Introducing a new weekly post called The Hartnett Highlights! This post aims to journal our life adventures while at the same time, make my food posts shorter. I’ve noticed when I combine my food posts with my life adventures, it takes readers forever to reach the recipe. I’ve decided to separate the posts so readers can pick which topics they’re most interested in.
Some people understandably don’t care to see pictures that don’t pertain to the post in question. Sure my dog, Homie, is cute as fuck but are her photos really relevant in a taco recipe post? The answer is no. Some people want recipes and others enjoy learning about or catching up with Kieran and myself. Some people enjoy both the personal aspect and the recipe side of my blog, so hopefully, those readers will look forward to an additional post from me each week.
Kieran and I love adventuring and we’ve only scratched the surface of what the Oregon has to offer. The Hartnett Highlights will focus on the personal, fun, and business side of our lives.
Speaking of business, I’m planning on taking my involvement with Shock Munch up a notch. I don’t receive an income for Shock Munch even though I’ve been blogging for 3 years. A podcast I listen to featured a woman who made 40K in her first month of blogging. And she started around the same time I did! I was shocked but then again, not really. I’ve worked on Shock Munch passively over the years averaging maybe one post per week. That’s not good enough.
Shock Munch clocks in around 2K page views per month. That may seem impressive but the number is minuscule compared to some bloggers who achieve millions of pageviews per day. Their readership could literally eat mine for breakfast.
I never approached Shock Munch like a business but that’s about to change. I’m currently writing and struggling with a business plan for my site. I’m struggling because I am not 100% sure which direction to go in terms of niche.
Here are some niche categories I’m interested in:
1. Camping recipes
2. Cooking and baking from scratch
3. Cooking and baking cuisine from all over the world
4. Cooking delicious meals with the least amount of ingredients
In retrospect the answer appears to be easy, I should become a camping recipe website which combines all 4 categories. The problem is, I don’t camp in the winter, so I would need to produce 4-5 months of content without going camping. I also enjoy making recipes, like ice cream, that isn’t always camping friendly. So, I have some soul searching to do.
However, I’m leaning towards recipes that can be converted into camping food due to my Campfire Butter Chicken post. I follow the company REI on Instagram and saw they posted the following: What are you cooking camp-side? Make us drool for this Weekend Project. Share your photo and don’t forget to tag #LetsCamp! I shared the butter chicken recipe and heard from REI soon after. The company asked for permission to use my photo for their Weekend Project. REI choose 4 photographers to feature for their project and my photo is front and center on their account.
You guys, my butter chicken photo featured on REI’s Instagram’s page has over 10K likes and counting. This is a huge deal for me. Some of my posts have gotten 60+ likes on my Shock Munch Instagram page but I’ve never reached 100. If my photography can hit over 10K likes on other people’s Instagram accounts, that means I have an audience out there. The hard part for me is figuring out how to get my work in front of them.
Here’s the truth, I am not business savvy. And I suuuuuuuuck at networking, I loathe it even. Ugh, I’m beyond awkward when it comes to selling myself. Yet despite my lack of business skills, I’m must buck-the-fuck up, and do it. Gah, I’m scurred!
My first steps will be hammering out a solid business plan for my blog. Next, I need to set a schedule of tasks throughout the week to accomplish. Some of those tasks will consist of commenting on other blogger’s posts in order to network and build an online community of blogger friends. Other tasks will include research and learn new skills each week to elevate my brand. There is always something I could do to improve this blog, like updating photos on old posts. I think we can all agree my photography has improved leaps and bounds from when I first started. I might as well re-shoot older recipes and bring them up to date.
Lastly, I need to post more content. Some bloggers post every. single. day. Some bloggers post 4x per week. Most bloggers average 3 posts per week. Then there’s little old Shock Munch averaging 1 post per week. It’s no wonder why I’m not making any fucking money. Some of those other bloggers post 3x per week and have children for crying out loud. Children! I have a dog.
So, I’ll be striving to solidify a posting schedule and have 2-3 posts going out per week. I’ve worked my ass off for other people all my life, it’s time I work my ass off for me.
So that concludes The Hartnett Highlight for this week! Kieran and I have exciting news on the kitchen front I can’t wait to share with you soon! We’ve gotten a few estimates on retiling our nasty kitchen floor and I’m stoked to tell you all about it!
In the meantime, thanks for stopping by!
Christina
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