Why Jeanelle Castro Thinks YouTube Is the Most Powerful Social Platform for Food Creators

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Hey there, this is Emily from the Food Blogger Pro team, and you are listening to the Food Blogger Pro podcast. This week on the podcast, Björk is interviewing Janelle Castro from Janelle Eats. Janelle started Janelle Eats 10 years ago while she was still working a 9-to-5 job, but she always knew that she wanted to be an entrepreneur, and she always knew that she loved making videos. In 2016, she started posting to YouTube, got serious about tracking her metrics and posting consistently. And within a few months, her channel started taking off. Today, she has nearly 2 million subscribers on YouTube and a thriving food content business. In this episode, Janelle shares how she built a content system where YouTube is the engine that drives everything else, including her blog traffic, her Google rankings, and her brand deals. She explains how she uses YouTube Shorts to drive traffic to her site and why she believes that the success of a social post and the performance of a blog post are more correlated than most creators realize. It's a really fun episode. We hope you enjoy it, and I'm just going to let Björk take it away.

Janelle, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for having me. It's so crazy to be on this side because I've been listening to you guys forever.

Yeah, well, that's super fun. We've been doing this long enough that we've had people like yourself who you can come along and say, hey, I've been listening to this forever, but you also have now a career as a creator. It's not like you're new to this. Uh, this goes back almost like 10 years. Did you start around 2016 as a creator? And at that moment when you started, did you know you wanted to pursue doing this full-time or was it more of an experiment? You were just kind of posting videos for fun.

Um, it was, so there's always that hope, right? For me, when I first posted, I was posting when I was still working my 9 to 5.. And it's, it was like a really good place, but I've always, always wanted to be an entrepreneur of some sort. And, you know, talking through it with my friends, with coaches, I realized that the one thing I really loved to do was make videos. So back in 2016, I started posting YouTube videos because I had seen another food creator do it, and I was never like, I was never a social media consumer. Even though people around me were, I was like, I, it's not for me. Yeah. But when I saw the food video, it was Emmy Made. I saw her snack videos. I was like, hey, this is kind of fun. Let me see if I could do something similar. And so I uploaded my first video. It was really difficult and I was like, let me just not do that. Then I ended up coming back to it 'cause it's just been like in the back of my head. And I knew that eventually it was like an idea you couldn't shake. Yeah, exactly. And eventually I knew that I, I wasn't going to work. In a corporate job forever. It just, yeah, wasn't gonna be for me. So I tried to do more videos. It's really difficult doing long form cuz back then it was all long form. There was no TikTok, no Instagram Reels, no YouTube Shorts. And so I would try to do this just like week by week. Uh, nothing was really happening.

I gave up at one point and wait, what, how far, how long into it? After doing it each week with your 9-to-5 job, did you have this point where you kind of were like, this isn't worth it?

Yeah. I'm like, forget this. Um, I would say like in the beginning it was a little more sporadic. So back 2016, 2016 is when I started my channel, but it wasn't very consistent.

Sure.

Maybe I did it for like a year, 2017-ish. Um, maybe a year or maybe not. You know what? There's another story after this where I'm like, this is why I started tracking it because it just went so long. It was such a slow And I—

what do you mean started tracking it?

That's how my career in content creation ended up taking off is because I finally started tracking to see how many videos I actually did.

Mm-hmm.

Because, um, the first ones, they were just like, like I said, it was kind of a slog and eventually I gave up. And then I got an email saying that my video, it was how to do a boodle fight, you know, like the Kamaayan feast, the Filipino, um, kind of like a banquet with banana leaves and everyone eats with their hands.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

And we, we lived in the, we were talking about this before we lived in the Philippines, so I can visualize that when you're talking about it.

Yeah. I, yeah. So like that video started gaining subscribers and I was like, wait, okay, maybe this is a sign. Lemme go back. Lemme try this again. Still nothing. Like it just wasn't doing very well. And then COVID hit, YouTube Shorts came along and I have a friend, Lisa Nguyen. She's an amazing friend, amazing person. She is the one that told me to start posting on YouTube Shorts. And she said, you know, just post 3 a day, 3 videos a day. And at this point I had been just trying the video thing, uh, picking up contracting jobs, you know, doing marketing and stuff like that.

So you, you had left your corporate job at this point and you were kind of doing freelance here and there and then working as a creator, trying to get things to catch.

Yes. I'm like, I've got that personality where I like have to quit cold turkey. Otherwise I know the temptation will always be there to just kind of fall back on my job. So I was like, let me be crazy. Let me just burn the bridges, make this kind of difficult for myself and not do the job and just pick up. It was so stressful, but eventually it had worked out. Um, I started, it was kind of like my, I was kind of cornered, like my back was to the wall and I was like, okay, well, if she tells me posting 3 a day is gonna help, let me just do it. And so that's where the tracker came along because let me tell you, after just like 3 days of looking up that tracker, I had like a physical tracker, like a paper tracker, and I would highlight how many I made. It was like 3 or 4 days I looked up and I was like, oh my God, it's only been 3 or 4 days.

Yeah. I'm exhausted.

Yeah. So if you ask me the question, how long were you doing it for? If I hadn't been tracking it, I'd be like, oh, I've been doing it for a week. Weeks, but it was literally 3 days. And so I think at like 2, like 2 and a half month mark of doing that, it, my channel started taking off. Like it was crazy. And the payout for Shorts back then was like really, really good. Um, and do you mean like the actual monetization from YouTube, the payout? Yeah, the AdSense. So I was like, wow, okay, well here's a career. Because dashboard was showing me. And, and so I think that's where it started and just staying consistent has helped bring upon more opportunities. Even if the AdSense for Shorts isn't as good as it was in the beginning, I would say it's brought so many opportunities, just like being known in the space. You know, brand deals come along. Um, it helps when I post a blog post on our website.

Mm-hmm.

We'll funnel in from YouTube Shorts and go there. So it's been very, very rewarding.

Yeah. It sounds like there was this period, 2016 to 2020, where you were trying to figure it out, like how, how often do I post? What do I post? It was a little bit sporadic. You knew you wanted to do it. And one of the things I love in a story is finding that like inflection point. And there's, all different versions of it. Oftentimes it's a conversation. Like I can think of a handful of examples where some friends sat down with some other friends and they showed 'em how to use like an SEO tool. Mm-hmm. And suddenly it like, it was a 1-hour conversation that maybe resulted in like hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars that they earned because it just opened this door that suddenly they were able to just really get after it. And it was like, okay, awesome. I think of another example of a friend, different world. He's not a creator, but he was sitting next to somebody on a plane and he was a speaker trainer. And she talked about how the difference between charging per session, like $2,000 per session versus per seat. And she said almost everybody else charges per seat. And so instead of 30 people and, you know, getting $2,000 for a speaker fee or whatever, or training fee, you get $60,000 because you charge per seat. And that changed his life in terms of how he approached business. But it sounds like for you, that inflection point was this conversation. Was it with Lisa that you said?

Yeah.

And her saying, hey, it's at this stage for what you're doing, it's around volume. And, and you're kind of at this point where you're like, okay, I'll try anything. If you say volume, I'll try volume. I'll try posting 3 pieces of content a day. You did it for 2 and a half months. And my guess is there was multiple different things. You had been in the lab for 4 years as a video creator, figuring things out. So there's that component. You had been training. It's kind of like learning an instrument or learning a skill. Like you'd been doing a version of that for 4 years. COVID, I think there was some version of that timing. I'd be interested in your thoughts on that for a lot of creators. The, um, shorts, like short-form video being at the right time, but also just like the work, like you put in the work, you had developed skills, you had probably learned a lot. And so all of those things, it sounds like, hit an inflection point that suddenly paid off. And I think the reason that I say that, and when I hear your reflections on it, if you feel like that's true or push back, if there's anything you don't feel like it's true, the reason I say that is because I think for a lot of people listening, they're maybe in that similar stage of grinding a little bit, trying to figure it out. It feels like you're kind of floating and you don't know where you're going. And so much of it is continuing to show up, continuing to try new things, listen to advice, try that advice. What are your reflections on that? What feels true in that? Things you'd add and maybe things you'd push back on.

For sure. I mean, I feel like you, hit all the points because I'm glad I didn't have to like say it for myself because it's exactly how it is. Like, and it's all like all the clichés that you hear about, right? You know, pi— you know, just don't give up, do this, do that, and then try everything you can because it really is a max, uh, a, a mix of luck and just skill, like you honing your skill.

Mm-hmm.

Because imagine if I had started, there were a few people that we had also talked to that had not done video as much as we had, and of course they try to do 3 a day. It's just a mixture of all these other things. Like, first of all, they didn't have the grit or the determination to do it because why should they, right? They hadn't been trying for this long. Um, the other thing was they just weren't as versed in video and like creating videos for other people. It was always about like what they wanted to make for themselves. Uh, and it's just all these things come together and like, it's as corny as it sounds, when your time comes, it comes and you just really have to put yourself out there. Again, it, I don't think I would've had these conversations if I didn't try all these different things and just put myself out there. And it's funny that you say you feel kind of lost, like floating around. That's how I felt. I was listening to, you know, all these, including the Food Blogger Pro podcast. I was just like taking in all this information., most importantly, put it into action, I would say. Because yeah, dude, I don't wanna look at my first video. You guys can look at my first videos, but I'm not looking at those first shorts cuz it is so hard to watch. But just the fact that I was making 3 a day, I got, it was, it was kind of like a shortcut. You're kind of speeding your way through to figure out what works and what doesn't.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It, you're compre— I've heard, um, this idea that like for startups, when you have a startup and you're working on a startup, you're compre— I, I talked about this with friends who built a wedding venue and it felt like, you know, they have kids and they were working like 50, 60 hours a week and like trying to like make it all work. And what I was talking about to them and they're like, oh, that really resonates with me. And I've heard other people talk about is this idea that when you're working on a startup, you're compressing your work career into like 7 to 8 years. And I think what I hear you saying is that when you are posting 3 times a day, it's not like that's some algorithm hack that then allows you to grow faster. It might help, but the number purely doesn't make a difference. But what does make a difference is that you're compressing the feedback loop in order to better understand what works and what doesn't work. Similarly, on the extreme end, if you only posted once a month, that feedback loop would be much longer and you wouldn't be able to understand as quickly what works and what doesn't work. So when you started posting more frequently, you were keeping track of that. My guess is you also then were able to see, hey, this one did really well. This piece of content did really well to sit with it and say like, could I reproduce whatever that was to try and do it again? And let's see if that works again. Oh, it did. What if I remix that and then have it with a different type of food or a different type of travel? Is that what was happening in that period?

Yes, absolutely. Uh, it's honestly insane. Like, I don't realize how much information about this I know until I talk to just an ordinary person or maybe another creator who's just starting out. Like, for me, it's so obvious, but it's because I like how you said that you're compressing the feedback loop because That's exactly what it is because otherwise it would take you so much longer.

Yeah.

And you know, basically it's like I had, I gave myself no other option. I was like, please, this has to work as I really don't wanna do anything else. I keep coming back to this video thing. It's been years. Like, you know what I mean? I'm like, clearly this is what I wanna do. So for me it was, a lot of people say, you know, you kind of have to sacrifice, but for me at this point I was like, there, it's all or nothing. I've done everything else and I'm good. Like, this is what I really wanna do. And I think for whoever's listening, once you find that and you're done kind of like, you know, stepping in with one foot, not the other, I think things move really fast for you. But it's just—

Yeah, you make your mind up and this is what you're gonna do.

Yeah.

And that's the direction you're going.

Yeah.

Uh, and I do think that there's something really hard about being in the middle ground where you're kind of dabbling. Because of, like you said, there's that, you're kind of extending that feedback loop. Similarly, I think, you know, sometimes people will reach out to us and they'll say like, man, you know, it's like, I feel like I'm not making a lot of progress and this, I'm thinking more so maybe this was a while back when Lindsay and I were first getting started. And one of the things I reminded them of was like, hey, this is both like Lindsay and me. Like we are both working on this. Both doing it full-time, this was like pre-kids for us. It might've been like 40, 50 hours a week, maybe more sometimes. Like, okay, this is the equivalent of like 80 to 100 hours that we're spending trying to figure this out. And for somebody who's working, it's not bad to do it as like a side hustle. I think it's just important to remember if you have 10 hours a week, 20 hours a week, you know, that's, you know, when we were working on full-time, it's like 8 times as much. Kind of effort that you're putting into it and moving it forward. Again, it's not bad. I think it's just important to remember, um, if you don't have the bandwidth to not be as hard on yourself. In your case, you decided to make the bandwidth, um, could probably place some of those bets and take some of that risk and say like, okay, I'm going to do this because I really want to do it. What did you learn that was helpful when you were compressing the feedback loop? So you talked about this idea that like, You know, now some of this stuff that you don't even realize, you know, until you talk to somebody, you know, a normie out on the streets and it's suddenly you realize like, you know, a lot about YouTube and how to rank videos and what's important. So what did you learn in that period of time? Maybe that still applies today as it relates to creating video and getting reach with that content.

For sure. I think definitely looking at the big picture. And I thought, well, you can correct me if I'm wrong cuz you probably talk to other people outside of like the, just strictly the food.

Mm-hmm.

Sorry, the video space.

Yeah.

Um, but I wonder if people are still obsessed over the minutiae of description, uh, you know, hashtags, things like that.

Um, yeah. Kind of like the tactics around video. Is that what you mean?

Yeah.

Like Yeah.

Yeah.

I've always, I mean, my quick answer with it is any of the tactic type stuff. Um, when do you post, like how long should a video be? Um, you know, any stuff like that. I think there probably is some, uh, of that that's important and that becomes a multiplier, but, but it's only a multiplier on the base. And the base is the video itself. How engaging is it? How interesting is it? But I do think if you double-click on the base, the video, that there are probably things that could be categorized as like quote unquote tactics or like best practice. Like you're going to have to move really quick. You're going to, you're going to have to have something that engages people really quick. There's probably some long-form content. There's some consideration around thumbnail. That's probably not as important for short form. Like, so I think. There probably are some of those things, but I think if you had 10 hours, spend 9 and a half on creating a really compelling video, both from the shoot and the edit, and then spend the last half hour to an hour on some of the like tactics that you wrap around it. But I'm not a video creator. Yeah.

Yeah.

Um, that would just be my like commentary as an observer. Uh, Does that resonate and feel accurate? Is that a little bit of what you're getting at?

Yeah, a little bit. It's, it's also just like, I want people to like, if, if you wanted to create videos consistently, to like sift through all that noise and really focus on, like you mentioned, it's like the meat of the video. Like what is it that you're putting out? Because it's interesting, there are people, I, I've since then consumed so many different types of videos. And there's people who you could tell they're not here to do the hooks and they're not calculating any of that stuff. They're just posting the thing and people eat it up. There are, there have been some like grandmas that post stuff up on accident because I don't think they thought that they were gonna post up a reel, but yeah, they posted and everyone is eating it up, which is so funny, you know? So it's like you really have to just. This is why I think it's so important to just post and the overthinking gets in the way because like, I think the dumbest video that I had posted was the one that started taking off, which lifted all of my other videos.

Hmm.

And what was it?

It was like, is carrots and peas still a thing? I was literally just talking about carrots and peas still a thing. Like, I don't know. Like it's just, I was like, let me, I needed to post 3 videos, right? That was the point. And then you find there is a pattern on the ones I know which ones are gonna do well depending on the type of title and the type of video that I put out. But there are still those surprising ones where I'm like, why do people like this one? It's ridiculous. Yeah. You know, um, for that particular one, it's because I was so tired and I said, is peas and carrots still a thing? But it was, I was cooking peas and corn. Oh, everyone's like, ah, it's—

yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's something. No, you guys, like, here's the thing. I. I was so tired. Like I had no idea, but what made me the money, so it's fine.

Yeah. But point, your point in it is, is that if you maybe lead with tactics where it's like, I'm going to try and figure out how to structure the perfect video versus leading with the desire to create and share, uh, that the desire to create and share is going to win in the long run versus creating based on tactics. Like you could create every, you could check all of the tactics boxes of how to succeed with short-form video and YouTube. Uh, but if you don't have that, like just pure desire to share, even like the expertise, the, uh, entertainment factor, whatever it is that you're going after, Um, then it's probably not worth doing it. And we see, we see that with like all different types of creators where it's somebody who likes the idea of like being a YouTuber or being a blogger or creating short-form video more than they like actually creating a video. And I think when that happens, you're going to find yourself in a tough spot because you're pursuing. This idea of like work from home or like have your own business, have your own job, as opposed to what you're actually gonna be doing 95% of the time, which is like shooting video and capturing video, potentially editing video. Um, and if you are naturally drawn to do that, I think of Lindsay, she has like a personal Instagram for like just our close family and friends, and she will still like shoot a video when we go on vacation and edit it and like share it for 37 people. Uh, and it's not, and it's good, like, and it's engaging and it's interesting, but it's like, she's not, there's no like strategy behind it. That's just like, she's naturally drawn to create and share. Um, and that should be probably a core component of how you exist. If this is going to be the work that you're going to do. Is that what you're getting at?

Actually, I think Lindsay is a natural video creator.

But how about for yourself? When you think of what you're doing, and I know that you're, um, within the last season here have started focusing on blogging more as a monetization tool and a content creation tool for what you're doing. Um, how have you approached the world of video creation? And content creation from a business perspective. Um, you alluded a little bit to early on short-form video, YouTube, it paid really well. That's, I think, shifted. Yeah. Uh, it's not necessarily the most like lucrative endeavor, but it's great for awareness.

Yeah.

You can do brand deals, you can point people to blog posts. How do you view what you're doing right now kind of from the business perspective?

For sure. Uh, so I think you make a really good point there where you said you kind of at the core have to like to share and create these videos because part of the game is you are kind of, my friend texted me this other day, she said, feed the algorithm beast. And we're like, yeah, this is just part of the game, right? This is part of the business is that you continue to feed YouTube or Instagram or TikTok because they need to be aware that you are an active creator and You know, they're, they're trying to keep people on their platform first and foremost. Like that's something you have to remember. And so now I'll be putting out a mixture of things, maybe something small. Like I think I just posted a video of my un— of my great grand uncle's painting. Yeah. Um, and it's, you know, of the Philippines and it's from my family. So it's still, it's still kind of has value in that people are getting to know me and my family, which is to me super important when I post my videos. But I'll also post some food stuff. So maybe some like instructions on like, you know, tips on making a rice cake or this, this rice cake. You know, I think the way I title my videos really helps where I'm like, this rice cake, nobody, no one ever dislikes this rice cake, or, or everybody loves this rice cake. You know, that's the way that I try to do my videos because I want to bring people in. I'm not tricking them or anything. I'm just repackaging it in a different way. And then I bring them to the blog because I'm not saying there's no space for SEO where you're, you know, if I posted that video, it would be caramelized sticky rice cake recipe.

Yeah. Yeah. From, for SEO.

Yeah. Or if it's in Tagalog, it would be biko recipe.

Uh-huh.

And I'm, for me, that's actually part of the first few years that I was doing this, that was what I was doing because of all the information out there, right? This is how you do video. It was always SEO. And for me, something just wasn't sitting right. And I think that's where Shorts came in and all the short-form videos, because then it allowed us to be a little bit more creative and it allowed us to do more output without having to always do the same SEO. Title. And so that's how I make videos.

They are. And I think it's so smart, especially in this world where SEO is shifting for anybody who's new to creating content. Like there's, you know, thousands of creators who are kind of competing for these keywords and have historically, but there's all of these platforms where people are creating content that Some of them do have a component of SEO. Pinterest maybe would be an example. You know, long-form YouTube content would maybe have some like SEO considerations with it, but like that looks very different now with short-form video content. Um, and it's more about how engaging is it? How interesting is it? Do people continue to watch it? You know, there's obviously like there's this shift that has been happening that people are well aware of from like social platforms to content platforms. And they are prioritizing not necessarily based on who you're following or your social connections. They're prioritizing based on topic, on interest, on, and then from that, what content in that pool is most engaging or interesting. And so, um, the downstream effects of that is if you get that attention, then what do you do with it? It sounds like in your case, you've said, how do I get people then to my site? I think one of the things that's really freeing for people who feel like the, you know, process of doing SEO is soul sucking is that you don't have to, if you have the ability to reach people on other platforms through other means, in this case, short-form video. So what does that look like to send people to your site? Um, you know, we, you, you are freed from having to have this like really rote, like keyword that you're trying to rank for. You can be creative with it. It's interesting. Uh, people discover it through social and then you point them to your site. What are the mechanics that you're using to help people get to the site once they see the video?

This is funny that you mentioned this because I think a lot of people, I've also done talks at food blogger conferences and this is the one thing that they're all concerned about. I think, okay, so on Instagram I use Link DM. It's very basic. That's, it's easy. You know, I'm like, comment this to get the recipe.

Mm-hmm.

On other places like YouTube Shorts, that's not a thing. Links are not clickable on YouTube Shorts and It was once upon a time, which was great, but now it's gone. But what's funny is that even if I just post on YouTube Shorts and I say, you know, go here, go to the Janelle Eats blog, janelleeats.com, for the recipe, people still go. Mm-hmm. So for me, I think, you know, it's crazy that I would see a spike in traffic when I post that. Not Instagram yet, right? Like just YouTube Shorts. So nobody's clicking like on the link DM stuff. Just YouTube Shorts, people are still visiting the site even though they have to physically go there themselves, whether they— I don't know if they're typing it in. They're probably typing it in because it's YouTube Shorts, right? Like there's no other way to link it. But I think it's because the way that I made the video was so— I like to say it's enticing enough for them to want to go visit the website, make the recipe, to go out of your way to actually like leave the platform and go on the website. For me, I was just like, okay, well I'm doing something right. I guess it might be because the video was so captivating and so enticing for them to actually leave and visit.

Yeah.

That's how, that's how it is on YouTube Shorts though. There's no way they can click the link. So I'm just, for me, I'm still surprised that people actually go through all that because I know a lot of people are obsessed with making it as easy as possible for people to just like click one link and then go.

Right. So, yeah. But your point is that, um, if you include a prompt, like, are you saying that in the voiceover and then does it show it in the caption?

I actually do. Yeah. So captions is another tactic that I like to put up because it keeps people engaged in reading.

Um, yep.

And I will put in, you know, janelleates.com.

Yeah.

And yeah, I guess it's also that on top of just the frequency of me being in front of these people. They are aware I have a website. They're aware that I make this food for them.

This is one of the things that we did recently. We sat down, it was me, Lindsay, Jenna. We had a meeting. We were trying to, we, we set up, um, like an, this is a little bit nerding out, but we set up an automation in Slack that, uh, reports like the previous year's earning for a single post. And then we were like, hey, I wonder what that looks like. So if one post had 365 days, like what would the list of all the different pieces of content look like for Pinch of Yum through the years, you know, over the last year or whatever, or I forget what the range was, but just to get a sense for like, um, how much does a post earn? And as a quick aside, I think Rapdiv has recently released, um, the ability to do API access. I don't know if it's API or MCP. Also for any Clarity users, um, you can get on the waiting list if you email me. We have an MCP for Clarity that allows you to do some of this stuff, but essentially it's starting to use Claude, ChatFBP to interact with a piece of content and, or these data databases to get information around them. And what we found was that, and this makes sense, but like there's a direct correlation to the pieces of content that performed the best on social. And the content that earned the most on the blog and that, that came up by like looking at the top 3 or 4 earners for the past year, not the, like, not the ones that are like these, you know, anchors that have been around for 6 years and like really performing well, but like the relatively new ones. And they all had kind of a direct correlation to performing well on social. Sounds really obvious, but I think it was a reminder for us around the significance of social. Um, and then what we did is we drilled down and we saw that like there was also a correlation to search and specifically branded search. So like the name of the recipe plus Pinch of Yum. And I think that you're onto something when you talk about this idea of like creating a piece of content that is compelling enough, interesting enough, captivating enough that people are motivated then to go and make it. How they do that, uh, how they access it will depend on, you know, how you're directing people and what the process is. You talked about LinkedIn. We use Grow.co. Some people use ManyChat, but a huge thing, uh, huge impact that we can have is like directing people or even just hinting at going and just like finding it, going to the website, searching for it.

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What has that been like for you as you had a strong social following, now starting to focus on the blog as the main kind of driver of revenue? Has that been more difficult than you thought it would be, easier than you thought it would be? Uh, what has that looked like and is that the main thing? Is that primarily what you focus on right now is like, how do we get people to the site monetized via ads?

Yeah.

So full disclosure, we have been going through a renovation for the past 6 months and for us before that renovation, the focus was to get website renovation or home renovation. Home renovation.

Okay. Yeah.

And we'll be going through a website renovation, so it's the thing. Okay.

We did the home, we did a kitchen renovation last year, like this time last year, so.

That's what we're doing right now. We just moved back in like literally like yesterday. And so I'm just like, ah, so the reason why I bring that up is because when we were actually bringing people to the blog 6 months ago, we were still kind of doing it sporadically in between, but it's been really difficult living in my parents' house trying to make content and bring them to the blog. It's just, it's different, but I did notice that when we we did push people to the blog, it seemed easier than we thought. You asked if was it harder or easier? It was easier than we thought to actually rank these specific recipes. So let's say I'll bring people to like, um, Filipino pork adobo recipe. Uh, once they go there and, and let's say like I pushed them out, I can't give you like a, a specific number. I don't really know how many times I've pushed them there, but it seems like when I push people there, the ranking, you can see the ranking go up and you can see it kind of stabilize. And our blog is still growing. It's not, you know, it's nothing crazy like, you know, all the other established food blogs. But we did notice that once I do push out a video and the video does well and people go and make the recipe, it seems to kind of like push up and stabilize in rankings and, you know, it'll drop and stuff like that. But if I just like push out a video, I'm like, oh cool. Like it actually like directly affects the rank and.

Yeah.

Maybe it's cuz YouTube is owned by Google and they like that symbiotic relationship between the two. But imagine if I actually focused on it like crazy.

Sure.

Yeah.

Well, it's one of the, it's one of the things that's hard to do as a creator is figure out like, where do you focus? Like what is gonna be the greatest return if you only did, this is the hard part. If you only did your blog or your website, we are now in an era of content creation, of website building, of blog building where you really can't do do that. You can't just, if you're gonna, if you've started a site within the last 3 or 4 years, it's gonna be really, really hard if the only thing that you're working on is the blog, is the website itself. So you have to have some other mechanism for promoting it.

Mm-hmm.

And, uh, so there has to be kind of this balance. I think generally it's gonna be better if your social platforms have a larger following because then it's gonna be easier to promote downstream the places that you wanna direct people, whether that be a website or other places. What does that look like for you as a, as a creator right now? Like if you think of the revenue pie chart for your business, how does that divide out right now and where do you focus on kind of revenue for the business?

So right now I think we're still focusing on brand deals and Yeah, I would say like brand deals and I would say like our AdSense for our YouTube is just about the same as the blog, or I think maybe the blog is just getting, you know, a little bit bigger now, which is nice cuz the blog for sure is much more stable in revenue than AdSense on YouTube because you—

Stable meaning predictable, like, you know, yeah, like more month to month. It's just generally going to be pretty similar.

Yeah. Yeah. Because with Shorts. And again, this is a short game. This isn't long-form game, which is totally different. Um, from my friends who actually do create long-form videos and from what I've seen from my own long-form videos, the ones that I post, it's very few. Um, they are more stable in gaining that revenue, but the power of shorts is that visibility and the ability to push people to your products. So when I was really pushing out our our Musubi molds, people were going to the site, like we were making a good amount of sales for just like passively posting about it. And so I think it's a really, really good driver to, uh, awareness, like what you're working on, bring people to the blog, uh, purchase your product for, yeah. So that's kind of how we're looking at things. And of course having that awareness, having that visibility online is always going to attract brands. And so for us, we're like, okay, well this is easy where I get to post what I want and these brands come and like, can we integrate your content? I'm like, yeah, sure. You know, like a short paid video.

Yeah, you would be creating it otherwise.

Yeah.

So what, what does that look like in the world of shorts and what, what types of brands are reaching out? Do you have an agent that you work with? Talk a little bit about what you've learned partnering with brands as you're doing, uh, brand partnerships for short-form content.

For sure. So a lot of, in the beginning I was working with a few management companies. They were helping me bring in some brand deals and I think after a while, I know that, I think some earlier on people were still looking for long-form integration and so we still had some good brand deals for shorts, but it's just not that much. So eventually we just were like, okay. We'll probably just like go on our own. And so now we don't work with anybody. We've kind of worked with multiple people through the years, but it's always just kind of like on and off, right? Like on and off. Sure. Okay, cool. Um, nowadays it's just all inbound, which is nice because I think the longer you establish yourself in the space, people find you. People are aware of you. Um, I would say I definitely don't post as many videos as I did before. But I wasn't getting as many brand deals inbound because I was new. Right. And so now that people know your reputation, they know of you, or if they've worked with you in the past or worked with maybe one, somebody that you know, they're more willing to reach out because you're known. Right. That's the other thing about like showing your face. I know a lot of food bloggers don't wanna show their face, but showing your face and personality.

Yeah.

It, it really helps. And you can help another person, by the way, you could, just be yourself. People like that. There will be people out there who like you.

Yeah. Uh, so can you talk a little bit about the different platforms? We talked about YouTube. You have almost 2 million followers there.

Yeah.

You know, obviously Instagram, TikTok, there's these other platforms. How do you view those different platforms kind of in your portfolio as a content creator? Maybe like their personalities, the platform personalities, and then also maybe their value to you as a creator. For sure. Um, and maybe the way you could do it is like start with the most valuable.

Mm-hmm.

And then describe a little bit about what you like about it and its personality a little bit as a platform.

I like that because I do feel like they have personalities.

Yeah.

So YouTube is, has always been like my number one. I started on YouTube. I love my YouTube audience. There's, I would say there's a lot more of them, as you mentioned, almost 2 million. Um, compared to Instagram and TikTok. But YouTube has just always been, it's always felt more robust. Like it feels like there's so much that you could do on YouTube as a creator. You can now do posts, you can do long-form videos, short-form videos, and it, it just feels like it still feels like there's so many possibilities. You could do a lot of things on YouTube. So YouTube is, is always my focus, so I'm always posting on YouTube first and everything else gets reposted to Instagram and TikTok. And for anyone listening, that's how I keep focused, you know, cuz you can't spread yourself thin. You can only do so much. Um, and Instagram is, I would say Instagram's so valuable. It's just, mm, you know, you're not gonna get AdSense from Instagram, but a lot of brands are looking at Instagram.

Sure.

Yeah.

That was gonna be my second question was for the brand deals that you're doing.

Mm-hmm.

Is their leading interest Instagram usually, and then TikTok and YouTube as a bonus?

Yeah. Which is funny, right? Because I'm, I would say my presence is, is much bigger on YouTube and I think people still hear about me because of YouTube. Mm-hmm. But I still get brands being like, all right, let's post on Instagram. Instagram.

Yeah.

Like that's their primary interest.

Yeah.

And is part of that, that they're whitelisting and then putting paid behind it? Or do you know, do they give you any insight as to like why Instagram over YouTube?

I would say, I think you mentioned it, like whitelisting is a big part of it. Um, and also it might also be the price because the audience on YouTube is just so large. Some of them are like, you know, let's just do Instagram, TikTok. Um, but I'm still, I still get people who want to post on YouTube. It's just sometimes it's like YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok, right? They wanna post them on all three, but there are a lot more that are like just Instagram or Instagram and TikTok.

Sure.

Yep.

And TikTok.

Um, pay attention. Yeah, sure, sure. Yeah, it's interesting. I feel like similar to the conversations we have. I feel like a lot of people are generally interested in Instagram, potentially Facebook. Um, do you post to Facebook, Shorts to Facebook?

Yeah. So actually my husband works with me and he is the one that posts on Facebook and Facebook does generate, um, some revenue. It's, it's kind of like it fluctuates, but we still try to post because we're just reposting. It's it's still time. It still takes time and, which is why he's the one that does it, not me.

Sure.

Um, but yeah, we, we are just repurposing the content that I make on YouTube because there's so much of it.

Yeah. And how about frequency on those platforms? Are you posting all new content, uh, and then going to the next thing and then creating a new video and then posting that? Are you repurposing anything? If something does well on Instagram, do you post it again the next year? Facebook, are you posting multiple times a day? Uh, what does that look like in terms of your kind of posting strategy for each of the platforms?

Right. So I, I feel like I should be posting, reposting more often. I don't do it as often as I should. Uh, I, there's, there's times when I will and I'll remember, oh yeah, I can repost. But I think it's just because my brain is always on and I'm like, there's all this stuff that I could post.

All new, a new thing. Yeah.

Yeah. That's, I feel like that's, I'm not gonna say every content creator, every video content creator is like this, but my friends, I feel like, like, you know, we all kind of post new stuff. But when I take a step back and somebody tells me, usually, you know, like my YouTube partner manager or like somebody else, like, why don't, you know, do you ever just repost it or put it together into like a new video with like maybe 5 videos that I stitched together, I'm like, oh yeah, you're right. I could do that.

Yeah.

Right. But you're so, it's one of the reasons why you're successful is because you are thinking about the next thing you're thinking about. What can I create? What's the next thing that could be, uh, you know, useful for people as opposed to thinking about how can I go back in my, you know, catalog and repost something. Um, that's great.

Uh, last question for anybody who's kind of interested in it.

They want to figure it out. They're maybe in that, you know, 1, 2, 3 year slog where they're in the middle of it and kind of grinding it out. What would your advice be for somebody who is interested in doing this? They want to figure it out, but maybe they're still in the weeds a little bit and haven't really broken out yet.

I guess like be honest with yourself and be like, you really want to do this? 'Cause if you really wanna do this and you actually give it your all, it will work out. But I, I really think, just taking from my own experience, I think there's still that doubt there and you're not putting all of, all of your focus and energy into it because I feel like once you do that, it actually takes so much less time than you think it will. Uh, but also like sift through the noise, right? Like do what you can because I know talking to other food bloggers too, they feel like it's this big thing that they have to do to post a video. And I'm like, have you been on Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts? If people post the most simple basic things and especially for talking to food bloggers, I'm like, you have a camera, you have the nicest camera with the nicest settings. If you just press the record button, I don't think it would hurt. Like you have the composition, everything, like. I feel like food bloggers have so much talent and if they just press the record button versus the shutter button, like you can make so many videos out of that.

That's great. Yeah. And it's almost like being less precious about it and saying, okay, how can I press record? How can I get something out there? Um, and the, what you said originally, a little bit of the difference between like dabbling and being a professional. And, uh, what does it mean to be a professional at something? And it's like, you take it really seriously. And then it's like, there's people who like make furniture for fun. And then there's like furniture makers, uh, you know, there's people who play music for fun and then there's professional musicians. And you think about the level of dedication to the craft that exists for professionals. Uh, we understand that. When we look at other industries. Uh, and I think it's a good reminder when we look at this industry to say, hey, if you're going to be a professional, it's going to require a lot. Uh, and there's going to be effort and time and, uh, it can't just be like a little something that you're doing on the side. It can be if that's what you want it to be. That's not bad. But if you want it to be your full-time thing, if you want to be a professional, uh, to treat it as, as that, which I think is A super good reminder for people. If people wanna follow along with you, Janelle, where do they do that? And we'll be sure to link to it in the show notes as well.

Janelle Eats on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok if you want to, but YouTube, Instagram.

Everywhere. Will you be doing a kitchen reveal when it's all done?

Actually, yes. This, I, I can't wait, honestly.

Yeah.

Please.

The greatest reward is you're just gonna be able to be back in your own kitchen. Like what a great feeling that'll be.

I'm like, watch out all the videos I make. Just watch out. Like you think I was on a little break these last few months, but just, yeah.

That's great. Well, thanks so much for coming on. Uh, and thanks for, uh, listening through the years too. Uh, it's so great to be able to have conversations with people who have been figuring it out, but then are also willing to, uh, share stuff like this. So really appreciate it. Thanks for coming on.

Of course. Thanks for allowing me to share my knowledge with I'm giving back basically for all the information you've taught me.

Yeah, well, it's great. It's great. Well, we love it. Thanks for coming on, Janelle.

Thank you.

Hey there, this is Emily again. Thank you so much for listening to that episode of the podcast. As always, if you enjoyed the episode or learned something new, we would so appreciate it if you could share the episode with your community. Or text the episode to a friend. It makes a huge difference for getting the word out about our podcast. We hope you'll join us again next week for our interview with Shruti Bhaskaran Mukhanju from the food blog Urban Farmee. She's going to walk you through a step-by-step guide for using Claude as a food blogger. In the meantime, we hope you have a wonderful week and we'll see you back here next week.