The Ultimate Blog Podcast - Pivoting Through Content Updates with Melissa of Bless This Mess

Episode Date: November 26, 2024

2024 was a challenging year for many bloggers. Content updates have affected so many bloggers, discouraged them, and made them wonder if it’s possible to find success after so many challenges. Melissa Griffiths, founder of the highly successful food blog for moms Bless This Mess, is here today to give her perspective on how she’s pivoting to stay afloat.After more than a decade of blogging, Melissa is sharing how she’s pivoting to work through the challenges of dropping traffic this year, how she keeps her readers engaged with approachable content, and how her passion and connection with her readers are a big part of her success. Tune into this one to be inspired.Click here to see show notes for episode 154!

Welcome to the Ultimate Blog Podcast. This podcast is the podcast we wish we had when we started blogging. I'm Amy Reinicki and I'm Jennifer Draper. Our episodes dive deep into how to monetize your blog, sharing unique insights and practical tips. We bring you in-depth interviews with successful bloggers and experts who offer valuable, actionable advice. Our mission is to educate, support, inspire,

and empower you in your blogging business. Welcome to the Ultimate Blog Podcast. I am especially excited today about the guests that we are bringing to you because I first met her when I had started my blog and this is clear back in 2014. I met her at a conference here in Kansas City for food bloggers. It was the first conference I ever went to and she was one of the first food bloggers I ever connected with. Her name is Melissa and she is the founder of the blog called Bless This Mess.

And I just thoroughly enjoyed getting to know her that day. And then again, over the years, we have met up at different conferences and run into each other and just every once in a while, stayed connected. I've always been so inspired by her and what she does with her blog and just her interesting life overall. So welcome to the podcast, Melissa. Thanks for having me. I've known both of you for a long time, so it's fun to be able to chat. Yeah, yeah.

We're looking forward to talking today. And I guess before we kick it off, I know I told them the name of your blog, but if you want to just tell them a little bit more about what you do as a blogger and kind of how you got started, that would be great. Yeah, for the last 14 years, I think I have just been writing about easy family recipes. It's just kind of like your normal home cooking stuff. I don't do a ton with processed foods, not a lot of can of cream with chicken or something. But it's just like normal, simple recipes that you'd make for busy families, for busy moms. I'm big on helping people get dinner on the table and making it

enjoyable even for mom. And then I do, I like a lot of baking. So I do a lot of sourdough and that kind of stuff too. Canning, some of that. I have a little hobby farm. So I live in Southern Utah. I'm out by Zion National Park and it's really, really pretty. So we just have our little hobby farm and I garden and I grow cut flowers and we

have our piggies and chickens and turkeys and we just have this fun life. And I homeschool some of my kids. My older two are in public school, high school now and they're class of 25 each. And then my younger three, I'm still homeschooling. So it's just kind of an idea like fun life. And we, I love cooking. I love hosting. I love recipes. I just think that it's a really great way.

I think that in our culture, sometimes we demonize food or we just want it to be like super fast and easy or only on a diet, but I just really love the art of food. Like I just think that food gathers, it nourishes, it celebrates. I love the emotional dynamic of food, too. I just love your energy, Melissa. I just have to say it. I like you make me want to move to southern Utah and like do all the things that you just said. And I feel like that every time that we connect and talk to you and

any time I visit your blog, it's approachable. The recipes are always very approachable, which is something that I appreciate being a mom myself and all that. But I want to know, did you always know that you wanted to stay home with your kids and do something on the side like this or it's no longer on the side? But what was your vision for that? When you decided to start a blog all those years ago, did you have any idea that that was an area you wanted to go down or how did that whole situation

like come to play that you decided to start this blog? Yeah. And like 2009, if you are in that era, if you're turning around 40, you probably had a blog spot. Do you remember those? Oh 40, you probably had a blog spot. Do you remember those? Oh, I had a blog spot. My husband and I's yeah, our first and last name dot blogspot.com because I was out here and I had like little young kids, but I had cousins and my mom and my aunties who were all in the Midwest where I grew up.

And so we were just, just blogging. Do you remember the good old days when we were just like, write about our day and write about our kids? But then I would show up at something and someone would be like, hey, can I get that recipe? I'll be like I'll put it on my blog and so that's kind of how it started But then I watched other women start to make businesses out of them And so I said hey, I think that I could do that and I did have an intention Like I called it my money blog from the day I started it. So I was already writing,

and I like that kind of like family and personal. But then when I saw people transitioning to just recipes, I said I could do that too, and I wanted to make an income off of it. And so I did. So in 2012, I launched Bless This Mess, and I always had the intention of being useful and making money.

I love that you had that insight going in, not just the insight, but the belief, like I can do this going in because I myself had a blog spot and I did not have that confidence. I, I saw other people starting to do it and I was like, Oh boy. Like honestly, when people started making money blogging, I've shared this before, but when people started talking about making money blogging, I was like, peace, see ya. I have no idea how to do that. And I have nobody to ask. So I'm just going to like slowly exit out the back door. And now I'm kicking myself. So I'm always inspired by people who saw that vision all those years ago. And you

have been through blogging through this like up and down and this journey that it is. And that's really why we want to talk to you today and why we brought you on today is because you've learned a lot since 2009 and especially since 2012 when this became like a business that you decided to start and do on your own. And so I kind of want to just give some give some airtime to that. Like what has been some of the biggest changes that you have seen from blogging coming from like 2012 to today to 2024? What has been some of the biggest shifts that you've seen that

have happened in that amount of time? Yeah, I think that in the beginning, we started out with people like pioneer women who were telling us every little itty bitty part of their day and people loved it. We ate it up. We checked blogs every single day because it was also half memoir. And then searches and optimization came about in probably, I'd say 2015, 16, not really popular until like 17, 18. But people were just there to get a recipe. They got tired of hearing about the story about why you love it or your grandma or any of those things. So it was really, really personal in the beginning.

And then it swung to being like, nope, I'm just here for this recipe. And so I feel like I worked really hard to take myself out of my blog. I produced great content, but I took down all my kids' birth stories. I was not telling you where it came from or why I made it or anything. I was just saying, here's how we're doing it. Here's tips for freezing it. I'm just gonna be really, really useful to you. And I feel like that pendulum has started to swing back like with the advent of AI and mass produced content. People are

like, wait a minute, we want to know that a human is involved here. So I feel myself like'm going to be able to do that. And I think that's a great thing. I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing. And I think that's a great thing.

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But we kind of have to take that step back and be like, okay, things just naturally ebb and flow. But yeah, it's hard. Like you said, you had to go through a lot of changes to get all that content off your blog. What's kind of your approach? I mean, you've been through this probably enough times at this point. What's your approach when you hear about a big change or everybody's chattering about, oh, we have to do this all completely differently. How do you go about kind of just filtering out the information, not panicking or freaking out? How do you go about implementing changes or knowing which ones to listen to and which

ones to ignore? I think it depends on the season because in some seasons when I felt like the blog was doing really well, I had some choices. So I would go, I would look at the new information and I would ask myself how I felt about it. If I felt excited or if it felt invigorating, I would say, yeah, I can implement that. Or I'm really curious about that. Or I'd like to learn more about that. And if it just felt like a time suck or something that was like bringing down my energy, I'd be like, I'm going to set that aside. I don't have to pick

it up right now. But things like Pinterest, Pinterest was new. I didn't, I didn't even have a smartphone until peen. Yeah. Right. I didn't have a cell phone, my own cell phone until 2013, let alone a smartphone. Maybe it was smart. I can't even remember, but I have, I didn't even pick up on technology super quick. So I just kind of implemented like slowly or if I watched it long enough, I would get an idea good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person.

I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person.

I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person.

I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I'm not a very good person. I've never been a viral person. I have just had this slow burn, slow and steady growth, incremental changes year over year. And it has been consistent. It's been consistent for 12 years. Like, I mean, I know I grow at this 15% rate year over year. I just keep moving along. I'm not pushing trends. Like I, I did not have quick growth. So it's been really slow and steady. And so to see a decline, I'm down to like 2018 traffic when I've had my 15% year over year. And that feels really painful when I've done all of these things over all these years. So when I think about content implementation, this time

I'm like, OK, what am I doing? What is going on? So I have changed. Like, I'm like, okay, what am I doing? What is going on? So I have changed like I'm doing different things with email and different things with affiliate marketing and even my content strategy because I feel the pressure, but I like it. I don't think that there's anything wrong with my business implementing change inside of me. Do you know what I mean? Like This stress has a positive impact in that it's making me reevaluate things that when I was comfortable, I did not do. Were you kind of anticipating that this could happen or did it catch you off guard? One

day did you wake up and you go, what is happening here when you started to see your traffic decline? Yes. I feel very completely caught off guard. what is happening here when you started to see your traffic decline? Yes. I feel very completely caught off guard. You were kind of blindsided. Yeah, because I think fall of 2023, a lot of people got really dinged, and I avoided all of that. And then about February of this year, 2024, I could see it like I lost, I had one key word. I'll tell you what it was, is cornbread. I've had cornbread in the number one spot for probably six years. And it has been my bread and butter. Like it's my biggest search term, it's paid my mortgage month after month. And I lost cornbread in the shuffle. And then I was like, Oh, this is not the dream. But then it was just steadily declining. And then I had some issues. And, and do you remember like WordPress recipe maker was like eating. The rich snippets or something.

There was some known issue in August of this year with that plugin. And so in August, so I had been steadily declining and I was about 20 down, 25% year over year, but then August came and something was happening with that plugin. And it knocked me down a full 25%. So just from August to now, like just August to September in that four weeks, I plummeted another 25%. And I'm I'm a fairly large site. We're talking like hundreds of thousands of page views at a time. You know what I mean? Like losing a million page views a month. And so it felt really significant and it was very obvious. And so I also could say, oh, it was that plugin and I did a bunch of work, but the recovery has not, I think that the recovery will be a lot

slower than the hit was. Sorry, I'm just processing that for a moment, just processing because I know that you are not alone in this hit. If you go to blog or Facebook groups, you feel it. You know that people who were getting some of that traffic, how deeply they have been hit. And bloggers, many bloggers, this is their full-time job. This is their livelihood. This is how they make their money. This is how, you know, we provide for our families. And so there has to be the question, I think, that you've had to have asked yourself

in the last couple of months is, do I continue or do I shift and do I stop this? Did you ever have that kind of talk with yourself, that heart to heart, like, maybe it's time to hang this up? Or did you always say, I'm going to figure this out? Yeah, I am the sole income for my family of seven. So it deeply impacts our lives. And my husband is not currently employed. So he hasn't been for almost five years. So I did say, what am I doing? How am I pivoting? I looked at selling two years ago because I was in the middle of some serious, serious health stuff and I hadn't been diagnosed with an autoimmune thing yet.

And so I really did a lot of soul searching about two years ago about whether I wanted to figure it out where I was, if I wanted to delegate, if I wanted to sell. And I decided then that I wanted to keep it. And I think that that helped me navigate this because I had committed to it. And then I had built some of a team. I'd gotten some help where I was being the bottleneck in the business and I wasn't producing

some of the things I wanted to because my health wasn't well. And I've had two years and I am feeling better. And I, you know what I mean? My symptoms are now managed. And so this fall I was able to honestly cut down on my team because an easy way for me to make more money was to have less expenses. And so that's what I love about blogging is that I know how to do it

because I like bootstrapped it in the beginning. There were not recipe card plugins. I used to make a whole separate URL with plain text for a print this recipe page. I handcrafted print your recipe pages in like 2012 and 13. I know the ins and outs of my business and even though I can delegate and sometimes I do delegate, it doesn't mean that I cannot get back into it.

I still know how to take my own pictures. I still love recipe development. I taught myself search engine optimization and even kind of simple things like social media. I had a social media. I had a social media manager for years and I've retaken it over. And that is what I love about owning this business is that it's recreatable.

Like I know how to do all of the parts and I can delegate when I can. And I kind of went through something similar like this during COVID. My husband had just left engineering in September of 2019. And so I kind of like let a team go then and I, I worked for myself again. I did all of the things. And so I feel like I'm kind of in that season again, like I can do this. I can take it on.

I can set things aside that are not going to be the same. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.

I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I did all of the things. And so I feel like I'm kind of in that season again.

Like I can do this, I can take it on, I can set things aside that aren't necessary or they're not a priority right now. But I feel like it's also shifted my priorities. Like I said, it's pressuring me to do things differently and I'm not upset about that. I had a lot of luck with Google. I had a lot of luck with search. I had a lot of luck with

search engine optimization. So I got a little bit lazy with my email list. I was pretty lazy with affiliate marketing. I have not done a sponsored post in years. Like some of these things. I'm like, I can pivot here. And so I am going about it like I'm just going to assume that my traffic is not going to recover. I need to be able to make a living off of this half amount. And if I cannot hack it in a year, we will figure something else not like my husband can't reenter the workforce. And and he he might write we we've talked about these things. But I am pivoting I'm doing much better on my

affiliate marketing. I reopened an Etsy shop. I used to have an Etsy shop for years and years and then it just wasn't the priority, but I really liked it. I liked having handmade things in people's homes and just these little things like I have pivoted and I feel like it was good for me. Now I have good systems and processes in place for my email and affiliate marketing and I should work a little bit harder on getting sponsored work that's kind of next on my list. So I'm just going to assume my traffic is not going to recover. And I'm going to run my business differently from a profit and income standpoint, and also from what I'm doing to drive traffic. If Google is not going to be it, how am I going to do it?

And I think that I used to be really good at providing value to people. I think that I would spend a lot of time thinking about this person or, you know, kind of my ideal, not client, just, you know, other moms. Like, what would be helpful? What am I struggling with? How are we getting dinner on the table? Are kids eating enough vegetables? I'm so tired of buying snacks. Like I would think about things and I would create content and printables and free ebooks. I did that really well in the beginning, like 2016 and 17. I had all these cool ebooks and stuff that I made. And so I've gotten them out and I've dusted them off and I've been sending them as freebies to my email list. And it's been really fun to kind of pivot away from like,

okay, we're just driving traffic from these search terms to let's drive traffic by being a person again. Like how am I being really useful to these people? How am I packaging my existing content? I have 2000 recipes. How am I packaging that so that it's easier to digest and so that people can use it really simply in their homes because people are busy. So I feel like I'm just like back to the roots kind

of vibe right now. Hey, I hope you are enjoying this episode with Alice and Hardy learning more about writing emails that sell. This episode has so many great ideas to use your email list to earn more revenue. So no matter what you are sharing with your audience, whether it be a blog post, a promotion, launching a product or maybe a new course, we highly recommend using Kit for all of your email marketing needs. Building those connected relationships with your readers has never been easier. And the platform is easy to use with customizable templates and automation tools that save you a lot of time and allows you to grow your blogging business in a simple and effective

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There's something very inspiring about that. And when you were just kind of sharing that whole scenario, the word that just kept coming to my mind is connected. And like you're getting back to that connection with your audience. I don't like to use the word audience very often, but like with your community, with the moms that you're helping, with the families that you're coming alongside. And I hope that that inspires other people listening here, knowing that that really is what we're doing when we sit down to create content is the goal is that you're helping

someone in some way, in some aspect of their life. But you're offering a hand, say, hey, I have this like, quote unquote, kind of figured out, let me help you too. But you're offering a hand, say, hey, I have this like, quote unquote, kind of figured out. Let me help you too. And I have to assume that that's felt, even though traffic's down, has that alone felt reinvigorating feeling like you're connecting again? Yes, it's so fun. And I feel like the only reason I was somewhat disengaged in the first place is because I

felt like people didn't want it. But I think that people want it again. So if people are ready to have me again, I'm ready to show up again. And this content creation and the packaging and being helpful, I did like an Instagram where you can drop like ask me anything with the questions. And someone was like, why are you so talented?

Or how can I come and live with you? Or like, how do you get all this stuff done? I'm like, my business, this Instagram that you're watching is literally, I built it on my talents. I am not telling you the outfit of the day, I'm not helping you organize your closet, but I'm really good at helping you get dinner on the table and feeding your kids and enjoying that time.

Like taking some of the drudgery out of feeding people because it is all day every day. And that is what I'm good at. This is what I love. So it's so fun to be packaging it nicely again and people wanting to know about me, the person too who's doing the packaging. Yeah. I feel like even though there's some really difficult parts about

this whole shift and traffic being quote down and all of that, what you said is so true. Like, hey, I'm going to take the traffic that I have now and I'm going to figure out how to make that work with the people that I have and to create an income from that, which I think is such a good perspective to have because maybe we're just in a time where we're not just going to be trying to push droves of traffic to our website of all these anonymous people. We have a group of people who want to hear what we have to say, and we're going to create what they want, and then we're going to create even more in ways that we can create an income

from it. Like you said, maybe we can do some sponsored work, maybe we can create some ebooks and all those kinds of things. Since you've been doing this for so long and you've gone through some of those ebbs and flows of connecting with your audience, what are some of your tips or your favorite ways that you are able to connect with those people and get feedback about what's helpful to them or what they're wanting or needing. Because I think that's something that people struggle with. Like, how do I know what people are coming to me to find out?

Like, how can you go about creating the kind of content that they want? I think I take two ends to this. I feel like they're almost opposites and I do both. So in one end, people don't, you need to tell them what you're fixing. Do you know what I mean? I'm just going to come in like, I know it's Thanksgiving time and I know the pie crust is a little fussy. So I'm going to come in and I'm going to show you and I'm going to show you how to make the lattice pie crust and then give you all these awesome pie recipes. So part of me is like, I know your general pain points because my blog I mean it's food There are general pain points, but then it's also like the busy parent aspect because I'm not fussy

Like you said, I I don't have fussy food and even sourdough I felt like my cookbook is called sourdough made easy if you have a chia pet for a sourdough I did I just think you're doing it wrong unless you like it unless you like I just think you're doing it wrong, unless you like it, unless you like the habit and the ritual of having a Chia Pet for a sourdough. If you want sourdough because it's delightful and you don't want a Chia Pet, you should come to me. So I'm like fuss free, so I'm gonna tell you

what I think your problems are and I'm going to solve them for you. And then on the other end is I love to ask. I love to ask people like, what are you struggling with? What are your pain points? How can I help you? And people have the best input. So I think like both of those places have room in my business and I do both of them. Yeah, because you can kind of marry it in the middle where you can base your experience

and what they're asking for and kind of pull it all together. Because I think people don't always know exactly what they need. Sometimes they think they know, but then what they tell you isn't what they end up using in the long run. I know people come, when I put out surveys, they'll come and say, oh, I want healthier recipes. So I'll make healthier recipes. And then it's crickets. They really want the comfort food and the home cooking kind of stuff. And so it's like, well, maybe you want the combination in the middle. We're going to find a way to make this work for everybody. Yeah. So you mentioned showing up differently in your email list essentially and communicating

with your subscribers in a different way. What does that shift looked like and how are you communicating with them differently and what does that change and how has that shift happened over the last couple of months and what are you seeing with that change? Yeah, I have switched to frequency. If you don't want to hear from me, unsubscribe. And so I'm sending a lot of emails right now and it's really, really fun. And I've also cleaned my email list. I did not delete on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things.

I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things. I'm missing out on so many great things.

I'm missing out on so many great no, I'm missing out on seasonal. I'm missing out on so many other things. So I have started emailing a lot and doing series within email has been really fun. I have some friends who just did croctober and they were sending out emails every single day with this specific thing, but they're still doing their seasonal They're still doing though what I made new and so I have been Watching a lot of other people and people are tolerating quite a bit of email And if they don't want to hear from you, I'm kicking them off, right? They're not your people

So to have a group of people who really want to hear from you over and over again and are clicking over to the site is Really valuable. So I've cleaned my list and I am it's very clear where you can unsubscribe or if I'm doing a series I just did that start your sourdough and it was seven days and I made videos for it And I was like if you don't want these click this like you don't have to get off the whole list But you don't want these, click this. Like you don't have to get off the whole list, but you don't have to be interested. But I had a really core group of people who were really interested in sourdough. And now they kind of think of me as the sourdough girl. I've also been putting a lot more content in the email

and my click rates went from maybe, you know, three to 800 clicks per email to three to 8,000. I'm averaging like 7 eight hundred clicks per email to three to eight thousand. I'm I'm averaging like seven thousand clicks per email because I am putting minimum ten recipes in it. I'm saying ten tomato recipes, ten zucchini recipes, ten Crop Pot recipes for back to school. I'm putting a lot like if you are going to go through the effort of opening my email I'm gonna give you so much and then I've been working on free resources so that email um the email thing I turned it into a I've been liking my ebook so I made an ebook all about starting sourdough and I just at the bottom

free resource like here's your free resource like for meal planning here's your free resource for sourdough I just did a 55 page thanksgiving book It was so fun to do. Like this is what I like. So I'll put that in for seasonally. Like here's your free 55 page guide with printables and kids coloring pages and timing sheets. Like it's magical. It's so fun. I love the content. So I've been working really hard on that free. But that's how I'm getting people to opt in to I put it all over social media It's like I may do a free 55 page guide to Thanksgiving I put all the recipes directly in it because I want them to print them out because I taped my recipes to my cabinet for Thanksgiving I don't want to be on my phone. I want that for them, too

So it's not always like you have to go back to the website. You have to like, I'm not trying, I love the clicks. I'm gonna take them. But for that ebook, I didn't want you to have to pop over to 25 different recipes on my blog. I put them all in there and you can just print them right off and you only need this one thing because that's what feels useful to me. That's what feels like I'm being a service

and I wanna be in your kitchen on Thanksgiving with you because you're going to remember my mom's roll recipe and you're going to remember that sugar cream pie that's kind of like a unique recipe. It's like a Hoosier Midwestern thing. And you're going to come back to it and you're going to remember me. I want to be in your kitchen with you. Yeah, what's clear to me is truly your enthusiasm for this. And for anybody who's listening and like, oh my gosh, I don't know if I can create that many ebooks. That's not what you're saying.

What you're saying is find what you're passionate about and connect with your audience in that way. Whether you like to send out an ebook, whether you want to just give them a video every week of you talking, whatever it is, I think if your own passion and just excitement over what you're sharing comes through, I think it connects so much better with the people instead of just like always just trying to do what somebody else is doing. So it's never about like copying somebody else's success. It's about finding what you're excited about, what you know that you can help them with

and sharing that with them. So I just loved hearing you talk about it because you're so excited about sharing it. And so I know it has to be really connecting with those people. Yeah. And we've just got to be useful. You know what I mean? I am competing with 5 million billion food blogs. And so I have done other things too.

My had density is extremely low and I some of these things I know I could be making more money But I don't want to turn off every single person who comes because my ads are so obnoxious if I'm annoyed you're annoying Yeah, you know, I've always I've been more like that too there are things that I could do to make more money, but I'm also not going to do them. And part or yet maybe I will in the future. We might get desperate. I just try to like keep some integrity also because I tell myself that's what will keep

my business going. Like it'll I'll have enough people who can appreciate my low ad density and my really helpful resources and my tried and true recipes that they'll come back and hopefully I'll be able to keep doing this because I do want to. What I hear you saying without hearing you saying the exact words is that the user's experience when they come to your site is your utmost priority. And I think that that is, if you take anything out of this, that's what I want you to hear, is that your users, your readers, your community, like showing them how you truly are there to help and serve and you get to do this job because of them.

And because of the impact, because of the connection, because of the clicks, because of the sharing. And I love that you guys are so passionate about this. to do this job because of them and because of the impact, because of the connection, because of the clicks, because of the sharing. And I love that you said, I put all the recipes in a 55 page ebook because I want to be with you on Thanksgiving. But I don't want you to have to have your phone out or your computer and have that whole mess.

But like I want you to have these printed recipes to where I can be with you in your kitchen. I don't like to use the word selling, but that you're selling an experience, I think that is really important. And at the root of it, it's connection. And I think that that is truly where we make the most impact as bloggers. When we are connecting. When we know this is the pain point and this is how I can show up in that space. No, you might not know how to organize everything and share all of that or you might not be who they go to like for the latest outfit trends, but there are so many families, women, moms who want to feel how you feel in the kitchen. They don't want to feel stressed. They want to feel like this is a life-giving thing to their families.

Sometimes we just need somebody to come alongside of us and say, hey, it doesn't need to be stressful, actually. I don't want this to feel stressful for you, so let me show you the way. I think you're doing it beautifully. I really do. for you. So let me show you the way. And I think you're doing it beautifully. Like I really do. I feel inspired just honestly hearing from you. And I know that when you and I were talking about this interview, I came up with the idea of having you on because of this hit in your traffic. But what I think is so beautiful that you're weaving into this is

what you said, like, I'm going to move forward, assuming that my traffic's never going to recover and I'm still choosing this business. I'm just pivoting. And what a gift that can be for somebody listening who might be feeling the exact same way that you have felt and an encouragement to like, don't give up on this dream that you have in this way of connecting with people. That's really, really important and really, really powerful. Thank you for that. And I think it's also helped me. I put a lot of time and money in this very specific calendar year into updating.

I touched every single post on Bless This Mess. I updated everything. I was adding content. I had tons of help. And I just really thought that there would be this awesome ROI on it because I was doing the things I had a content audit. I did Literally everything on the list and then I got hit as soon as I was done like I got hit the hardest in September because I spent like an entire nine months just

Working and working and working to make the site perfect, make the post perfect. And I think also what I got out of it is that I can't like let this run my life. I, I homeschool, I work from home. Do you know what I mean? I, my, I have kids in varsity sports. And so I would come home and work for another two or three hours at night while my kids watched a movie or my husband got them ready for bed. And so I was like, you know, I don't have to do this. I worked really hard in the ROI. So now I'm doing like the smarter, not harder, but also I can pivot. We could get a different job. It's also like loosen something up inside of me because I was chasing this one very specific goal and this is a call from like mama God or the universe or whoever is out there to just say like, maybe your priorities got a little bit off too. And so I've been, I've been putting up my computer at, you know what I mean? I put it up when I make dinner and then I haven't been getting it back out.

And I've been watching call Mark movies with my mom and my dad. And I've been watching a lot of movies with my mom and my dad. And I've been watching a lot of movies with my mom and my dad. And I've been watching a lot of movies with my mom and my dad. And I've been watching a lot computer at, you know what I mean? I put it up when I make dinner and then I haven't been getting it back out. And I've been watching Karl Marx movies with my family. So some of this too, I like, I did the things and it did not turn out like I wanted it to.

So maybe if I calm down a little bit and maybe don't work as much, it's still gonna have the same result. I'm gonna work smarter, not harder. I'm still working, but maybe I don't have to like kind of chase this dream that I really wanted for a long time. And maybe I should be like enjoying my life in the meantime. Is that a tangent? We can cut that whole part out if we want. Nope.

Please don't cut it out because I'm like sitting here teary. Like for real. Yeah, I think that that's so, so, so important to remember because we set these big goals and those are great things. Goals are amazing and they're what propel us forward. But you know, none of this is guaranteed. And so you don't want to miss out on your life. You don don't wanna miss out on your life. You don't wanna miss out on your kids being little, whatever it is that you do. It's so important to make sure that you have the right priorities.

And having an income for your family is obviously very, very important. But like you said, you thought you had it all figured out and you thought you were doing all the right things and it did not turn out like you planned. So it just gives you that new perspective of, I have to go back to the basics. I have to figure out what's truly, truly important and I have to figure out how to make both of these things work. And I think that that is, it's just incredible. It's incredible the perspective that

you have and the calmness that you have. I'm sure you don't always feel that way, but today you are very much projecting like, I'm calm, I have this and I'm going to do the thing and we're just going to get through this. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate that. I just appreciate you so much.

I appreciate today, but I appreciate all the other times that we've connected and being able to learn from you and feel inspired by you and I would love to have you back on next year and Do a follow-up to this I'm gonna put it in my notes to have you back on in a year and see How this shift has has worked and how it's gone in the year and in the meantime just want you to know, like we're rooting for you and thanks for inspiring us today, but also inspiring every single person who hits play on this episode, because I think that this has just been like a warm hug in some ways.

And so just thank you, Melissa, for being here and for sharing it in a very honest and real, but yet positive way, because it is not like the content updates that have affected so many. It has been a very, very heartbreaking thing for many bloggers. And just being able to share your story in a real and honest way that can help others, I just sincerely thank you for being to share your story in a real and honest way that can help others. I just sincerely thank you for being willing to do that here today. So if you can please let people know where they can be more at ease in the kitchen and not have fussy meals, I'm sure that they are wondering how they can make your recipes. Yeah, my URL is old. So it'sthismessplease.com. And then I'm on social at Bless This Mess Blog. Awesome. We will be sure to put those in the show notes and thanks for being here.

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