So you think you know your onions when it comes to food and you quite fancy chucking in the desk job to blog about it? It all seems very life affirming, but is it possible to earn a decent living writing about your dinner? Having never made a bean directly from my food blog, I was surprised to discover the answer is yes.
More than a decade after the first amateur cook chronicled her kitchen escapades online (widely acknowledged to be Julie Powell, who tried to cook all 536 recipes in Julia Child’s classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 2002) you could be excused for thinking there are now more food bloggers than readers. But while the number of food blogs has exploded in recent years, opportunities to monetise them have also blossomed, according to experts.
•
But first some basics if you want to turn pro. A scruffy blog with dingy photos and hastily dashed-off content won’t wash. Food blog standards are now so high it’s often hard to distinguish them from professional websites, so you need a slick ‘theme’ (template) to showcase your work. There are plenty of these available for free or at little cost that you can tweak and personalise. High quality photographs, and increasingly video, are essential. You also need to write to a professional standard if you want to command payment for your work.
So once your amazing blog is up and running, how do you rake in the cash?
Display ads and affiliate marketing (where you direct your readers via a link to a product or service in exchange for a commission on a sale) are conventional ways to monetise blogs, but you need a very large readership to earn a living wage this way. Many bloggers also slog away in the hope of securing a book deal, and while this can reap huge rewards – take the Telegraph’s own Deliciously Ella as a good example – this kind of success is rare, and publishers are much more cautious about signing up food bloggers than they once were. (Ella has some terrific tips about food blogging here).
One of the lucky few: Deliciously Ella managed to get a book deal off the back of her popular blog
A more effective way is to blog about the products and services of brands in exchange for payment, according to Sally Whittle, founder of Foodies100, a 5000-strong food blogging community whose members are some of the most successful in the UK. Around 85 per cent of Foodies100 members earn some income from their blog this way, although most bring in less than £1000 a year - and, of course, not everyone feels comfortable being paid to push a particular product. The most successful Foodies100 bloggers, however, earn as much as £15,000 per year by working with brands to develop recipes with one of their products as an ingredient, for example, and then blogging about it. Many bloggers supplement this income with book, newspaper, magazine or other commercial deals.
“The more creative bloggers are really working with brands to develop bespoke recipes or working as brand ambassadors,” Sally says. “They can earn as much as £500 per blog post or maybe £1000 at the very highest if it includes a video. These bloggers are writing at a very high level and have created their own brand, really and they work these products or services seamlessly into their blog.”
It’s not essential to have a huge volume of traffic visiting your blog to earn money, she says, particularly if you focus on a specialist area, such as using vegetables in desserts, for example, as brands recognize this as an effective way to reach a target audience directly.
But isn’t all this just selling your foodie soul to the devil?
“If you go back four or five years, certain bloggers felt reluctant to monetise their blogs because they felt they were selling out, but it’s much more widely accepted now,” Sally says.
Emily Leary, author of Foodies100’s top ranking blog A Mummy Too gave up her day job to blog full-time two years ago. It’s not an easy way to earning a living – she puts in a 40-50 hour week – but is worth it to do something she loves. “It takes long hours, patience, hard work and determination,” she says. “For that reason, it also really helps to love what you do. For me, cooking, writing and photographing for a living is very much a dream job.”
Her advice is to find a niche subject to blog about and to inject personality into your writing. “It’s difficult to maintain momentum if you’re not interested in what you’re writing about, so choose a path that feels viable but also one that you feel genuine passion for,” she says.
Dan Tombs, aka The Curry Guy, is the author of Great Curry Recipes, the UK’s number one food blog according to Cision UK rankings. Dan says a successful food blog involves more than just posting tasty recipes and nice photography – a solid knowledge of search engine optimization and social media marketing is essential to build your readership.
“Don't listen to those social media ‘experts’ out there who tell you it's not about the number of followers but the quality of followers,” he says. “The truth is you need the numbers if you want to sell eBooks or get big brands interested in working with you. Think of it this way - you could be in the best rock band to hit the planet but if only 1000 people know about you, you aren't going to sell many downloads of your songs. “
Do you own a food blog? Share your tips with us @TelegraphFood
