very successful blogs. She has a lot to teach you about blogging. And if it's something that you've been meaning to do, this is your sign to get started because we have some really practical tips to help you.

Welcome Tonya to the podcast. Uh, thank you so much for coming on and joining us. Can you just tell us a little bit more about who you are and what you do.  Oh, sure. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. Um, my name is Tanya Lawson. I am a musician, blogger, passive income SEO specialist, and a private music teacher.

I'm very multi passionate and I do just a little bit of everything. I, um, talk a little bit about how I got here. When I graduated with my doctorate in 2005, there were 50 university clarinet positions available. I, in the United States, I applied for all 50 and I made the final top two in two jobs. I went out and interviewed and in both instances, they took someone with more experience.

Totally understandable. I was fresh out of college. The next year, there were only five positions available and I applied for all five and I got an interview for one. And once again, I made the top two and they went with someone with more experience. So I knew I needed to do something to make a good living and I had already been teaching music lessons.

So I really just went all in on building that business. So then the next year, I once again applied for however many jobs, and I actually got a job offer for one of them, but it ended up being a one year position. I was going to have to move across the country. It was not guaranteed for the second year, and I had spent way too much time building up my music studio, so I turned that one down.

And I live in an area where you can go into the schools and teach music lessons. And it's wonderful. But that area I lived in talked about cutting that program. And I panicked, what was I going to do? This was my whole income. And that's when I decided I was not making a good decision by keeping all my eggs in one basket.

And I needed to diversify. So I looked into blogging. I knew I had a website. I knew I should be able to make money with it, but I just couldn't figure out how. So I took a course on SEO. And of course, everyone told me I had to have a niche website if I ever wanted to make money. So that's what I did. I started my coffee blog and it started making some money.

So I thought, you know, I'm a creative. I am not just crank out content. I like to experiment. I like to do different things. I'm a musician. I'm an artist. And I knew there had to be a way I could take what I had learned about SEO and apply it to my own personal website where I talked to other music teachers and other creatives.

So I started experimenting with what I knew, and finally, I figured out exactly how to do it. And suddenly, my personal website, that they told me was never going to be able to make money because it was a niche web, it wasn't a niche website, started outperforming  my coffee website. Then  2020 came in, and everything shut down, including lessons in the schools.

And I was already Technologically savvy. So, I was, it was easy for me to transfer all of my music lessons online. And I was one of the few people who actually gained work during 2020. Because you have all these parents with kids stuck at home and they need something to do. So I started teaching lots of music lessons.

But I still had a little extra time, so I used that to start my third blog. Which is my passion project of my gardening blog.  Oh my gosh, I love this. This is so cool. And I, I know so many entrepreneurs resonate with the multi passionate and, um, you know, having permission to be able to do different things, but I also love that you, you know, you talked about testing, learning, developing, and then using that across, you know, multiple different, um, platforms.

So you've shared a little bit about your journey and how, You got to where you are today, which is amazing. So I want to dive into, I guess, um, helping people understand how they can use blogging to get more audience, you know, without, and as you've mentioned to me, when we talked before, without having to promote it on social media and work really, really hard to get people in traffic to your website.

So you shared a little bit more, a little bit about your blogging journey. I'd love to know more about that. You know, what you learned along the process to get this traffic to your website and what's been your experience. And you said you've been able to monetize it. And I'd love to know in what ways, you know, what ways were you able to monetize your blog throughout this journey?

And of course, you started, um, you know, teaching lessons online, which is amazing. Cause I think a lot of people when COVID happened, stressed and, you know, some people flourished and some weren't sure what to do. So I'd love to, um, understand a little bit more about your blogging journey and how you were able to monetize.

Oh, yes. So the blogging journey itself, like I said, it started out of that, that moment of panic that I, I need a second income stream. So I, I went all in on it, learning how to do SEO, what, what SEO was even, because I, I had no idea. And It's one of those situations where once you get in there and you understand what you're doing, it's pretty easy, but it's also something that's constantly evolving.

So kind of like social media,  different things are trending. Instagram introduces reels. Instagram goes for video content. It, whatever's new is always. Changing. And the same things goes with Google. Google issued so many updates last year because they're really changing direction in what they want. So you have to stay on top of it.

So you have to continually create content that Google wants. And here's my little secret,  create content that people want to read. And that is the content Google wants. Don't spend all your time creating content just for Google, because that's not going to work for you. You need to create content that people want to read.

Now, there are a few things you can then go in and do on the page to boost your SEO, but becoming an authority. in your field and creating content people want to read is really the secret to ranking on Google. And, you know, it sounds like, well, that's too simple. That can't be it. But that's it. And that is exactly how I got my, um, personal website to take off.

Um, now monetization,  Once again, I don't want to keep all my eggs in one basket. So I have multiple revenue streams on the blogs. So on all three blogs, I have affiliate income  where I make a percentage of a purchase when people click my link and make a purchase through it. I have ad revenue. I do have ads on my blogs and as annoying as ads are,  when you're reading a blog, people are giving you information.

That you're not paying for and they have to be compensated in some way. So I do have ads on my blog. I don't have ads that block the text, but I, I have ads on there. Um, I also with my, um,  my website, Tanya Lawson. com. That's the one that's more geared towards my business. It is not a niche website. Like the other two are, I have courses on there and I have my membership and I earn passive income through that as well.

So, um, any masterclasses that I do, I record them and I have a section of masterclasses on my website called 29 masterclasses and.  I randomly sell those just out of the blue where people have found them on Google and purchased. So I'm all about implementing as many revenue streams as possible. And my latest is YouTube.

I'm working on growing my YouTube channel to get monetized. And then I will tie that back into my blog as well as an additional revenue stream.  My gosh, I love it. And I think it's, it's interesting just to hear your journey because, you know, there's, when you're creating content for your audience, they, you know, they either want to support you or they love, you know, they trust you.

So if you've got a link either to your products or someone else's products, you know, you've built up that audience that trusts you. And I absolutely love that. And it's really interesting. I do have a question because obviously with TikTok now and Google search becoming on social media more like of a popular thing, you know, lots of people now going to TikTok.

I will be honest, whilst traveling, when I'm looking for places to visit in Bogota, I've been searching TikTok.  What, um, are your thoughts around, you know, people saying SEO or, um, not SEO because SEO is definitely not dead, but blogging, dying, blogging, you know, being on the outer, you know, have you had people ask you like, oh, but isn't blogging, you know, isn't social media now the way people find your things?

What do you say to people that have said that to you in the past? Well, yes, they've said that. And. One, blogging itself is not dead. Blogging the way we used to blog five or ten years ago is completely dead because that is on social media now. We don't follow bloggers to see what they eat in a day or to see, you know, their favorite workout clothes.

We, we look at at TikTok for those things. Now, um, we look at Instagram for those things. So those have switched over to more social media, but blogging itself, people misunderstand the word blog. The word blog has become kind of a dirty word recently. And I, and people associate it with the deer diary post.

But that's not it. Um, for example, my kitchen sink, the faucet, the water pressure, it was losing water pressure. So I go to Google and I type in how to get water pressure back in my kitchen sink. And up pops an article that tells me exactly what I need to do. That is a blog. People don't think about that as being a blog, but that is a blog.

Now, going back into social media, I love social media. I'm on TikTok.  I am on Instagram.  I, I love those platforms and they're so, I have so much fun with them. But here's the thing.  You do not own your content on social media.  Your account can be shut down at a moment's notice and you can lose your entire audience.

Okay?  You own the content of your blog. You have it backed up. You can, if something happens and your site crashes, it can be fixed.  Whereas on social media, it doesn't.  And you said yourself you're searching for social media posts. Google is actually pulling TikToks and stuff as well in the Google searches.

So it all ties together and if you can have a strong online presence through your website, your social media is just going to help further establish you as an authority. And Google's smart. If Google sees that you're popular on TikTok, and also that you're talking about this thing online, it's going to drive you to the top of the search results.

I love this. And thank you for saying that.  Yes, we don't own our social media content. And I think we get very caught up. I know I've had a guest on the podcast before. She had a membership on Facebook and a Instagram of maybe 12, 000 followers and someone hacked her account. She lost everything. Not just her social media following and her account, her whole membership and all the content that was hosted on Facebook group.

And this was like five. Well, maybe three, four, five years ago now. So like,  yeah, she learned from that, but it's, it's a risk. It is definitely a risk and I am all for long form content. So thank you for sharing your thoughts around that. And, um,  Now, I like, I loved hearing your experience in your story. I really want to go into, I guess, some actionable steps for everyone listening to be like, okay, I'm a business owner.

I have a website. I have a social media. I've been thinking about blogging, but I'm not really sure where to start or what to do. So you mentioned this, you know, how to bring new people to your website without posting on social media. So what is the strategy? Tell us a little bit more about how We can use blogging to bring people to our site without consistently promoting it all the time and, and, uh, feeling like, yeah, we're on a little bit of a hamster wheel of content creation.

Well, first of all,  you need a blog. And I know that's obvious to you and me, but a lot of website owners out there who may have e commerce stores, they don't realize they need a blog. They're like, oh, I have my product out here to sell. That's all I need. That's not the case. Ikea has a blog. Home Depot has a blog.

If those big stores have blogs on their websites, then you better bet you need one as well. And this is why the blog is what helps you get found on Google. Um, people aren't searching for your business.  They're not searching for it by name. They are searching other terms like plumber near me or how to fix a sink that has low water pressure, or, uh, where to find piano lessons for my child.

Those, you can write blog posts around those topics, and then those blog posts bring people to your website.  And that's where the SEO comes in. So one thing I tell people because  SEO seems so overwhelming. You have to do all of these things. Um,  the number one thing you need to do is think to yourself,  what questions are people searching for on the internet?

So I always recommend to my clients when they're first starting out, sit down with a pen and paper and literally write down every question you've ever been asked about what you do.  Then go to Google,  type in those questions. And scroll down to the people always ask, and then look at those questions.  Okay, now one, you've already got an entire page of blog post talk.

But we're going to take it a step further. Then hop on over to Answer the Public, and type in the key points from those questions. One or two words. It's going to then generate an entire list of even more questions. That people ask and now you have a year's worth of blog content in those three steps.  I love that.

I love answer the public. Actually. I got this like lifetime offer. It was like a hundred dollars for life. I was like, what? That is insane. I have to buy this immediately because now that Neil Patel has taken over answer the public. He's of course, you know, used it, um, to help others because. Yeah, I think it's awesome.

I guess. So, okay. We've got these blog topics now when we go to writing what makes up a good blog. So, you know, for example, we have this, um, you know, a question that we get on Google, like my tap is leaking. How do I fix it? Or, you know, say we're more of a creative person with, um, you know, we want to share a few more insights.

What other things should we be adding to our blog to make it engaging? Do we add, you know, I know you said it's not this like dear diary concept, but do we add personal experiences or hypothetical stories? How can we make it more engaging and a better blog for people to consume?  Okay. So first of all, each blog post, you want to keep people on the page.

That is your goal. You do not want them to leave. to find more information elsewhere. So you need to answer every possible question they could have about the topic you're writing about.  every possible question they could possibly think of. So take your main topic and then what are two main questions that come off of that?

Okay. Now what are two main questions that come off of each of those until you run out of questions and you want to cover all of that. Secondly, you don't want a bunch of academic language in your blog posts because that's really dry and it's really hard to, to read. And that is like, that was the number one thing I had to learn as a doc, as a doctor, as an academic who has a doctorate.

I was so used to writing in that academic language, like my dissertation. Um, but you have to write the way you would talk to someone, write the way you would speak to someone. That instantly is going to be more engaging and keep them reading. So yeah, write it like it's a story, like you're explaining something to someone.

And if you have. personal things that are related that your audience can relate to, sure, throw them in, but don't go off on a random tangent to where your reader is like, why are we talking about your grandmother? So like recipe blogs. The recipe blog where you have to learn about somebody's grandpa three times removed in their favorite banana bread before you get to the recipe.

So stay away from all of that. And that was a very big thing for Google for a while. The longer the content, the higher it would rank. Well, as part of all of those updates last year, they got rid of that. So you don't have to write immensely long content anymore. Only when it's relevant. Perfect.  Oh, that is good to know, because I know we often think we have to write these really long posts.

So, so what are some of the things that Google brought in last year that could help, uh, the listeners go, okay, well, I know all this stuff about blogging. What do I need to unlearn? And what am I maybe doing wrong? What are some of the no nos that maybe were yeses and now are not, and what are just general no, please don't do this when you are blogging.

Okay. So the biggest thing Google did last year, they've always had their eat. factor. Expertise, authoritativeness, and trust. Well, this last year they added an extra E. It's now E E A T. And that extra E stands for experience.  Google wants to, this, this was a response to the rise of AI writing.  Google wants to make sure that you know what you're talking about.

Um, I'll, I'll use myself for an example. I have an article out there on the best clarinet mouthpieces.  I frankly wrote it for my students and it's actually one of my top performing posts. But the reason I wrote it is because the, the articles that were ranking at the top of Google were terrible. And if you looked at them, you know that the people who wrote it have never even seen a clarinet, let alone played one.

They didn't know what they were talking about, but they just generated all this stuff using AI  and using. what's selling the best on Amazon, which is stuff that's really cheap. And it was terrible. So I wrote the article and literally within two days I was in the number one spot at the time. Because one, Google knows I'm an authority.

I am a clarinetist. I have a doctorate in clarinet. It's out there all over the internet. So Google made that connection and drove me up. So it got rid of all of the people that were just using AI to crank out all these best of posts and they were making lots of money doing it. And these new updates really drove it down.

Another thing on the experience factor is using your own images, not using stock images, using original images that have never been on Google. And here's the thing, they don't have to be perfect. Because just like social media, those perfectly curated images, Instagram images are no longer what is popular.

People want real. They want real life. They want to see what you're doing in real life.  So the same thing with Google. They want to know that you're actually, so for my garden blog, I go out into my backyard garden and I take pictures. You see like, The bag of soil in the background. It's not perfectly curated rows.

There are weeds, but it is real and Google likes that reality. And then with social media, if you also have stuff on social media showing your expertise, link that into your content because that further makes the connection with Google that you are a real person and that you truly are an authority in your field.

Oh, I love this. And actually that, that answers a lot of people's questions. Like, what's the point now people are just generating blogs on chat, GPT. And yeah, so I guess like, this is where your experiences are, your expertise and sharing that with your audience. And that's why, you know, having your website up to date as well, your socials with everything.

And that's, and it's interesting because I think we, Forget how smart Google is and how it can connect the dots with all of our profiles. So that's why, you know, like  amplification of our content or showing up in multiple places is really good for connecting everything together. And having this digital footprint is super important because it all helps in the long run.

And I like, I have had the same experiences, you know, I've blogged for quite a while and, um, With my content marketing stuff, you know, it's my biggest traffic generator is organic search, but of course social media is like super shiny and fun. So, you know, sometimes we get stuck in that social media rabbit hole of just producing, producing, producing.

I've got blogs from 2020, that if I just go in, click edit, update the date, make it relevant to now and repost it.  Life's good. Right. And it literally takes me like 10 minutes. I don't have to create new. I can just update what I currently have because I have a lot of content as I'm sure you definitely have the same amount, but I absolutely love these tips because I think we're now like, okay, well, I'm spending a lot of time on social media.

Now where should I be directing this into? energy and blogging is definitely a good one. So how often should we look at blogging? Where should we, you know, to, cause everyone is very time poor. Um, where can we add this into our schedule? You know, and how have you used it? Like obviously you're creating three for three different blogs.

How often are you doing it? What do you recommend for the people that you help around? Okay. I'm ready to start a blog. How often, how much time is it going to take me? Let's be realistic.  Okay. So  ideally posting once a week. is ideal. But as long as you're posting on a regular basis, It's fine. But the more content on your website, the better, the faster you'll rank.

Um, I have  over 100, 000 words on each of my three blogs. I'm trying to get to 100 articles as quickly as possible on each of the three blogs. And here's the thing. It doesn't have to take a long time.  We're not going for perfection. Because you're never going to achieve it. Get the content out there. And I am actually a proponent of using AI writers.

I'm a fan of AI writers. I have been using AI well before ChatGPT found its, its thing. I started using AI writers back in 20 Early 2020? Before the start of the pandemic. And um, Or maybe even 2019. Uh, it, I used something called Jasper for a while. Mm-Hmm. . And then I got chat, GPT Pro when it finally came out.

I use Koala for a little while and I, now, I'm using one called First Draft AI that I really like, but  AI doesn't write the blog for you. It gives you a really strong. first draft that you then have to go in and edit because you are the expert. Because here's the deal. AI is not perfect and it's not always 100 percent accurate.

You need to go in and make sure it's accurate because you are the authority. But by using AI to get a good first draft, you can speed up your content creation time. Significant. I can crank out a blog post from start to finish in an hour to an hour and a half  in that manner. I, I don't  I don't do one blog post at a time.

I batch. So I'll go in and batch a bunch of drafts using AI. And then I will go through them and edit them, throw them into WordPress, which is the platform I use. Then I'll go in and add all my affiliate links, my images, et cetera, optimize it for SEO and hit publish.  I love that because I'm really big on that as well with any content.

Like I don't do one post at a time. I'll do. Types of content creation. So one day I'm really good at writing. Like I find them really in the zone of writing on a Tuesday. So I try and write everything on a Tuesday, filming things on a Wednesday. So I like, I do it the exact same. And I think that's the best way to do it because you're in the zone on that particular task rather than, okay, that blog post is written.

I now have to put, you know, like that process. And I love that. I agree with, um, AI, you know, it's great for a skeleton. And then you can add. You know, obviously we changed the old chat JBT in the midst of the digital landscape, you know, we, we remove those really interesting sentences that AI can tend to give us and we make it personal, but I love that you mentioned that.

I think that's really helpful for people, you know, and perfection, uh,  Progress over perfection, you know, we don't have to have these blogs, even be these like thousand word masterpieces, which I think everyone's got in their heads that they have to be, you know, a certain way. I think the thing that I love about any kind of content creation is, yes, people are going to share the formulas and the secret ways to optimize your content.

But at the end of the day, if it's raw and authentic to you. That's how you resonate. Like you said before, create content for your audience. And that's how you rank in Google, because I think people understand you and connect with you. And to go back in with the time thing, make your blog content, your number one priority, because then you can take that blog post.

And you can pull out the highlights of it and you can come up with 10 different Instagram posts. You can come up with 10 different reels that you can then repurpose on TikTok.  You can come up with 3 to 5 different YouTube videos all from that one piece of content.  Thank you for that because that is a very core repurposing element as part of my strategy.

And I absolutely love that you said that. 'cause I think that is the power of repurposing. And also, as you said, you know, we don't wanna have to be consistently posting on social media to promote our blog, but it's a beautiful way to get traffic to our website because we're not asking them to buy something.

We're asking them to read a blog article. Right. Which is a lot more of a. You know, a more subtle ask than buy a nice stuff. It's like, it's, we're talking funnels here, right? Like we're just funneling people down the process and that's the perfect way to do it. Having a blog is your middle funnel is awesome.

So I love that you mentioned that.  Yes. And you know, I'm not anti social media at, at, I love social media. I'm on it all the time and it's fun. I think organic traffic though, is what you really need to focus on. But like you said. When you first start blogging, especially you're not going to have organic traffic yet.

Google doesn't know who you are and they don't trust you yet. They have to learn that. But in the meantime, you can use those social media channels to drive traffic to your blog so that it gets more eyes on it. The more page views Google Google's like, Oh, people are looking at this. Let's check it out.

Then they start. seeing a correlation and then they start ranking it and then you start getting organic traffic in and the ideal point is over time, you don't have to promote it on social media if you don't want to. You certainly can, but it's not required because let's face it, stuff happens. Uh, my roommate of 19 years had emergency surgery two weeks ago.

I was barely on social media the whole time. I certainly wasn't promoting my blog post. I was in survival mode. And what happens if your child gets sick, or heaven forbid, you're in a car accident, or maybe you just want to take a month off to decompress because it can be exhausting being online all the time.

Having that organic revenue stream, the organic traffic coming to your blog allows you to do those things.  Oh, I love that you say that because I'm all for getting off this content creation hamster wheel and a long form channel is the perfect way that you don't have to be on social media all the time.

Website traffic for me over the holidays didn't just plummet because I took time off social media.  No, it didn't. It's like still the same, like, because I have an active blog, I'm actively, you know, and, and how good, like I've had people find me through Google because of my authority, book in a discovery call with me and hire me for a content retainer, which is thousands of dollars a month.

Like, you know, it's anywhere from 1500 Australian dollars a month.  Like amazing. Of course that can happen on social media. But when it happens on Google, because you created like content years ago, it feels so good. Like when people write, you know, where did they find you? And they say, Google search, I'm like, Oh, that feels so good.

Like, it just feels awesome to know that what you've created from now to five years from now is still relevant and helping you get people onto your website. And that's where people make purchasing decisions on your website. Not necessarily from your social media.  100 percent they do. And like you said, that organic traffic, it doesn't just make you feel good.

It means that's a lead you didn't have to chase. It came to you. If you do affiliate marketing and like go back to that clarinet mouthpiece article I wrote, I literally make a sale of at least one clarinet mouthpiece on Google at least once a month, if not once a week. And that is a article that I wrote in 2020.

It has been that long. And I am still making sales from that article. I'm still bringing in a percentage of that income from that one article I wrote three years ago. That, well I guess almost four years ago now, that is passive income. That's what it's about. Doing the work once and being paid for it over and over and over.

Yes, I love that. Amazing. You've given so much value and we have, you know, something to really start with. So, you know, thinking about. Starting a blog, we can use AI to just help us get started. Google those topics or those keywords and find the things that people are searching for. And just let's like, just start doing it, like take action, see what we can, you know, achieve.

And then of course, as you said, promoter on socials until you can build up traffic organically through Google, and then you can decide what you want to do and tweak and change your strategy from there. So how can people get help if they're like, all right, like, I really want to give this a go. It sounds like something I could learn.

I know you help people with this. So how, how can people. Discover this world of blogging and start monetizing from their blog or in their business and use it as a revenue stream for their business.  Well, first of all, I am always talking about it over on Instagram and my TikTok as well. I post YouTube videos every Monday.

And today's was about brainstorming content ideas for that blog when you're stuck. And, um, I also have a blogging membership. It's called Creative SEO. It's really for anybody with a website or even if you're a small business and you don't have your website yet, but you know you need one. I have even a section in there on how to get it set up the right way so that it can get found on Google.

And because this foundational information is so important. I've even priced it. It's literally 33 a month. It's less than I spend on coffee every month. And  it's, it's priced that way for a reason. And it's because the people who really, really, truly need this, they don't have successful blogs that are bringing in a lot of money yet.

This is the price point they can afford to get them started and to start bringing the traffic in. And then as they start bringing the traffic in, if they want to take it to the next level, we can work together in other ways, one on one coaching, etc.  It's like I said, there's no reason not to join it. If this, this is something you're interested in.

It's literally less than I spend on a tank of gas.  I love it. I love it. Is there anything else that you want to make sure gets added before we wrap up? Thank you so much for sharing your insights. It's motivating me to, even though I do blog, but to, I don't know, do something. Maybe I want to start another blog now.

I don't know, maybe let's see.  Well, sounds like, yeah, it's the only other thing I want to tell people is.  You may be looking at it and going, you know, I know I need a blog, but things are so busy. This is just not the right time. Well, here's the deal. The right time is never going to get there. You just need to get out there and do it.

Don't worry about it being perfect. Just take the action. Take that first step. first step. You can perfect it later on. It doesn't have to be fancy, but the faster you start getting content out there, the faster Google will start recognizing you because SEO is a long game. It is not short term rewards.

You're not going to get instant gratification. So the sooner you start just like compound interest on a retirement account, this earlier you start, the more payoff it's going to have in the future.  Oh, I love that. That is a good mic drop moment to leave there.  That is so true. There's, and my, my dad always recited this from, I don't know, some famous sports players, like don't think do just like do it.

You know, it's like Nike has a slogan of that for a reason. So you just, you have to start.  yet perfect later. You only learn by doing. So thank you so much Tanya for sharing your experience with blogging, how others can get started and how it can really help our business, our content strategy moving forward.

I really appreciate your time. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. It's been a blast. Blogging. I love it. What do you think? It's very interesting because I know, even though a lot of people say I'm not very good at writing, um, I know a lot of us are. I have the power of creating really impactful blogging and it's not really about that.

It's yeah, about what you can share. So  if you've wanted to start a blog,  this is your sign. It's time to start. And it's probably one of the most low maintenance in terms of like blogging, you know, you don't have to have your hair and makeup done to start a video, even though I don't think you have to anyway, but.

There's so much you can do with blogging. You don't have to edit like you have to edit a podcast. You know, there's, it is low maintenance in terms of what it needs to get set up and get going. Whereas, you know, podcast, YouTube,  social media, there's just so much you need to do. So  blogging is actually probably the most low maintenance content channel and has a lot of impact.

And, um,  Yeah. If this is, if you've been looking for a sign to start, this is it. If you have a blog, you know, what things can you do to optimize it? Or how can you go to that next level? If you have a blog, share it with me on Insta. But if you're on Spotify, I've got a poll for you. So I'd love to know your answer.

Check out the poll. But be a content queen or king and remember that developing your strategy and story develops your business. Thank you so much for joining us today. Please don't get, please don't forget to share this with all your business and entrepreneurial friends. You can do this in two ways. One, you can share it on your Insta stories and tag at content queen Mariah, which is creating content for your own page, which is win win, or you can share it and tell them about it.

If you do rate and review, it does help me get amazing guests like Tonya on. She found me through the charts. through having amazing ratings and reviews. So if you want more amazing guests, make sure you take a little bit of time to do that. I would really appreciate it. And follow me on Instagram and TikTok.

If you're not already come and say hello. I love knowing who's listening. I have amazing conversations with some of you on socials. So come over, say hello. Tell me if there's any questions that you might have. I'm very open to answering them. I might send you a voice note, might send you another podcast episode that could help you.

But if there's something I haven't done any content on, I absolutely will. I'm always. Looking for ideas. Last week I talked about what do you do if you have  too many ideas, but I always prioritize questions from my audience. So I will prioritize it anyway. Have an amazing week and I will talk to you very soon.

Bye.

PodcastMariah MacInnesmarketing, marketing advice, how to be authentic online, business ownerComment