Influencer Entrepreneurs: Marketing Tips to Make You More Visible
Surviving in the entrepreneur world is not an easy task. Jenny teaches you how to build a stronger business with blogging and social media tips that are up to date and proven. No more trading time for money! She teaches content and email marketing strategies that helped her build her audience and sell her lifestyle blog for over six figures in 2019. As a former inner city school district teacher she understands the importance of breaking strategies into bite size pieces of information all with the master plan of giving you homework so that you can implement the strategies in your business immediately. Get ready to be able to put her strategies into practice after just one listen!
Influencer Entrepreneurs: Marketing Tips to Make You More Visible
The Ultimate Blog Roadmap: How to Go from Overwhelmed to Thriving with Amy Reinecke & Jennifer Draper
Turning your hobby blog into a thriving business doesn't have to feel overwhelming. This eye-opening conversation with Amy Reinecke and Jennifer Draper of Spark Media Concepts reveals the strategic framework bloggers need to build sustainable, profitable platforms.
The foundation begins with clarity. Many content creators struggle with the "multi-passionate" dilemma, resisting the focus that actually attracts their ideal audience. Amy and Jennifer explain why niching down isn't a life sentence, but rather the path to authority that allows future pivots. They share practical wisdom from supporting bloggers since 2017, emphasizing that your website remains the only digital real estate you truly own.
Technical overwhelm stops many bloggers before they start. The guests break down the essential elements every blog needs: a self-hosted WordPress site, appropriate plugins, and an email marketing service that captures your audience from day one. The good news? Starting doesn't require expensive custom designs - quality themes provide everything needed for professional presentation.
Content creation becomes the next hurdle. The conversation explores how burnout happens when creators attempt to produce endless original content across multiple platforms. The solution? Strategic content planning based on keyword research paired with intentional repurposing. One well-crafted blog post can generate approximately twenty pieces of content when approached systematically.
Perhaps most valuable is their perspective on embracing AI as an assistant rather than replacement. Initially resistant themselves, Amy and Jennifer now leverage these tools to streamline processes, prevent burnout, and focus creative energy where it matters most. Their practical approach to technology, content planning, and audience building provides the roadmap bloggers need to transform information overload into sustainable success.
Ready to move from overwhelmed to thriving? This episode delivers the clarity and confidence to build your blog with purpose.
This is the Influencer Entrepreneur's Podcast with Jenny Melrose, where I strategize with business owners on how to grow and scale their businesses to hit their income goals. This is episode 443 of the Influencer Entrepreneurs Podcast with Jenny Melrose. Today we're going to be diving into the conversation of the ultimate blog roadmap how to go from overwhelmed to thriving and we're speaking with Amy Reinke and Jennifer Draper. I'm super excited about this conversation to be able to talk to bloggers that are doing this full time as business owners. So if you've been wanting to take that hobby blog and turn it into a full-time income, you're going to want to listen and take notes throughout this conversation. If you haven't already grabbed our strategic growth guide, make sure that you grab it. It is going to help you set yourself up to be able to better position yourself so that you can stand out in this space. All right, let's dive in. Hello ladies, welcome to the podcast. How are you Good.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having us, Jenny. Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1:Of course, I am so excited about having this conversation about the ultimate blog roadmap how to go from overwhelmed to thriving. But before we jump into that, will you actually introduce yourself and your business to my audience?
Speaker 2:Yes, so I'm Amy Reinecke and I'm one half of Spark Media Concepts. Jennifer and I started back in 2017 supporting bloggers with our business, and I had actually just become a blogger in 2017. I had served as Jennifer's VA, actually and I always laugh when I share this story because I say I was her virtual assistant and we were actually next door neighbors and so that is how it kind of happened. I looked at what she was doing we weren't even really close friends, we were more acquaintances like we weren't even like really close friends, we were more acquaintances and I was like how is she doing this blog thing? Like I was so curious how she was doing it, and she ended up meeting an assistant. I became that assistant by just a way of things, and then in 2017, jennifer, at my kitchen table, shared the idea of helping other women start blogs. She had essentially just helped me create mine and I thought she was a little crazy. And if you've spent any time or if you get to know Jennifer and I, you'll realize really quickly that our personalities are very different and we serve like two different kinds. So I pretend that or I say that one of us is like right brain, One of us is left brain. Together, we make the whole brain. And she had this idea of helping other women start their blogs. I thought she was nuts. I was like that, you know, this is before. I feel like courses and things like that really were at the forefront. And she shared that with me in like I don't know fall of 2017. And I just was like, okay, that's neat.
Speaker 2:And uh, in December of 2017, I was talking to somebody who essentially described the exact thing that Jennifer had told me that she wanted to do, and this person was like I, I need help with this. And I was like I can do that. Uh, me and my my friend, jennifer, we can do that for you. I said get in the car, call her. And I said I know that that was like a pipe dream. Uh, so let's do it, like, let's start it. And that's how spark was created, and so we've been supporting people in that way ever since. Jennifer is like the OG blogger. She started in 2013. Um, but since 2017, we've been supporting bloggers. We have a membership and we have a podcast and it's just our goal to help women understand, like, who they are and the impact that they have and not being afraid to use their voice.
Speaker 3:I'm Jennifer Draper and I, like Amy said, I started my blog in 2013. I, like you, I started as a food blogger and I now own and run two food blogs and just felt so passionate about blogging and was so thankful to have Amy along for the ride and realized that there were other people like us who were struggling out there with all the information overload. So when we were able to come together and create something where we felt like we could cut through the noise, it just felt like such a strong passion of ours to be able to help other women because we were like you could have a blog and you could have a blog and everybody should have a blog, and so that's kind of how our Spark Media concepts and everything else came to be. I love it.
Speaker 1:Yes, I always say that the website is the piece that you need. It is the only thing that is not rented property, because everything else is. They can take it and shut it down and change the algorithm on you and you've lost all those people. So that website is just so important yeah totally agree with that. What would you all say are the biggest mistakes new bloggers make that actually lead to overwhelm.
Speaker 3:I think there are.
Speaker 3:There's a couple of pieces of it.
Speaker 3:One piece is like the technical piece.
Speaker 3:So, you know, just getting in like over their heads and trying to figure out how to set everything up and not not taking the time to do it correctly from the start. So being like, oh I, you know, I'm not good at technical stuff, so I'm just going to set up, like a Squarespace site or something like that, rather than thinking through the step-by-step of what is going to be the best for their business, whether that's, you know, learning a little bit more about WordPress and how to set up the website and things like that. So learning some of that backend stuff, whether or not you're going to ultimately create your website or hire somebody, but like understanding a little bit of that background piece, I think is really important because that's like you said, this is the foundation of your business and so you need to understand how it works and how to use it so that you have that power moving forward. And then I think the other piece that really truly leads to overwhelm is listening to too many people there is so much information out there.
Speaker 3:You're on Instagram, you're on TikTok, you're looking at YouTube, you're reading all of this stuff, you're in different Facebook groups and there's so many people giving advice and a lot of it's probably great advice, but you have to really focus in. You cannot do all the things. You can't do them all at once at least. So really finding like a tried and true resource and then just making your plan and sticking to it, and I think that just having that like a plan that you can walk through step by step and staying focused, versus like letting all of that noise in and being like, oh, but then I have to create this amazing reel and I have to go viral, but I'm supposed to be creating blog content. When you're doing all the things, you're not doing one thing. Well, so pick the one thing or the two things and just really focus on those to get started and create your rhythm there. And once you have that mastered, that's when you can add new things.
Speaker 1:Yes, I think it's so important to really understand, almost like a pathway of focus for you what direction are you going to be going and to make sure that your foundation doesn't have cracks in it, because that is the biggest thing that I see. A lot of clients haven't set certain things up correctly and they have to go back. They're not growing their email list. They don't understand keyword research, they're whatever. They've grown their entire platform on Instagram. It's just you have to really understand what you're trying to do with that. So how can someone pick the right niche without getting stuck in analysis paralysis, yeah.
Speaker 2:This is a common question, honestly, and I think we get the question a lot of like well, I want to talk about all the things, and that is a very common thing, especially for new bloggers or content creators, is that you do want to talk about all the things, but you do need to just have a moment where you can ask yourself the important questions and say what are you really passionate about? What do you really want to talk about? What are people asking you about? You can have a blog that literally nobody cares about, and I don't mean that to be insensitive. I mean that to be like you might really love oil painting orange flowers, but if nobody else loves to learn about oil painting orange flowers, you're literally never going to have anybody come to your site. So I think it's kind of like you have to hold two things in your hand. One, you have to do some keyword research and understand, like, what, what are people wanting to know more about? And two, what do you know a lot about? What lights you up? What are you passionate about?
Speaker 2:It doesn't mean that someday you can't expand that, but we really do believe, like we've talked about that foundation. When you begin, you need to have a really solid foundation. People and Google need to understand who you are, how you are serving, how you're showing up, and if you don't have that, if you don't know who you are, nobody else is going to know who you are either, and so I think that that can cause a lot of the, the overwhelm in regards to, like the analysis, paralysis that you talked about. Like, if you don't know who you are and if you don't know who you're serving, then you kind of are in that, like that, that crazy mindset of like well, I could serve this person and this person and and that, just that doesn't serve you well and it doesn't serve anybody coming to your website well either.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I always hear from clients, but I'm multi-passionate. I don't want to get stuck into a corner like baby and I'm like don't tell me that we're going to be clear.
Speaker 1:Yes, you have to. You have to really get clear on who you're going to serve and how you're serving them. What problem do you solve for them? And, like you said, this can change over time. You can choose to pivot. I've had clients that went from talking about sensory bins and then ended up with twins that were only not supposed to be twins, and she went yeah, sensory bins don't work anymore for me. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the moms that need to be more self-aware and not feel like they're doing everything wrong. So that's who I'm talking to now. And she just pivoted all of her content to show that that was what her ultimate purpose was and then, moving forward, made sure that the content was very specific to that. You can pivot.
Speaker 2:You are not going to get trapped in this box right out of the gate and have to stay there forever and ever. I think that brings up a really valid concern that a lot of people start with is that they feel like when they choose their niche, they're married to it forever and that you can never change and I can never have a different opinion. I can never have new ideas. That is simply not true. We are multifaceted people. You are going to grow. Your opinions might change. You might totally disagree with something in five years. That, like, is the hill you're going to die on today, and so when you can get over that part of it too, I think it's easier to choose like okay, this is the path I'm going down right now. This makes the most sense right now. It doesn't mean that it's going to be the path forever, but right now, this is where I need to be.
Speaker 1:Yes, absolutely. So what would you say are the essential elements? Every blog needs to start on the right foot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love this question and you know you're going to get different answers depending on who you ask, but we've worked with so many bloggers at this point and I'm going to start with the number one thing that a blogger needs before they dive into this is they need to know their purpose, because things are going to be a little challenging, it's going to be a little difficult and you're going to have to learn new things that you might not want to learn, so it's not always just the fun and passionate part of sharing content. You're going to have some things to set up in the first place. So having that purpose written down and something that you can look at as you're going through these steps is going to be critical. And then, for us, we believe that having a self-hosted WordPress site is the foundation of setting up a blog. That, if you are going to create a monetized business from it like if you're wanting to have ad revenue as part of your revenue stream and so setting up a self-hosted WordPress site and then having the appropriate plugins that you need on that site for your site speed, for your image optimization and for your security and for social sharing and things like that Knowing what you need so that your website is functioning properly, and a good website theme is perfectly appropriate.
Speaker 3:You do not have to hire a web developer to create a custom site for you when you're first getting started. There are plenty of expenses when you're starting a business and you can keep these pretty reasonable when it comes to starting a business. Starting a blog is not incredibly expensive. There are some things that you have to invest in, but you can start in some of these places right out of the box. And then the other piece that is so important is to sign up for an email marketing service and integrating that into your website so that you can start collecting email addresses from your followers, because that is something that you technically own. It's not like a social media platform that can go away. That is your direct line of communication. As you start to build your following and your readers and your traffic. You want to capture as many of those people as possible so that they'll come back again and again, and again.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I will say that I think email is one of the things that I dragged my feet on the longest, because to me it was very tech heavy again and the website had been tech heavy and I'm not a tech person. But it is so much easier now than it ever used to be and there are so many different softwares that make it so simple. There's plugins that can connect depending upon who you're using. Don't let that be something that holds you up. Plus, there's so many YouTube videos out there that will show you exactly step-by-step how to set it up. So that is definitely I would wholeheartedly agree have your email software and then provide them with something in exchange for that email that they give you, so that they can see your expertise and want even more from you through your emails, for sure.
Speaker 4:Hey there guys. My name is Melanie from Mostly Under Control, and I am a member of Jenny's Influencer Entrepreneurs Insiders membership. I've been a part of it since 2017, and over these six years, I've taken full advantage of the weekly trainings that Jenny offers and the monthly group coaching. The group coaching is probably my favorite part of the membership. Jenny has taught me so many things for my business. She helped me niche down and write and teach about what I wanted so that I wouldn't burn out. In addition to what she teaches, the networking I've done with other members has been invaluable. I recommend her membership to all of my online business owner friends because it is worth every single penny.
Speaker 1:How can bloggers develop a content strategy that doesn't lead to burnout?
Speaker 2:Great question. I think burnout is very real for entrepreneurs and content creators because we feel that you just it's almost like that more content means you're going to be better, and I kind of want to flip the script on that a little bit and remind anybody who's creating content that being consistent is really important. And being consistent looks different for Jenny than it does for Jennifer than it does for myself, and I think that we can often look, look too much at what everybody else is doing and think that that's the way that you have to grow, and instead you need to, like ask yourself what, what does it take to grow? And if you're constantly like running someone else's race, you're going to get burned out. If you listen to podcasts all day, if you join a whole bunch of courses, like Jennifer said, if you have too many, too much input, you're going to feel overwhelmed, and so I think that the best way to prevent burnout is, like we've talked about understand who you're talking, to understand what your niche is and then make a plan for yourself, understand your time. We often tell our members to do a time inventory um, spend a couple of days and, like write down how much time you spend doing any given task, and that includes anything for your personal life and your family as well, because that does play into the equation there with how much time that you have. Nothing feels worse than saying, okay, I want to spend 20 hours a week working on this and you actually only have 10. So you're already like out of the gate, going to feel like you're failing. But if you have a clear understanding this is the amount of time that I have to work on this and these are the tasks that are the most important in this business right now, then you can make sure that your time is being used wisely and you're not like just just spinning your wheels constantly.
Speaker 2:And I think a lot of times, burnout comes from this inability to understand what's working for you and your business too. And so understanding, like okay, if I put out a blog post, how can I repurpose this content? So you don't need to recreate the wheel every single time. But that blog post. We recently did an interview on our podcast and the guest told us that with one blog post, you should be able to get around 20 pieces of repurposed content from that. Think about that. Think about the overwhelm that that can prevent If you write one blog post a week, if you have the capacity to do that, and then you go into chat, gpt and you use that as a resource, as a way to say okay, now help me create other content from this one piece of content that, right there, is going to save you time, which is going to lead to less burnout as well. So I think it's looking at the big picture, understanding how much time you actually have and then utilizing that to the best of your ability.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and I think too, like for some of you potentially listening, is that you may find that maybe your writing takes you longer writing a blog post, so maybe you talk. Better. Start with the podcast as that one piece of content that you then take the transcript, turn it into a blog post and, at the same time you're doing the podcast, you record for YouTube and turn that into a YouTube video and then have corresponding social media. It is all about repurposing. We have to get off that hamster wheel of just continually churning out new content for every single platform when there are now AI tools that you can take a YouTube video and it'll spit you out 10 shorts right out of that that you can use for Instagram, tiktok, whatever, wherever your people are. So, yes, it's getting smarter and not working harder at it, so I love that. What would you say is the best way to plan content to ensure steady growth?
Speaker 3:This is where you kind of have to turn into a little bit of a data nerd. And, um, you know, as, as bloggers, I think a lot of us start out like, oh I, I have this passion and I want to share what's on my heart and things like that. And yes, that's absolutely important. But you have to combine that with being able to know what are people actually looking for, because you asked how to ensure growth, and if you want to ensure growth, you have to create content that people want and need. And so telling yourself that, yes, you can have a list of brainstorm topics, but now it's time to dive into the data. We're going to have to use a keyword research tool and we're going to have to find out are people searching for this? How many people are searching for this? Is this a topic that I can be an expert or an educator on? Can I teach somebody something? Do I have something to offer in this area? And being really thoughtful about that.
Speaker 3:And then the second piece of that is then, once you are creating content, you're going back and you're reviewing the results of how that content is performing.
Speaker 3:So you're going into your Google Analytics and you're looking in your emails to see if people are responding to you about the content that you're writing or in your DMs or whatever. You're collecting all of that data, you're looking at the numbers and you're looking to see what is actually resonating with your audience and then you can find common themes and then you can create more content that links back and expands upon other things that you've written, so that you're creating the stuff that people really want to see. And so doing that on a regular basis, just having that on your to-do list, on your calendar, it's like okay, I'm going to review the results of what I've created and then I'm going to use my keyword research tool and I'm going to see what else I can do, because if you're creating the content that people really want and need, that is going to be what's going to create that growth, rather than trying to find the next like viral thing that's going to get you a ton of traffic.
Speaker 1:Yes, it's becoming that resource for them. So if you are that food blogger and you're getting a ton of traffic for cauliflower recipes, well, do you have the how to, how to steam, how to go through and chop it, all the things that can lead to it to then be able to create the recipes and then go higher level with it? It's really creating that of just an ultimate resource for them where they can find everything they need in one place, instead of having to go to six different websites and eight different YouTube videos because the answer wasn't completely within your content. When you can be that ultimate resource, it just makes such a huge difference. So how can AI or automation tools help streamline content creation?
Speaker 2:I think it can do so many different things. I think it can do more things than we even realize and we've kind of done a deep dive with this in the last several months here and just utilizing it more. And I think we can use AI as an assistant, not as a replacement. That's been said by I think you said it, jenny, I think other people have said that too and I think that that's a really common theme when we go into using these different AI tools A lot of it.
Speaker 2:In the beginning, I think, when AI came out, we both had a negative connotation with it. We were at a conference, actually, and there was an AI presentation and we were trying to decide which ones we were going to and I told Jennifer, I think I'm going to go to the AI one, like I just want to learn a little bit about it, you know, just understand. And Jennifer was like I am not going to that, no way, not doing it. And we met after and I was like you should have gone, and I was like you should have gone, like I just had my world rocked with this because, like I said in the beginning, creating like content today looks so different than it did, and we have to remind ourselves of that. So, if we need to streamline our content creation, then we have to find systems and we have to find processes that work for us, that can be duplicated. Every time we go to write a blog post, we shouldn't have to ask ourselves now, how do I do this? But if you can use AI to go through that process, like, okay, you have a blog post, what are all the other ways that you need to become visible? What are all the pieces of content that can be created with this? Or maybe you just start with a topic idea what can be created with this? Because we no longer have to just rely on our brains alone.
Speaker 2:We can use AI to help generate ideas, and I don't think that we should be afraid of that, and I think, as women, we oftentimes are afraid of that, because we're afraid of asking for help, and that's essentially what it is, and that was us in the beginning. How are we going to implement this in our business? How are we going to use this? And what I can say is we use it for our business and I use it in other aspects of my life as well. It really does just give you this broader array of topics to think about and consider and understand how you can make an impact in a greater way, and so don't be afraid to use it and don't be afraid to test it out in different ways in your business.
Speaker 2:You might really love to use it in regards to email marketing and helping you come up with ideas, but you may really hate using it for, may really hate using it for, like an outline for a blog post. It just might not be what you need, but I think the more you use it, the better it becomes. And so, not being afraid to kind of go from that negative connotation with it and allowing yourself to see if this tool could be a game changer for your business, and not only that, but to go back to what I said earlier, to help prevent burnout, what can you do to just allow your business to run a little more freely? Because there's a lot on our plates as entrepreneurs and not everybody has the capacity to hire multiple VAs, and so how can you use this free resource to help you get the content that you need out to be able to make the impact that you want to make and stay connected to your audience? Don't be afraid of asking for help in that way, and that's what we think AI can really do.
Speaker 1:Yes, it's all about that process piece. Anything that you would essentially want to hand off to a VA, hand it off to AI. Start asking those questions for sure. I've even gone back through any of the products that I offer, course wise, and I have all AI prompts that are now going to be incorporated into my courses because my process has changed. Because of AI, I don't need to go and search every single thing via Google about a brand to understand what they want, when I could just go to AI and say what is Smucker's looking for right now and pitch me some ideas that I could send them over to it. It is so much faster. Why would I do all the research legwork when it can do it for me? And that is what I'm incorporating right into all of the courses that I offer. My programs have that in there, so it does. It's just a huge piece of the process that can make things so much simpler.
Speaker 1:So now you all offer a beginner blogger tips playlist. Can you tell us a little bit about this? We're linking to it in the show notes so y'all can make sure that you can grab it. It's on Spotify so that you can listen in just like you are to this podcast.
Speaker 2:Tell us a little bit about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so this playlist was created for the person who's like at that beginning stage of like wanting to start a blog, like what are some important foundational, uh steps that you need to consider when you want to start a blog?
Speaker 2:It's got four episodes in it and it'll take you under two hours to listen, so you can just pop in an AirPod, go about your day and just listen to what we have to say about how to get started blogging.
Speaker 2:That's really who it's for. I do also want to mention that, for those of you who are listening because I know you have a lot of seasoned content creators and people who have done this for a long time we do have a membership called the ultimate blog roadmap, and this this was designed in order to support bloggers of all levels, and so that is something that we are really excited to offer bloggers, along with the podcast, who just want, like, a higher touch, who want to understand, like how to grow and how to essentially increase their visibility and to really understand how to blog the right way. Uh, jennifer mentioned it earlier, but there being a lot of voices and and like knowing where you can go, like this is where I need to go to get the best blog advice. We'd love to uh have you learn more and that uh website is ultimate blog roadmapcom.
Speaker 1:Perfect. We will also link to that in the show notes, for sure. I appreciate you both so much for taking the time to speak with me and share your knowledge with my audience. Thank you both so much Thanks for having us.
Speaker 1:I hope this conversation helped you have a better idea of how you can take that hobby blog and turn it into the business that you've always wanted and, if you are someone that has an online course, how you can start to create content consistently in order to help attract that audience. These are great ways to be able to monetize and grow your business. If you haven't already, make sure that you grab our strategic growth guides. We can really help you make sure that you are standing out and also make sure that you grab those free audio recordings that Jennifer and Amy are offering that are going to give you a beginner's guide to really making sure that you're on the right path for setting up your blog. As always, I appreciate so much for listening in. If you haven't already left a rating and review, I would love it if you would take the time to do so. Just hit however many stars you see we deserve and leave us a quick comment about your biggest takeaway from this episode. All right, until next time. I will see you all then.
