393: How Passion and Sourdough Feed a 9 Million Pageview Food Blog with Maurizio Leo

This episode is sponsored by Clarity. C L A R I T I. Here's the question. Are you manually keeping track of your blog posts on a spreadsheet or project management tool? Maybe it's like Airtable or Asana. Or maybe you're not even keeping track of anything at all when it comes to optimizing and organizing your content. How do you know what to change and how do you know what you're doing is actually moving the needle? With Clarity, all of that stuff is easier. It's easier to keep track of things. It's easier to know if the changes you're making are having an impact. And that's why we built it. We realized that we were using spreadsheets and cobbling together a system, and we wanted to create something that did that for you. And Clarity brings together WordPress data, Google data, like Google Search Console, and Google Analytics. And it brings all of that information into one place to allow you to make decisions and also inform you about the decisions that you've made and if they're having an impact. I could talk on and on about the features, but the best way to understand it is to get in and to work with the tool yourself. And the good news is clarity is offering 50% off of your first month if you sign up. And you can do that by going to clarity.com food again, that's C-L-A-R-I-T-I.com food to check it out. Thanks to Clarity for sponsoring this episode. Hey there, Bjork here. As you probably know, you're listening to the Food Blogger Pro podcast, and one of the things that's so awesome about doing this podcast for me personally is that I get to have conversations with people and I get to know their story. And number one, it's just a chance to connect with people and get to know somebody a little bit more. And that's awesome, regardless, whoever it might be. But it's even more awesome when the story is extremely compelling and encouraging to me as an entrepreneur or business owner or creator in the world. And that was true for today's podcast with Mauricio Leo. He has not only one of the most successful iOS apps or apps on the App Store, but he also has a really successful website and following online all around bread. It's called the Perfect Loaf. And he's been doing content in this specific space for years and years. And he's going to be talking about that. And you can really tell the reason that he does it is because he wants other people to be Successful. He wants other people to figure out how to get the Perfect Loaf. It's the name of his company, it's the name of his brand, and it's really the heart behind everything that he does. And you see that in the interview. That. That's really the thing that motivates him. As a matter of fact, even at a point when he had millions of page views a year, still didn't have ads on his site, and it wasn't until recently that he put those on. And we're gonna be talking about that. Some of the decisions he made along the way, we're gonna be talking about the different components of his business. He has a membership component, and that's a really important piece of it. And we're also gonna be talking about how he balances all of this stuff. He has multiple businesses, so we're. What does that look like to balance these things when you don't have a really big team? So he's gonna be talking about what he's learned along the way when it comes to, you know, focusing on going deep on certain things and working hard, you know, hustling to get things done, and also making sure that along the way that you stay passionate about what it is that you're doing. That was a through line through the interview as well. Before we jump into the actual interview, want to do a quick shout out for the podcast group that we have on Facebook. You can go to foodbloggerpro.com facebook and what that will allow you to do is join the conversation, which is something that you can't really do in a podcast. And so we're trying to figure out ways to open up the lines of communication with podcast listeners. And that Facebook group is one of the ways that you can do that. So, again, that's foodblockerpro.com Facebook. Be sure to jump in there and join the conversation. Now we're going to move into the conversation with Mauricio, the founder of the Perfect Loaf. And I can't wait to share this interview with you. Mauricio, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Yeah, we're going to be talking about all sorts of different things. We're going to. It's all within the category of things I'm interested in. Everything from iPhone, games, and software. Not games, software. To bread. That's going to be the spectrum of the conversation that we're covering today. Starting with iPhone and iPhone application. You're by official training, a software engineer. Is that like what you went to school for? And how you started in your career was around software development.

Yeah, that's right. I went to school for computer science. So it was, you know, way back when that was actually kind of just emerging as a field. I think it was kind of a new degree, actually, when I was taking courses at university. But yeah, I went to school. I've always kind of had an engineer's kind of mindset. So I've always approached, you know, I was like that typical kid who, you know, took apart the vcr, who, you know, deconstructed everything in the house to my parents, you know, much annoyance. But yeah, I've always had that kind of deconstructive, like, you know, engineering mindset. So when I was exposed to computers when I was young, I was just immediately, like, taken by the complexity. You know, it was kind of like a world within a box in a way. And I was just. It was just amazing to me back then. So I. Yeah, it was. Even though I kind of grew up in the food industry, my. My family, we have an Italian restaurant here in town, and I spent my childhood, you know, in that restaurant. I was still kind of.

Restaurant is.

It was called Mimos. Mimos Restaurant. Yeah, my. My dad started it when he came here in from Italy when he was, you know, in his early 20s. And I. So I spent my whole childhood there, kind of in the back of the restaurant, you know, watching my dad mix pizza dough and, you know, cook and talk to the customers and stuff.

But yeah, eventually, when still open, you said was called.

Yeah, it was called that because during the pandemic, my dad finally got the motivation to retire officially. Yeah, he. I mean, he ran it for, you know, 40 plus years. And so it was. It was kind of like I. I feel like he might've just kept working if it wouldn't have been kind of a pushing force.

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. And then. So restaurant is no more like closed it down during the. Like, didn't sell it, but closed it.

Yeah, his. Well, his partner took it over, so his partner kind of. It's now called Sal's, and so he's. He's taken the. The reins there.

Yeah. Cool. My dad owned a greenhouse growing up and. Greenhouse. And so I remember kind of similar where you're in the back room, you're hanging out. Like, I would kind of. It was my first job technically, but also it was just like something for me to do while he was there. And so much of that experience as a kid is like, learning through osmosis. Like, you're just there and you experience it. My guess is that comes back around to what you're doing now. But before we get there, that'll be kind of a little bit of a foreshadow. I'd be curious to know how long your time in the software world existed. I know that you developed what looks like a really cool app. It's called skyview. Is that right?

That's right, yeah.

Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about that in your world, your time in the software engineering world?

Yeah. So I went to university for computer science, and when I got out, I got a job at a big defense contractor here in town. So I worked on. They were called unmanned aerial vehicles back then, but now we know them as drones, which you can kind of go to Walmart and get a drone. But this was before when they were like the size of a refrigerator. So I worked there for six, seven years. And while I was there, the iPhone app store. Actually, it was before that it was Google had a worldwide developers challenge for anybody that wanted to submit an app on their kind of new phones that they. Not Google phones, but Android phones that were coming out. So me and a couple coworkers, we got together and we developed what is now skyview. But back then it was kind of an earlier version, and with the limited hardware we had on those phones, we could really only use it to do a few things. So we used the sensors on the phone to allow you to track the sun and the moon as it is going overhead, you know, by holding your phone up to the sky and you can see kind of their trajectory, where. Where are they going to go? And so we entered the competition and we, we placed third in the world for, for that. And that kind of bootstrapped our company, our, you know, our startup, if you will. This is way before startups were like a thing, you know, before it was cool. And so we took that money and we, we left our jobs and we, you know, just set out and tried to make an, you know, make an app on the App Store and see how it would do. We released skyview back then, and it, it was an editor's pick back then when that was like, you know, if you got that, it was like everybody who had an iPhone was going to download your app back then.

Like, it's displayed as an editor's pick in the App Store. Yes, just like super prominent real estate in that place. And so then everybody clicks on it and downloads it. It's like kind of a gold mine.

Yeah, it is. And, and there weren't, you Know, back then, the barrier to entry for app development was, you know, it was a lot lower because it was a, you know, nobody really knew what was going on. So anyways, the, you know, the app took off and, you know, it's still, you know, this year we're in the top 10 on the App Store. So, you know, even 10 plus years later, our app is still doing really well. And it's, it's a unique app because, you know, it's, it's always kind of relevant. There's always stuff happening in the sky. You know, celestial events are coming, you know, whether it's a meteor shower or an eclipse or, you know, a blood moon, you know, that kind of thing. So we're really unique to and really lucky to be in that position.

Did you say top 10 in the app Store?

That's right. For the, for the entire year? For the past three, four years running. Yeah. So it's always been kind of up there. Yeah.

So in like a certain category, because.

It, it was a top, I guess, in the top 10 revenue for 2022. So, yeah, it, it always does really well. And, you know, we're, we're continuing to maintain it and it's just, you know, we love it, we all love space, and so we, we keep it going.

So this is maybe a good transition. So you have the success with this app and it's continuing, you're continuing to run it. But then 2013, you kind of start to enter formally into publishing content in the food world. Can you talk about what that was like? Cause it sounds like it wasn't necessarily a pivot point. A lot of times people will say like, hey, I was doing this thing, and then I realized this thing wasn't for me. So then I made a transition into doing this thing. But for you, it was like, this has been successful throughout. You've continued to do it and you've folded in a successful business in the food world. You know, close to 10 million page views a year at this point. And which. These are, you know, 9 million, I think you said, and kind of your opening notes, which is awesome. 80,000 email subscribers, over a quarter million Instagram followers. So you have these two really successful businesses. But take us back to the launching point of when you started to think about it sounds like kind of folding in, for lack of a better word, some of the things that you've learned in the, in the food world from your dad and launched the perfect loaf. So talk about that.

Yeah. So, you know, when we left to do Skyview full Time I was kind of at home all day just writing software with no coworkers around. And really. And, you know, it's just kind of isolating. So I was just looking for something to do, like, with my hands, you know, not just writing code all day. I wanted to actually, you know, make. Make something.

Yeah.

And I've always been, you know, I grew up in my dad's kitchen, and I've always been interested in kind of cooking, but I kind of serendipitously got gifted a book on. On bread baking. And I didn't know anything about, you know, aside from pizza, I didn't know anything about bread, especially sourdough bread. And when I went through the book and I tried, you know, a couple of the processes in there for making a sourdough starter and doing all those things, I was just completely taken by the science, you know, the craft and kind of the marriage of those two things. And I think, you know, my interest in looking at things deeper and kind of trying to figure out what's happening below the surface, I think it is just really like this perfect mix of things that I am interested in. And then when I made my first loaf of bread in my own home oven and I. I ate it, I was like, this is amazing. Right? Yeah. I mean, for a lot of people, bread baking, especially, you know, natural fermentation and sourdough, it's. It's complicated, it's intimidating. And I'm kind of that stubborn person who likes to really take the hardest approach first, and I just get the satisfaction out of that. And when once I baked that first loaf of bread and I created my starter and those first few trials, I was just kind of, you know, hooked on that. So that was my, you know, my experience with bread baking. And when I was doing it, I was looking for help. You know, I was looking for materials online. If there were bakers around me, I mean, there really wasn't a lot back in, you know, 2012, 2013. And so I was like, okay, well, if there's other people, there's other people like me who are trying to figure this out, you know, maybe I can write about it and see if I can help some people figure out this craft. And that's what I did. I, you know, I've always been in the computer space. I've made websites, you know, since, I don't know, like the geocity days, like 1999 or something. So it was easy for me to kind of create it. I didn't know anything about WordPress, you know, CRMs, like, you know, recipe card. I didn't know any of the stuff we know today and like, how well fleshed out it is.

Yeah.

But I just did what I knew and I was really just writing to kind of myself because there was not a lot of traffic in the beginning for many years and that, that's just how it started. And I just consistently kept baking. I mean, I was. I'm not going to downplay my obsession for the sourdough bread part of things because that was the driving force.

Yeah.

If it would have been like a passing interest, I think I would have lost interest in publishing for so long. But, you know, it's been 10 years, over 10 years now that I've just constantly been writing and recipe developing and publishing.

Yeah, it's. It feels like an important through line that you hear with anybody's story around success as a single author, publisher in a specific area is some level of like, passion or purpose or drive that has to exist. But at the same time, I think there oftentimes are those moments. And I was just talking about that. I had breakfast with a mentor this morning and he was talking about, you know, different seasons that he's been in. And if it's a hard season, does he do anything different? And he doesn't. He just continues to show up. He goes to his coffee shop in the morning, he journals. And I think that's the other reality is even when you're not wanting to do the thing that you're usually passionate about, you continue to do it. So in the arc of the last 10 years, how much of your content creation was passion driven, and you used that as kind of a drive to say, hey, I'm going to write about this today. I'm going to journal. Not journal in the sense of like, you know, journaling in a notebook. But like, I have this thing I'm trying to figure out. I'm going to document it and publish it versus I'm going to be consistent and I'm going to push through even when I know that I don't want to, because I want to build a thing and get momentum with it. So can you speak a little bit to that? Because I think the passion versus, like, scheduled pursuit of content publishing and service of growth, those two things sometimes have an interesting dance that they have together. What should that look like for you?

Yeah, it's a, it's a great question. I think that, you know, you nailed it. It's like that's an important kind of dichotomy that you have to, to kind of balance out. Like, are you doing this because you, you have, you want to keep consistent and you just want to, you know, be stubborn and keep posting until something happens. I think for me, it, it was more on the passion side than it was on the, you know, I've got to check this box this week or this month kind of thing. If it, if it would have been, you know, like a task, just a simple task that I had to do, you know, like a lot of people, I probably wouldn't have done the task if it was just task motivated, but because I actually was really curious about, you know, the bread making, you know, developing my skills in the craft over and over and over again because I had that foundation. I think that's why I was able to be consistent for the past, you know, decade. I think if it was, it was the other way around, you know, I might have missed. You know, it's easy to say, okay, well, my, you know, my main job, my day job, I have to, you know, ship this software this month. Oh, I'm going to push off my, you know, my hobby or my passion if it's just something I had to check on a, you know, check off on a checklist. But yeah, I mean, there were many days when, I mean, many days when, you know, I was writing software all day and then, um, at night I was, you know, testing my baking, I was shaping, I was filming or you know, doing a photo shoot in my kitchen with like horrible lighting. I mean, you know, those kind of things. I think after a while you lose your kind of your, your driving force if, if you don't have that passion as, as your foundation.

Yeah, that makes sense. Um, the other thing I'm curious to, to know about is your relationship with your job, doing the software development and this really successful app that you have. And specifically, it sounds like you have partners within that business. And I've always been interested to know what that looks like when you have partners within a business. You're navigating that and then you have this other successful business on the, on the side that you could also justifiably spend time on. And do you like, work a normal workday and then do this at nights and weekends. What does that look like to have two successful businesses, one of which, the Perfect Loaf being fully owned, the other of which I would guess you have partners and navigating that reality of those two things.

Yeah, the two. I mean, it's kind of been a gradual shift for me. So of course in the beginning it was All Skyview. And, you know, I was just doing that and I was just baking on the weekends, kind of, you know, once a month or so. And I think the reality with having kind of remote jobs and, you know, being able to do whatever you want during the day, the reality is you can kind of, you know, get your work done quickly, you know, for your main job, and then do some other things if, you know, if time allows. And I think being an entrepreneur and, you know, running two businesses, I think that the time commitment could easily be 100% on one or the other.

Yeah.

And it's easy to. It's easy to neglect one and want to put all of your time in the other. And I have to say, you know, early on, I love software development and engineering. Engineering. But I almost, you know, equally or more enjoy, you know, bread baking. I had these dreams of quitting my software life and opening a bakery and kind of just baking bread. And I think I would have been totally happy with that. But, um, it's hard to. It's hard for me to ignore the engineering side, and I always want to kind of dip back into that.

Yeah.

So I'd say, you know, the. The kind of split there was, you know, I would work early in the beginning, I would work mostly in the software job, and then on the weekends, I would, you know, be baking constantly just, you know, just because I wanted to. And recording that for. For the perfect loaf as I was doing that, I think maybe you touched on something that's like my partners with Skyview, I have two other co founders, so there's three of us in that company and we've never hired anybody, so it's always been just us three. They have other pursuits, too. They have other businesses there running. And at this point, with Skyview especially, it's kind of a mature piece of software and we don't have to do as much as we need to as we did in the beginning. And, you know, not only is Skyview mature, but the iOS I'm just going to use iOS for example. That's. The platform is so mature now. I mean, there's, you know, skyview at its core is an augmented reality application. And back when we started writing it, in the beginning, there was no toolkit for that. I mean, there was.

Yeah.

Oh, man. I mean, I could do a whole podcast on just the hurdles we had to go over just to be able to get it to run.

AR kit kit, Exactly.

We built our own mini AR kit in there, plus a, you know, a model of the universe and you know, all the other stuff that goes into.

It and what you got with doing that is the momentum and the awareness of this being the app. Whereas now my guess is it would be easier to create an app that competes, but harder because you're so entrenched now as the recommended de facto app that does that. Is that, is there any truth to that?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, if we, you know, if we really wanted to, we could probably recreate the app in no time at all and then ship it on the App Store with a brand new name.

Yeah.

But, yeah, we're, you know, we've had so many downloads now and it's really word of mouth and organic growth at this point.

Yeah. Cool. So let's talk about the Perfect Loaf. At what point did you realize, hey, this could actually be a business? Because sometimes we'll do these interviews and people are like, I knew from the start this is what I wanted to do. I want to build it into a business for you. It sounds like you, your interest primarily with it was documenting your own process in the pursuit of perfection. Right. Literally the perfect loaf around baking bread. So did you know from the start you wanted to build it into a side hustle or kind of a main pursuit, or was it more just documentation of your process of trying to get it perfect and in doing so started to realize, hey, there's other people who are trying to do this as well and I can help them.

Yeah, there was no, no business intent, you know, at all. Because, you know, back in, and you know this just as well as I do back in, you know, 2010 to 2013, you know, monetizing online was, was pretty tough. I mean, it was like Google, Google AdSense kind of thing. And the, you know, the revenue from that was horrible.

Yeah.

And so I, you know, I, I don't think I put an ad. I also don't really like advertisement on websites just in general. Um, I don't think I put an ad on my website for maybe 8 years or something that I ran it. I mean, it was just completely the way it was. You know, I played with adsense a little bit. None of it worked. And I, I wasn't, you know, honestly, I wasn't searching for any kind of monetary income because I had my other business that was running and I did the Perfect Loaf completely out of just the joy of sharing what I was learning.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, early on visits were low, but there was enough traction and enough comments and enough emails and feedback that it kind of created this self fulfilling you know, cycle of me posting and then people saying, hey, I love this, asking questions, and I'm like, oh, okay, well, maybe they need help with this. And then I would help them with that and then they would ask questions and then I'd help them with the next thing. And so this kind of, I don't want to say it was a flywheel, but this, you know, this process just continued on and I mean, it still continues to this day. So. Yeah, yeah, it was no monetary intent until probably eight years into the life.

So that would have been recent. Like, that would have been within the last couple years.

I didn't put ads on the site until I want to say, right as the pandemic was beginning.

So, yeah, which was a good time for a bread site to make that decision. You know, interestingly, at that time, as many people know, like, advertising revenue spend went in half. But for some sites, binge beyond being one of them, like, traffic doubled. My guess for you was that was a pretty interesting time period. March, April of 2020. Was that fun for you to see people at home baking bread in Mass?

Yeah, I mean, it was literally like the next day I, like, woke up and, you know, sat down, was writing a recipe and I was like, what in the heck? You know, like the Google Analytics, they were like off the charts. And part of the reason why I put ads on the site was because the maintenance fee for the amount of people visiting the site started to over take my budget for keeping the site running. I mean, there was so much traffic to the site that it was, you know, I'd never seen anything like it before. So that was one reason why I almost had to put ads on, because I got into this point where I needed to. To offset the hosting fees.

Yeah, totally. It's a good problem to have.

Yeah, no, it was, it was great.

Yeah. Yeah. It's one of the things that, you know, people often talk about, hey, when should I put ads on my site? And I think what's really cool with your story is you represent one way to do it, which is you wait as long as possible. And my take on that would be, like, you're potentially able to compress growth, meaning, like, could potentially grow faster because not only is your experience going to be better, but your site's going to be faster. All the positive things about not having ads, the downside of which would be obviously the income. Like, you get income that can then fuel additional growth. So there might be like an argument for it in that favor. But I also think that there's some element for people of even if you make like a dollar a day, which we were at that point where we'd look at a site and be like, oh my gosh, $2. It's like, oh, like you're doing it. Like it's validation that you know, you're going through the process of creating something that is able to create income in the world. But what was, what's nice with your story is you had this main pursuit that, that you could continue with. So there, my guess is there wasn't the need for that until it got to the point where, wait, it's so popular that hosting is expensive and you need to supplement that so you're not like losing money. Right. It's a side hustle because of how popular it is. So what was that like for you to go through the process of saying I'm going to turn ads on now and then the next day starting to see like, oh my gosh, like I'm able to create a substantial amount of income from this. Did that change your perspective on how you produce content, how you go about doing things, or was it just like business, business as usual and now you're able to create an income from the site?

Well, at first I didn't know quite what to do because you know, like you said, just immediately I had this, unlocked this additional source of revenue into my life. Like what, what do I do with these funds? So you know, I, what I've done since then is I've, I've literally taken that money and I've tried to funnel it back into the site. So I'm trying to, you know, use the funds to, you know, I have a part time editor, you know, now which is, it's like a luxury for me because I don't have to continuously edit. And then I've, you know, like I have a part time illustrator. I've done, you know, some SEO like content audits. I haven't brought anybody on in terms of like content creation because I think the site, you know, it's probably like you guys with, with Pinch of Yum. It's, it's kind of hard when it's something, you know, you're writing yourself, it's hard to get someone else you in on that. So I don't, I don't know that I'll be doing that. But basically, you know, the funds that have come in, I've used them to, to grow the business and now I see the perfect loaf as still kind of, I mean it's still absolutely like a Personal outlet for me to share and connect with the audience. I've built up, you know, over the past decade. I have people who write in who have been following along for that long, and it's always great to kind of make those connections. So I don't want to lose that. But the additional funds have kind of helped me grow the site in a way that I don't think I could have done if I didn't have that revenue source.

Yeah. Simon Sinek has this great speech that he did. I think it was at a conference. Maybe it's just a general concept that he shares, but he talks about the idea of a business being a vehicle, and gas for that vehicle is revenue. You don't just aimlessly drive a vehicle around. Like, it has a purpose and it has a destination. And revenues, fuel for that. And it's cool to hear you reflect on that. It's a bit of, like, purpose. Like, what is the reason for doing this? It's for the community. It's for people. It's to build something in the world that has an impact. And you see that in really unique ways in the food world. Like, we got an email from somebody recently, a pinch of yam that said they were doing. Lindsay was doing this bucket list challenge for these different recipes that she had. I think it was connected to this. And somebody wrote in and said their grandfather had passed away, and they weren't able to all get together to be there with him in time. So she invited them over, and they made Angie's tortellini soup. And it was like. And how meaningful that was. And you realize, whether it be bread and, like, somebody's first successful time making a loaf of bread and sharing that with their family, you know, they. That being, like, such a meaningful thing for people.

Yeah.

And. And. And. And we have these opportunities. Like, I'm gonna attempt to communicate this. Let me know if it makes sense. We have this, like, income comes in from the things that we're doing, and that's like, revenue income. But we have the ability to, like, turn that into other types of income. And there's relational income, there's impact income. And it is kind of with the idea of, like, gasoline or fuel being the thing that powers you towards your. Your impact, your destination. I think the same is true in this space. Like, we have the ability to take that and look and think, like, great, in your case, how do I make this site better so people can be more successful with it?

Right.

That the output of that is still income. It might not be financial income. But it's still a type of income. And I've been trying to think more about that in the work that I do. Like, what are the different ways that we can create other types of income as income comes in that. From the business. Which is cool to hear you reflect on that. One of the things I'd be interested to hear you talk a little bit about is the. Speaking of having an impact is the community or the membership element of it. I see you have the perfect loaf membership, community, 1300 members that are part of that. What does that look like? And when did you launch it?

The membership? I launched it in 2018. So it was quite a while back. And you know, I didn't, I've never actually really pushed it hard. You know, I didn't try to like sell a membership. But, you know, people were trying to, they were, they were asking me, you know, how can I support the site. Like, I love your recipes, I love your guides, I want to contribute. And so I was trying to figure out a way where I could, you know, not only allow people to do that, but also to kind of solidify a community, you know, around the site. And I, I wanted a space that was not on a social network, A space that.

Like a Facebook group or.

Yeah, exactly. And honestly, it was a really hard decision because if you're in Facebook, you can get more reach. But I don't feel like you have the right, the same kind of connection that you would if you kind of own the space. And so I created the membership and it's been kind of steadily growing over the years. And I just recently launched like a Discord server. So I wasn't sure how many people would go on there. And it, I mean, it's great. There's a lot of people that pop on. You know, we're talking about bread every day. And I've had, I've done one kind of ask me anything and I have some plans for those in the future. So, you know, it's a, it's yet another place for me that's kind of outside of Instagram or, you know, Pinterest or any of those places. It's a place for me to kind of interact with people that follow or people that are interested in Sourdough kind of one on one. And I, I mean, I've made some amazing friends that I wouldn't have, you know, simply through email, you know, in that kind of space too. So it's just another way for us to kind of rally behind, you know, shared passion.

Cool. I, I don't know the exact percentage, but I always think of in the marketing world they always talk about you have like, let's say a million people who come to your site and like maybe 1% of those would be people who would be interested in that, like having a more high touch experience and being a little bit more connected. And in that group, you know, there's probably 1% of those people who would be interested in doing like an in person conference or. But it's interesting to think about because I think a lot of times in this world what we think about is that first group, it's like traffic, it's people to your site. But we're trying to get better thinking about things like like you're doing like, okay. But we know that we can connect with a group of people and offer a service that's different than like content monetized via ads. In the case of Pinch of Yam, it was meal plans that we did. You know, in your case, this membership community. So just a reminder for listeners, like that's something that's out there as a way to think strategically about your business. What does it look like for you in terms of how you actually run that? Is it, do you do classes, do you do like one off conversations? And then just functionally speaking, like did you, you have this strategic advantage of being a software engineer. So like you could probably build some of this on your own. But like what, how does it run in terms of the, the actual different components of it?

Yeah, it's, I mean it's all behind memberful. So I use their kind of turnkey service for handling all the membership stuff, which has been great. And then it, you know, they tie directly into Discord. So I, you know, I went, I went around and tried to figure out what the best kind of community building, you know, space on the, the Internet was. And there's a few more options nowadays than there were, you know, back in 2018, 2019 when I was getting things running. But you know, so far Discord's been great because I'm on my computer if I'm not in the, you know, kitchen baking and you know, I'm, I'm always on Discord, you know, chatting with other bakers and if they have questions, they can DM me and I'm available. And I think it, I think it provides value to them because they not only have like a direct conduit to me, if they, you know, have an issue and I'm there to help, but they can also ask. I mean there's Some really skilled bakers in my community and they're on there too and they're providing, you know, feedback. So yeah, I mean I try to use as many, you know, third party solutions as possible. Like writing my own stuff is totally an option, but as you know, with software stuff, you know, then it takes maintenance for me and then it takes time away from me actually creating the recipes and you know, the guys. So I have to balance my time there and I don't have any other employees currently. And so that's, that's, you know, that's a serious consideration.

So yeah, they talk about if there's a task, you can like stop doing it, you can delegate it or you can have software do it. And I feel like it's much just possible that third option of just having software do it is like the best answer.

Absolutely.

You know, it's, you can't do it with the high touch stuff, but as much as possible, figuring out ways to have that happen. And then your cookbook. So this is something that you recently launched. What was that process like for you to go through? You know, it's a, it's one thing to like run a company, the app company, it's another thing to run a company and then to build the successful site. But to have a company, you have the site ongoing, you have this membership community. Then you also went through the process of publishing a cookbook. That's a lot of stuff. So curious to hear your thoughts on like the amount of work that goes into it and just your experience with like workload going into, you know, the process of doing a cookbook.

Yeah, the amount of work is, you know, it's extremely high. Not only do you have to write the recipes, but, you know, you have to test the recipes and then there's a photography. So there's, you know, there's, it's like bundling up an entire, you know, website of recipes that you've been working on, but making sure it's 100% perfect because you can't have it, you know, obviously any errors and then having to interface with the publisher and photographer. So yeah, the amount of work is very high. And just to top all that off, I was doing that right as the pandemic began. And so my kids were home and I was, I was homeschooling them and writing the cookbook at the same time. So needless to say, I was waking up literally at, you know, 4:00am until they had school, you know, writing all morning, doing the homeschool and then just fitting in, writing and testing, you know, as I could. I'd say the advantage that I had was that I had already been writing recipes for, you know, seven or eight years. So I, you know, my formula development for bread recipes is pretty solid. You know, I can almost make a recipe and it, I can bake it one time and I know it's going to be, you know, it's going to be good. So I had that going for me. But you know, with all that, the book was a year late because, you know, I attribute it to the pandemic. But also. Yeah, just the sheer amount of work that goes into the book. And my, my book is. It's a little bit longer and maybe more intense, I guess I should say. It's.

It.

There's a deep dive kind of into the science of bread and sourdough bread making. So there's that side of it too. There were just a lot components that went into it.

Yeah, yeah. It's the through line that we hear with anybody who talks about a cookbook is like, this is a lot of work. Yeah. Just period. Like there's, it's just more than you'd ever think that it would be. And especially if you're doing it well and doing it right. It's called the perfect loaf. You could just Google it or like search for it on Amazon. 4.9 out of 5 stars, which in my opinion is like the perfect rating. Like, you don't want something that's like five out of five because then people.

Are like, wait a minute, this doesn't seem right.

But like 4.9, you still get all of the stars filled in. Like you don't have that star. Almost 200 ratings, which is really cool. Looking forward, what does that look like for you? Like you have these different opportunities before you and it's, it's, it's a really good problem to have, but nonetheless a problem to solve, which is where do I focus my time and my energy? You know, obviously there's the life things, kids, day to day stuff that you have. But speaking just specifically with your businesses, I'd be interested to hear you reflect a little bit on when you look forward over the next five, 10 years. Let's say it's. You have the, we've talked about the previous 10. If you look forward 10, what do you think the, those chapters look like as they start to unfold?

Well, I think, you know, Skyview and my app business is kind of in a good place where it is. I think, you know, there's not too much to do There, except, you know, just kind of keep it afloat and keep, keep the app relevant, updated with the Perfect Loaf. I mean, there's, you know, as any food site or any, any, any website, really. I think it's just. There's no end, you know, you can continue to create for the site indefinitely. I mean, there's really no, there's no end for me. And I. And that's. I think the exciting thing for me is that I can continue doing this. You know, I, I don't think I would ever consider selling the Perfect Loafer, you know, doing, going down that path because I just enjoy it too much. And, you know, it's. It's not something I'm trying to get rid of. It's like I want to, I want to keep that and keep, Keep doing it. And I, I think, you know, my, my mission for the site really is to just be the best place for people to learn to bake sourdough, if that'. I kind of want to be the place where everybody says, oh, well, you know, you got to go to the Perfect Loaf, because that's where it is. So it's, it's kind of like, you know, whatever things I come up with to make helping others learn that craft easier, I'm, you know, I'm all for it, whether it's the website and other piece of software or classes or, you know, I don't know, conference kind of thing. You know, whatever it means, I think I'm game for going down that.

Yeah, I was having a conversation with a friend yesterday and I was talking about his just kind of general interest in men's goods and like, he'll. He's probably slept on like a hundred different pillows. It's not just like. Or like he was talking about trying to find the perfect candle for their living room. They just moved. One of the things he said was, it's great because I'm never done optimizing. And I think for him, what he meant is, like, there's always something for me to do in my life where I can get a little bit better at it. Not in like, a relentless pursuit of perfection and being exhausted by it, but almost in this, like, adventurous, exciting way of, like, there's always something around the corner that I can. Maybe there's a candle that's like a better fit for our living room. And it feels like what you're getting at is kind of a similar thing where there's always going to be an opportunity to teach something or learn something in this area of passion or Interest. And what's really cool about it is the perfect loaf. Like, that feels like such a great brand for what you're after, which is trying to help people get that, get some, you know, their level of perfection with going through this process of baking with sourdough. So it's just a cool observation of like the brand with your passion and interest and pursuit and the opportunities that are there, which is really cool.

I think what you said actually is perfect. I mean, it perfectly sums up not only my approach to sourdough because, you know, if you have baked sourdough bread or baked bread, you kind of know, you can kind of get an understanding for every. There. There's so many components in the process. Like, you can take a really simplistic view and just, you know, mix some dough together and bake an amazing loaf of bread, or you can go down the path that I've done, which is like every motion is critical. You know, temperature is critical, flour combination. I mean, there, there literally is like an infinite number of steps that you can kind of dig into and make it better. So that, I mean, what you said about the home goods site, I mean that's, that's baking right there.

Just in a nutshell, it's. It reminds me, even just on the right now the homepage, like how to use the dough poke test. Like that being one step, right. Any that you can perfect and like get really good at, which is cool. So what would your advice be for anybody out there in the world? You know, they're interested in business, they're interested in creating their own content. What's your advice for them? Knowing that you've been at this now for 10 years?

I'd say, I think, I think one of the strengths that I have is that, you know, I, I've always approached not only Skyview, but also, you know, certainly with the Perfect loaf is just kind of like, you know, authenticity, accessibility and you know, just like a willingness to, to help. Like if that's something you're interested in. Like, I, I've found over the past 10 years that I, I love, like helping and teaching people to learn something. Like maybe I would have been a good teacher if I've, you know, would have gone down that path in life.

But.

And I guess, I guess maybe I have. Maybe this is like my way of, you know, teaching. Yeah, it is. But, you know, you have to. I think if, if you're interested in creating a site like that, like, it could be like a woodworking site or it could be. I don't know, skydiving or, you know, whatever, whatever interest you have, like, if you want to share that with, with people and you want to help them, like, you know, draw, draw that from a place of authenticity, you know, it really needs to be there. Otherwise I think people can tell that you're not, you know, you're not really into it. So.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's awesome. So if people do want to connect and they do want to be part of the community, how do they do that?

Just go to the perfectloaf.com and you can find me there. Or I'm at Maurizio on Instagram.

Cool. Is that literally you got the handle, like your first name handle?

You know, I'm an app developer before the app store, so I downloaded Instagram, you know, of that day that it came out. Yep.

That's awesome. Mauricio, thanks so much for coming on. Really appreciate it.

Yeah, thank you, Bjork. I appreciate it.

Hey there, Alexa here. And thanks for tuning into this episode of the Food Blogger Pro podcast. We hope you enjoyed this episode. And I wanted to just round out this episode with giving you a quick tip on one of the things that comes as soon as you become a Food Blogger Pro member. It's just one of the nice perks that comes along with the membership. So it's called our deals and discounts page and it has a bunch of companies that we've partnered with to help offer our members exclusive discounts on their products or services. So we're always adding new and exciting deals to the page. But as of right now, some of the deals include NerdPress, which is the company of our WordPress app expert, Andrew. He helps people with tech headaches on the blog, Core Web, Vital optimizations and more businesses. And list legal for all of your legal needs from our legal expert, Danielle Simple Pin Media for all of your Pinterest needs from Kate. She is our Pinterest expert. Ericsson Surfaces for really beautiful photography backgrounds, Link In Profile Process, Street Influence Kit and so many more. We have so many good ones here, including one that's been really popular recently, which is Cooking with Keywords. We have a nice 10% discount for food Blogger Pro members. So you get instant access to all of these deals and discounts the moment you sign up for a membership. So if you're interested in learning more or signing up, go to foodbloggerpro.com join and you can learn more and sign up right there. Once again, FoodBloggerPro.com join to get access to our deals and discounts.

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