Happy 4th Blogiversary (Plus a Giveaway)!

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I can’t believe it, but 4 years ago today I started this little blog of mine. I’ve been reminiscing for the past week about how far I’ve come, how many people I’ve reached, and what I can do in the future to help even more.

There’s a giveaway at the bottom of this post for a $25 Starbucks gift card, so don’t miss it! But first, I’d love to take a trip down memory lane with you to see how this blog has progressed. Take a look:

Why I Started

It was 2015, and I wasn’t very happy with myself. Allison was almost 18 months old, I still had a lot of baby weight to lose, and I was feeling the blues of being a stay-at-home mom with almost no life.

We had just come off of a year of eating very frugally (See How We Ate For $37 a Week For a Year) and I had friends asking me how I kept getting all these good deals on groceries. Instead of answering each and every one, I thought maybe a blog would be a good outlet for that.

I did some research and found Blogelina’s blog startup service. At the time, I paid $1.00- Yes, just one dollar- to have her set up my blog, WordPress, and a free year of hosting. My thinking at the time wasn’t really to earn money from this; but if at some point in that first year I made enough just to pay for the blog, I’d be happy.

This was my original logo on top. So… thankfully my sister is a great designer and hooked me up with something much better.

My original intention of this blog was to showcase how to get good deals on groceries, and also document my weight loss journey as at the same time I decided to get healthy. I’d post coupon deals and store sales for like 3 or 4 different grocery stores, but I got burnt out on that real fast- so instead I just wrote about general grocery tips and tricks.

Now it’s morphed into healthy eating on a budget, which includes freezer meals, meal prep, and meal planning. I think I’ve found my sweet spot, because I never seem to run out of ideas!

Where I am now

I thought it’d be fun to look back and see how much this blog has grown in the past 4 years, and I’m pretty amazed. Take a look at the past 3 years:

That is a huge jump in pageviews! March of 2017 I had 27,000 sessions. I ended January 2019 with 114,000 sessions. I keep growing, refining my skills, learning more, and having so much fun along the way. I still can’t wrap my head around it!

My Top Posts

There are some posts that just do better than others. They circulate through Pinterest pretty regularly and are my constant top sources of traffic. Here are the posts you all keep coming back to again and again:

• How We Ate for $37 a Week for a Year
• 20 Dinners That Cost 5 Dollars or Less
• Meals to Make When You Have No Money
• How I Stick to a $60 a Week Grocery Budget
• 20 More Dinners That Cost 5 Dollars or Less
• How to Eat When You Have No Income
• 4 Weeks to Fill Your Freezer Challenge
• How to Make a Healthy Grocery List

The Money

Believe it or not, blogs can and actually do make money. Like I said before, I didn’t start out wanting to make a full-time income from this- I just wanted to help people save money on groceries. And that’s still my passion, and I won’t turn away from that. But I have also turned this blog into a source of income- a really good part-time income that I’m hoping to double this year and turn into full-time.

While I won’t post exact numbers yet, I’ll post percentages of where my income actually comes from. Because I get asked all the time, “So how do you actually make money from a blog?”

• 80% advertising: Most of the money I make comes from the ads on my blog. I give out a TON of free information in the form of blog posts, so the ads are one way to earn me a profit at no cost to you. I’ve been with Mediavine for over 2 years now, and they’ve helped me grow so much since I started working with them!
• 15% affiliates: On some occasions, I earn a small profit when you click one of my links and either make a purchase or sign up for something. For example, if you click on one of my Amazon links and buy something, or if you sign up for Swagbucks using my link.
• 5% products: I’m actually really proud of this one, because I never thought I’d create products to sell. I never thought I was good enough. But I took a leap of faith and created freezer meal plans and an e-book to purchase, and that’s going over pretty well! I’d love to get that number up and better my skills, and make products at least 50% of my income.

So if you’ve ever bought something from one of my links, purchased a product, or even read a blog post (Like now!), then thank you. Seriously. Thank you for supporting my family. You’ve allowed me to pay for Allison’s preschool, buy a new couch set, and save for some serious goals. You are amazing.

And to show my appreciation, I’m giving away a $25 Starbucks e-gift card! There are many chances to win, so enter as many times as you can. The last day to enter is Sunday, March 10th. Good luck, and thank you once again for helping me make No Getting Off This Train amazing!

 a Rafflecopter giveaway