Thinking about starting a food blog? Or are you already running one but not sure how to make it grow? Whether you’re trying to get your first site visitor or reach that elusive threshold for an ad network, this post will share some of the top tips for food blogging that are still relevant in 2024.

Let me preface this article with a word of warning—a lot of the blogging advice that you find on the Internet or in Facebook groups may be outdated or from someone who has never actually run a food blog.

I want you to know that I’m there, with you, in the trenches. I’ve run my fitness and food site for more than ten years, and it’s my full-time business. Granted, that site is multi-niche – but I also have three other food blogs that I’ve started. One of these is a smaller, profitable business that I still own, and the other two I grew and then sold for a nice chunk of change.

Here are some of my best tips…

4 Must-Know Food Blogging Tips

*Note: The first three tips here are more for brand-new bloggers; tips four through eleven are relevant for both new and experienced bloggers.

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. As an affiliate, I earn a commission on purchases.

1. Niche down.

Food blogging is more competitive than ever. I can’t find data on exactly how many food blogs exist, but there are certainly more than there were ten years ago. Of those that have started in the last few years, many did so with the intention of making it a business (rather than “hobby blogging,” which was common in the early 2000s) and came into the industry ready to learn and hustle.

Because it’s competitive, it’s hard to make a “general” recipe site. It’s tough to establish an audience base (you know the saying – “if you speak to everyone, you speak to no one”), and it’s tough to demonstrate your expertise in Google’s eyes.

Instead, think about how you might go deeper into something you – and readers – would care about. For example:

• Delving into a specific course. For example, a site about appetizers, desserts, or breakfasts.
• Writing about a particular cuisine. Think Italian recipes, Southern cuisine, Korean cooking, etc. Note: Be cautious about cultural appropriation. Be authentic to yourself, and don’t try to misrepresent your food or expertise.
• Going all-in on one food. I recommend choosing something that has a strong following if you go this route, like bacon or chocolate (rather than something more obscure like starfruit recipes).
• Catering to a particular dietary need, like egg-free recipes for families with allergies or plant-based recipes for those who choose to follow that type of diet.

2. Build your site on WordPress and use a recipe card.

This is a two-parter. First, get self-hosting and build on the WordPress (dot org) framework. It is the gold standard in food blogging. It allows you the most control over your site, offers the ability to use a recipe plugin, and has a lot more functionality than many of the drag-and-drop builders.

Self-hosting ensures that you’re building your “house” (aka your website) on the right “foundation” (aka fast servers). BigScoots is an excellent host. They may cost slightly more than some of the shared hosting sites offer, but they are quick and extremely responsive as far as customer service goes.

When you are creating recipe posts, you need to use a recipe plugin that creates a recipe card. That’s not just for pretty looks – it adds schema to your post, telling Google that your site is a recipe. This is essential if you want your recipe to be shown in the carousel of recipes in search results. I use WP Recipe Maker. Here’s an example of what a recipe card looks like:

Speaking of which – fill out all the key info on the recipe card. Prep and cook time, servings, calories…it’s useful to make it as complete as possible.

3. Remember that building a blog takes time.

Sometimes, I’ll get emails from folks asking if I can teach them how to make 100K in 3 months from starting a blog. I don’t want to say that’s impossible because there are exceptions, and I’m not trying to be a dream crusher. But realistically, 99% of folks will not achieve this. (Heck, a ton of bloggers do not ever hit that six-figure income level, let alone in 3 months.)

Don’t let that discourage you! But let it be food for thought into how you plan your goals and define success. If you feel you’re going to make 100K in 3 months and end up making $10, that’s a pretty big disconnect and can feel terrible. But if you set your expectation that you’ll make $1 in 3 months and then make $10 – well, you’ve done amazing then, right?!

For context, most bloggers who approach blogging from a business standpoint may take 1-3 years before they make a decent income from this job. Perhaps less if someone has a ton of time to commit and a good understanding of how to grow a site. Possibly more if someone never learns the fundamentals and doesn’t pay attention to trends in the market.

It takes time to build up your content and your authority so that you rank in Google. It takes time to gain traction on most social media platforms. It takes time to reach the benchmark for major ad companies (like 50K sessions/month for Mediavine’s primary program) or get enough targeted traffic for affiliate posts.

The way to grow faster? Learn as much as you can quickly about driving traffic to your site, publish a lot of awesome content, assess what’s working (type of content, platform, etc) and do more of that. Simple in theory but takes a lot of work.

4. Be aware of AI in search results (but there’s good news).

Google is set to release their AI answers, called Search Generative Experience (SGE), this year. When they release that, people will get an instantaneous answer from Google before other search results appear in the results.

In my opinion, food blogs are actually one of the safest niches in the blogging space for two reasons: 1) The AI answers are currently displaying teaser text and directing people to actual links for full recipes, and 2) Even if the AI answers shift to providing an entire recipe, I think many people still like seeing photos of a recipe and reading comments/reviews from others first.