So if you guys haven’t noticed I’m getting better with my charcuterie boards. In a previous post HERE I shared with you my very first attempt at making one and although it was cute I didn’t have a clue at what I was doing. If I’m being honest, I still don’t but they are looking a heck of a lot better. I’m also trying to experiment a bit more as well.

I kept the same thing in mind when creating this board. I wanted the best ingredients for an affordable price. Like previously, Aldi was by far the best option. I love that they have a great selection of cheese and crackers. Even though I don’t eat a ton of cheese, a girl loves her options. The crackers on the other hand I eat. My daughters happen to also like them as well. 

For this board I used scalloped sea salt crackers. They are light, airy, and have just enough salt to complement any cheese or spread you would like. Although Aldi has a tone of fig, jelly, and cracker spreads they typically aren’t my thing and the kids get them everywhere. So that was a no no for my house. 

Aldi also has a great gourmet deli selection for meats to use on your charcuterie board. I happen to like the Apple Farm Deli Selection option. It comes with pepper salami, hot capocollo, and hot calabrese. I like to take them and create little meat flowers on my board. They are simply the cutest thing ever and again, my girls love them. 

When I make my charcuterie board I have to have some type of fruit included. This time I used grapes, and strawberries since we would be enjoying this board in the afternoon. I didn’t want anything too heavy before dinner. I also found a delicious sparkling cider that paired perfectly. Again, this was a kid friendly board and I made sure they had something cute to drink. I even let them use my wine glasses so they were extremely excited about that. 

I spent less than $20 on this entire board and everyone enjoyed it. Aldi has everything you need for your next gathering and if you want more options check out their new charcuterie section in the store. If you want to see other boards people have created make sure you head over to Instagram and search the hashtag #AllAldi. 

I’m currently sitting at my desk in my office and my mind is all over the place. My main thought is, where has this year gone? It has seemed to simply fly by. Although I have had quite an eventful year in my heart I know there’s still more steam left in me. I can feel a shift because my soul isn’t settled, I’m meant for more.

From being Mrs. New Jersey America 2020, competing at Mrs. America, recovering from life-saving breast surgery to homeschooling kids. This year has truly been a rollercoaster ride. Filled with laughter, tears, and so many small victories. I am still thankful for it all. My gratitude journal is filled with pages and pages of small victories. 

As I sip my coffee and think of the people in my life and how they have impacted my journey I’m fighting back the tears. I can honestly say, I have met people to have truly changed my life. They altered my mindset and shifted my perspective in a lot of areas. It has helped me understand myself on a deeper level as well as learn what I will and will not allow in my life moving forward. It’s hard to realize that some of these people are only in your life for a season. Although I want things to be different I’m learning that sometimes the hardest thing to do is to simply let go and that holding on does more damage. This journey I’m taking, everyone will not be able to go with me. It hurts like hell but I have to face my new reality.  

I have to remind myself that these last three months of 2021 are personal. It’s time to make them count.

Being a goal-oriented person. I thrive on creating small goals that ultimately help me reach the much larger goal. Personally and professionally I created a list of goals I’m aiming to achieve. For the next three months, I will be focusing solely on the career-based goals I’ve set. 

In recent months I’ve made time for a lot of things that had no return on the investment. Even now, as I sit here wondering how certain situations in my life have gotten to this point It’s registering that I was giving more than I was receiving. All that time wasted and nothing to show for it. I was investing my time and energy, wanting more than was available, and settling for crumbs being given. Why wait for people to give your the scraps they have leftover? Never again.

We know the saying If you want something bad enough you will find a way or find an excuse. This goes for people and ourselves. We accept excuses from others and ourselves when we know we deserve better and have the capacity to do better.  I want better so guess what? These next few months I will be doing the work to receive everything my heart desires. Period. Never wait for others to give you what you can take freely for yourself.

On that note let me give you a quick word. 

Queen, if you learn anything from me I pray one of the many lessons is to never dim your light for anyone. Don’t allow anyone to make you feel like your doing too much by being you, treat you like your ordinary, or mistreat you due to your loyalty and or love for them. This goes for family, friends, and relationships. It’s ok to want more. It’s ok to require more. As the saying goes, “If I’m too much, go find less”.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled blog post.

I know what I want, I know what I deserve and I know that no one is going to give it to me but me. Thus, it’s time to buckle down and get to work. I’m removing all of the distractions and focusing solely on this one particular goal. I’ve wanted it for a very long time and I know it’s attainable to me. The best part about it is that if you are reading this post, YOU are a part of the plan. 

Looking forward to what the next few months have in store for me. It can only get better from here and I encourage you to take these next few weeks and check off some goals from your list. 

Let’s hop into it without all the fluffy stuff, shall we? One thing I need you all to know beforehand is that I’ve had my blog for years. I mean years, however, I never set out to monetize it because I’ve always felt as though it was a place to share my beauty, fashion, and lifestyle tips. Almost like an open diary for my friends to read. That changed over the pandemic and I wanted to monetize and grow my blog. With all of my hard work over the years, it was time to capitalize off of it but I didn’t know where to start.

 I decided to do a writing challenge to help grow my blog in 30 days. This challenge was meant to help me grow creatively as well as push me past my own boundaries and limitation. I haven’t written that much since college and quite frankly I was a bit rusty. Over those next 30 days, I would receive more than 10,000 page views and a new strategy that got me results. 

Here’s what I did.

Let’s Plan

I started by creating a monthly blogging content calendar. Nothing fancy, I just used a Google calendar and color-coordinated my content for my blog and YouTube channel. This helped me stay consistent and know when things were scheduled to go live. Planning ahead and scheduling blog posts was essential because my schedule is pretty hectic. The more I can do beforehand the better. 

Once I planned out all the articles I wanted to write for the month and when they were scheduled to go live I would get to work creating the content. Essentially I created deadlines for the week to keep me accountable. 

Seeing all that red on my calendar helped me stay the course and was so fulfilling once the blog post was live. I was being consistent and getting results. This is still a strategy I use today for my post. 

How Often Did I Post

For the month of December, I posted 5 times a week on my blog. Monday through Friday one blog post went live. There were a few times I had a post go live on Sunday due to work but overall I posted during the weekday.  I was running a tight ship but I wanted and needed to see results. Desperate times called for desperate measures and this gave me the push I needed. I scheduled for my blog post to go live at 7 am each day and would also schedule a post on my Facebook and Instagram pages to get any additional traffic to my blog. 

My Biggest Secret

As I mentioned I am a beauty, fashion, and lifestyle blogger. But over the course of my 30-day challenge, I changed the way in which I delivered my content. 

Before, I would be sharing as if I was talking to one of my girlfriends about the latest mascara or fashion trend. During this challenge, I focused on content that was beneficial to everyone and would be for years to come. 

I created all EVERGREEN content. Evergreen content is information that will be usual not only for today but 3-10 years down the line. Here is an example on my blog. I wanted to share as much useful information as I could while still staying true to the things that I loved. Since the information I was giving was usual it would allow readers to bookmark the pages, screenshot, and come back to read more of my content. 

THIS WAS THE GAME-CHANGER.

DO THIS NOW

If you happen to have old content on your blog that you love, repurpose it. There were some days I just was downright tired of writing. I mean 5 articles a week plus work and kids, No ma’am. So I decided to work smarter not harder. I went back and looked over some of my older blog posts that I loved that didn’t get the views or traffic I wanted and started to rebuild. I would add more valuable information to them, update the pictures and repost them. Adding a little razzle-dazzle to older content was a lifesaver. I wanted to grow my blog but not start from scratch.

The goal of any blog should be to give the reader useful information or at least be entertaining. The more you can help solve a problem the more traffic your blog will receive. 

The hardest lesson I had to learn as a blogger is, unfortunately, the reader doesn’t care about YOU.

Sorry to break it to you in those terms but it’s true. I mean they care about you as a human being, however, when they are looking for information they don’t care about your dog and how cute she is. They are looking for information. 

When you keep this in mind while writing it will help you keep the mindset of how you can add as much value to them as possible. This helped with my content delivery as well as what I shared on my blog. Again, game-changer. 

You want blog traffic fast, do this now

Get on Pinterest, simple as that. Let me preference this by saying I was not the biggest fan in the beginning. Creating pins and getting the sizing right was stressful. Especially in the beginning. I was over it, so I stopped trying to figure it and invested in myself. I hopped my little butt right over to Etsy and found another content creator who specialized in pins and purchased a few templates. 

Guess what, it was cheaper than buying Starbucks!

Creating pins really did stress me out and I knew that in order to get traffic fast I needed to maximize my time on social media and focus primarily on Pinterest. You don’t have to purchase templates. Canva has free resources available to create your own but as I said that was not my ministry honey. I needed this process to be as stress-free as possible. 

The templates were easy to use. I would just customize the wording and pictures and boom! I was able to create pins in seconds. The template I purchased came with 50 different style pins to choose from. This made creating 5-7 pins per post so much easier for me versus trying to do it from scratch. It also helps with branding for my blog because my pins are consistent in size and color.

My Pinterest Schedule

My method was creating 5-7 pins per blog post. I would schedule two pins to go live on the same day as the blog post and the others during the remainder of the month. I focused on my pins just as much as the content I was creating because the pins are going to get the readers to your blog. The more attractive your pins are the more opportunities you have for someone to view your content. 

Of all the social media platforms I have, none of them have given me more traffic than Pinterest. 

It is the only site designed for someone to leave the platform in order to view other content, so my suggestion is to master it. NOW!

Although I love Instagram and Facebook, it doesn’t get people to convert as much as Pinterest. At this point, I have even taken pictures from my Instagram and reposted them on Pinterest to drive traffic. And it works. Cute outfit, post it. Beautiful lunch, post it.  

With this, please don’t spam the site. Remember, you want to add value. Just posting because you took a picture of a bowl of spaghetti isn’t gonna cut it. Tell them about the restaurant, the location, the beautiful views for pictures. ADD VALUE. 

Be informative and the traffic will come.  

I want to leave you with this, although my results are typical they are attainable. You can also surpass my results. I know some bloggers who post multiple times a day. And are able to get this type of traffic for one blog post, however, this would be very useful for a new blogger or even someone like myself who needs a challenge. 

The key is to be consistent. I truly believe me posting consistently was what drove the most traffic to my blog as well as the type of content I was sharing. If you have a niche-specific website, sharing content that is seasonal or relevant to your niche will also play a role in your blog traffic. Just remember, your blog is not about you, it’s about the reader. 

Start to implement these strategies on your blog today. and watch the traffic pour in.