Free and Fearless

Lidiya Kesarovska
  • 5.0 (4)
  • ENTREPRENEURSHIP
  • UPDATED BIWEEKLY
Free and Fearless

Welcome to The Free and Fearless Podcast where we talk about having more freedom and income than you know what to do with, creating digital products that people love, and making offers that sell themselves, all while serving your purpose and living your best life. I’m your host, Lidiya, a business mentor and founder of LetsReachSuccess.com, and I’m here to help you build your dream business and be bold and unapologetic.

  1. 5 DAYS AGO

    Is Blogging Dead in 2025 and Beyond + How to Adjust

    Are you wondering ‘Is blogging dead? Do people still read blogs? What’s the future of blogging and is it worth starting a blog?’ You’re not alone. Beginner bloggers often use this as an excuse not to turn their blog idea into reality. And those who’ve been blogging for a while now might actually give up because they think blogs aren’t relevant and profitable anymore. Hopefully, this article will change your mind. Table of Contents* Is Blogging Dead in 2025 and beyond?* How to tell if blogging is still relevant* To this day I’m finding new bloggers every now and then.* Do people still read blogs?* Blogging is not dead but it is changing.* 3 Ways to Prepare for The Future of Blogging* 1. Diversify your traffic sources. * 2. Aim to rank in AI overviews. * 3. Create people-first content.* Can you still make money blogging in 2025 and beyond?* What do you think? Is blogging dead? Is Blogging Dead in 2025 and beyond? I started my main website, Let’s Read Success, in 2013. So that’s over 10 years ago. While a lot has changed in the industry, one thing is sure. Blogs are still relevant. You can still make money blogging, there are more tools than ever available at your disposal, content management systems are well-optimized and helping you rank as long as you produce great content and learn SEO, and plenty of bloggers are earning a full-time living from this. Just recently I interviewed a few of them. You can enter almost any niche, no matter how big or small it is. Your blogging strategy may vary based on that, but the potential for growth and profit is there. I believe in this business model more than ever. In fact, it’s my main focus again, after I spent nearly 2 years prioritizing my course business. I absolutely love blogging and it never gets boring. There’s always another task to take care of, you can get creative with your content and work on things you’re passionate about. You can watch your metrics grow, monetize in different ways and slowly but steadily grow your income streams. If you’re new to blogging, here are some resources to get started with: * How to Start a Blog That Makes $1000/Month: Free Guide for Beginner Bloggers * How to Increase Blog Traffic (& Reach 1 Million Page Views): 12 Powerful Website Traffic Tips * How to Make Money Blogging for Beginners: Your Step-by-Step Guide to Monetizing a Blog How to tell if blogging is still relevant If you need more proof that blogging is not dead, there are ways you can see for yourself.

    14 min

  2. DEC 2

    The Main Struggle for Bloggers Right Now (+ an Invitation)

    If you’re a blogger and see the title of this post, you might immediately guess what I’m going to talk about. There’s one main thing big and small publishers and website owners are struggling with right now, and that’s traffic. It directly affects income, of course, but the issue is the declining traffic, or even the lack of any traffic if you’ve been hit by a recent Google update or just the changes in the way search engines rank websites. And I mean all search engines, how AI tools feature the content on top of the results, which is the case with Google’s AI Overviews, how you may easily be penalized even if you aren’t doing anything wrong. Add to that how less quality and newer blogs are ranking way before you, even though you were on top for years for specific keywords. Things are changing, and we need to adjust. You’re not alone. And the first thing I want to tell you is that you’re not the only one. Almost anyone right now is suffering from this, is confused, has lost trust in Google, and is looking for alternatives. I also see that most bloggers who teach blogging, like me, are changing their formulas, so to say. And that makes sense. It’s natural.  What has been working till now may no longer work. The way to rank on Google will be different now. It’s still about quality content, but not so much about on-page optimization anymore. Old formulas are not bringing the same results anymore. Such as the SEO + Ads formula, meaning that you create many articles targeting keywords that you’ve found using a tool, you optimize them strategically and you interlink them well. Then you publish them with the goal of ranking them on top of the search results for that extra term, getting traffic to your site, and earning from the ads that you have displayed on your pages. Technically, you were still creating the content people want, you were satisfying user intent, but let’s face it. The goal was to rank and get traffic and make money. Now Google knows that and doesn’t consider it natural behavior and might not trust your site that much anymore, even if you have the best content. So what many bloggers are doing now, is to optimize less, and to create people-first content. Not each piece will rank, and most of the content won’t be created with the goal of ranking or to get the green light by an SEO WordPress plugin. This will result in more natural helpful content being published, and which people will be happy to read, especially knowing how much AI and low-quality articles there are out there now. But you might be wondering: ‘How would people find that content then, and be able to enjoy it and learn from it?’ Here’s a way. Authority  While other search engines still take standard SEO practices as a main factor when ranking, Google is more about authority. They want you to create content on a topic you have experience with, in a niche you have authority in, and to make it trustworthy. They want to see who the author is, so things like an author bio and a good About page become important again, as well as presence on other platforms and having your ...

    14 min

  3. NOV 27

    12 Tips for Beginner Bloggers to Kickstart Your Blogging Journey

    If you’re thinking of starting a blogging business now, there might be many things standing in your way. Before we dive into the list of tips for beginner bloggers, let’s talk about them. Table of Contents* Why You Haven’t Started a Blog Year* Tips for Beginner Bloggers* 1. Create original content.* 2. Create people-first content.* 3. Don’t overdo SEO.* 4. Write for your ideal readers.* 5. Start an email list early on.* 6. Pick the right niche.* 7. Stick to it.* 8. Use the right tools.* 9. Make your blog professional.* 10. Get on Pinterest early on.* 11. Learn about the different ways to make money blogging.* 12. Create your blogging schedule.* Bonus blogging tip: Prioritize Security* Final words Why You Haven’t Started a Blog Year That includes the number of other blogs out there. If you look at that and consider it competition, you might think that there’s a website covering every topic under the sun already so a new one won’t make any difference and won’t get any attention. If you look at how long it may take to rank high in Google, especially this year, you might not even start a blog. If you read about all the things currently happening in the blogging space, how many bloggers lost almost all of their traffic overnight due to recent changes in the algorithm as well as the switch to AI-driven search online, you might lose any hope of ever getting a spot in the search engine results page, and thus never getting traffic to your blog, which means no profit either. If you look at all the things you’ll need to do to actually set up a professional site, get it up and running, add functionality, build an email list, publish content constantly, optimize it, keep up to date with the latest trends, tools and algorithm changes, monetize in multiple ways and the possibility of waiting years till you turn this into a full-time business, you might never start a blog, let alone do the work consistently to grow and monetize it. Things are different for bloggers today than they were a few years ago. And even one year ago. But that also has an advantage for you. While others may have lost their traffic due to Google’s updates, while they may need to do massive content audits (like me) to update old content and give it another chance to rank higher so they can bring their traffic back, while they’ve tried a million things to grow their blog, while they are still fixing mistakes (such as errors on their site, bad content from years ago, overly optimized posts when different SEO practices were working, and so on), you don’t need to worry about any of this. You can start with a clean slate, and grow a blog more strategically, the right way, and not rely on a single source of traffic or income. So, if you’re serious about this and want to do it the right way, I now want to share with you my best tips for beginner bloggers.

    15 min

  4. NOV 18

    Organic Traffic Down? Try Writing for People, Not Search Engines

    The topic of this month’s video training inside Fearless Bloggers Pro, our community and membership for bloggers, was about seeing a drop in traffic. I shared many industry updates with them and just what the current state of the blogging space is and where things are going. I also shared my traffic numbers, what I discovered after analyzing why my traffic went down, and my action plan from here on to bring it back. Why Your Organic Traffic Went Down Now, there are many reasons why your organic traffic – the one coming from search engines – may have dropped significantly. This and last year the most common one is a recent search algorithm update. It could also be a manual penalty, tracking problems with your site, changes in the SERP layout, issue with website crawling and indexation, lost backlinks, an overall decrease in your content quality, the use of AI content, seasonality, outdated content and lack of any new content, and so on. But usually, if you haven’t done anything wrong, anything against Google’s guidelines, and if you’ve had good traffic for a long time now and kept doing the same things as a blogger, but see a sudden drop in traffic, it’s changes with Google. Seems like they aren’t favouring small publishers anymore and I hear bloggers from all niches and at all levels, complaining about it, being disappointed in Google and not relying on it anymore, and looking for alternatives to organic traffic. Things aren’t easy in the blogging space right now, and the way we optimize our content is changing too. On-page SEO is changing, the rules of the game are just different now that AI is dominating the search results and there’s so much low-quality content out there. What do we do? The usual tips apply: * Create quality content consistently; * Stay up to date with the latest Google algorithm updates; * Follow Google’s guidelines for creating helpful content; * Publish unique content only; * Go back to old content and update it; * Check Google Search Console for errors in indexing; * Improve the user experience on your site; * Improve page speed; * Have a good WordPress theme, and overall design of your site; * Use only quality plugins, and don’t overdo it. Only keep the ones you need; * Diversify your traffic sources by building a presence on other platforms; * Grow your brand. Improving your site’s reputation now is also about branding, not just content or traffic. By becoming an authority in your niche, you gain trust with both readers and search engines. But ultimately, there’s one tip that comes before anything else. One practice that becomes more crucial and necessary than ever before in the online space… Writing for people, not for search engines Now, you might be thinking: ‘But, Lidiya,

    8 min

  5. NOV 13

    A Last-Minute Black Friday Marketing Plan for Bloggers

    Looking for Black Friday marketing ideas for your blogging business this year? You’re in the right place. To begin with, check out this article I wrote a year ago with some practical Black Friday tips and ways to make your Black Friday sale a success. Below, you’ll see the steps to do it last minute and still see some results. It’s already the 11th of November, and I only outlined my Black Friday offer yesterday. I decided what product to have it for, who it will be for, what the price will be, the promo period for the deal, when to send emails and how many, and even wrote the first email because I felt inspired. Now, I know many of you can’t find the discipline or motivation to get to it, and are more likely to give up on having any sale this year. But you can still do something about it, and it can still go well. Here’s how: Your Black Friday Marketing Plan Step #1: The What The very first step of your Back Friday marketing plan is to decide what you’ll promote.  Digital Products If you already have a paid product or service, then that’s what you’ll work with. If you have a few, pick the one that makes the most sense, or bundle two or more of them to create a unique offer at a reduced price. This is a once in a lifetime or once in a year opportunity for people from your audience to get access to that exact bundle. If you don’t have a product yet, these are 2 paths you can take. First, you can create a digital product or start offering a service right now. That’s right! It doesn’t need to take months and you don’t even need to create the content yet. You can presell your course, for example. That’s called a beta launch and it can be your motivation to actually produce great content and release a new module or a few lessons every week or at whatever pace you decide and promise people.  If some people join, then consider your idea validated. People have paid for something that doesn’t exist yet. You now get to create it and get their feedback in the process. If you want to learn all about creating, launching and preselling a course or another digital product, I teach that in detail in my program Bold Business School. Affiliate Marketing Now, if you don’t want to deal with all this, as it can be stressful last minute or you might simply not be ready for it, especially if you just started blogging, then you can rely on affiliate marketing. Other companies have amazing Black Friday deals, so as long as you’re an affiliate and believe in the product or service, you can promote it to your audience. It’s still a win-win because your people hear about great offers and can grab one of them and save a lot. Or even get a lifetime deal that can’t be found any other time of the year.  You earn a commission, and the company you promote gains a new customer. That’s what I’m doing with tools I use for my business such as the stock photo and templates membership I’m part of, Styled Stock Society. Years ago, during Black Friday, I grabbed their lifetime access and it was a great decision. They have this deal every year.

    13 min

  6. OCT 15

    My New Blog, Its Content Strategy and The Vision Behind It

    In this post, I introduce the new blog I started, how I picked its name and niche, developed a content strategy, design, and every other element. It might be fun for you to learn about my new idea and how I quickly turned it into reality, and it might even inspire you to start your first blog, or a second or third niche site if you’ve been sitting on an idea for some time now. The members of Fearless Bloggers already know about it and I’ll be taking them with me on the journey of growing the new website inside the monthly income reports that I publish in the membership. But I also wanted to share about it with everyone else that is interested in this. Also, this is the first time I acted so quickly on a new blog idea. Meaning that the new domain and WordPress site were up and running two days after the initial idea. But because with the hosting I’m using, WPX, I can create four more blogs and just pay the domain fee but have free hosting, it doesn’t really cost me anything to start a new site and see how it goes. I like to give it one year. Also read: How to Start a Second Blog (for Free) with WPX Hosting I recently discontinued one of the other blogs I was running so I had space for one more project and I came up with such an exciting idea. I also know from experience that it’s good to use this initial momentum and actually get things going as well as publish more content on the new blog before the excitement wears off. So, are you ready? Introducing my new blog The new blog is called Blogging Terms and you can check it out here. It’s a collection of all terms bloggers will ever need to know. My big vision for it is to turn it into the Wikipedia for bloggers, but just for the definitions, not for the strategies or how-tos as that is already covered on my blog and in my courses and so many other bloggers do it too. From what I know, another site like Blogging Terms doesn’t exist or at least it’s not ranking high. But please correct me if I’m wrong and if you find something similar. But at the same time, every big blogger out there has a post or page on Blogging Terms or something like a glossary that shares many definitions of popular blogging words and trends and tools. Picking the blog name Once I came up with the idea for the new blog, I had to decide on a name. That’s one of the most fun parts of the process of starting a new site. It’s also one that you can get stuck on and I know many aspiring bloggers who never actually started their website because they wanted to find the perfect name, the perfect niche, the perfect team to design it and anything else. But this is not the most important thing. Your niche, of course,

    18 min

  7. SEP 14

    Blog Monetization Myth #4: I had no revenue in my 1st year so it’s time to give up.

    Welcome to another post in which I help you overcome a limiting belief as a blogger that stops you from actually growing your business. That’s the myth that if you haven’t earned anything or have just a little profit in your first year, it’s time to ditch your blog and move on to something else because it’s just not working. Also, let me know how you like those short posts/episodes I’m releasing these weeks. It’s a different format. I know these work really well for some people. Others might prefer longer ones with actual tips and strategies and step-by-step processes in each. Maybe they take notes. But here, there’s just one point and I share examples and I help you shift your mindset and take action. And sometimes that’s all we need, right? Before we dive into today’s topic, here are the other 3 blogging myths I talked about: * Blog Monetization Myth #1: It’s too early to monetize my blog. * Blog Monetization Myth #2: Affiliate marketing is the only way to make real money blogging. * Blog Monetization Myth #3: I can’t earn from my blog without social media. So, about today’s myth. If you know my story, you might know that I didn’t earn anything in my first and even second year as a blogger. And so did most of the successful bloggers I’ve interviewed over the years, many of whom are now earning six figures from their website and some even seven. Obviously, everyone’s business journey is different and there are many reasons why you might not have earned anything from your platform just yet. But the chance is very little that you might need to leave it behind and give up on the dream of being a full-time blogger. Sure, you might be in the wrong niche. You might have no time to actually work on your blog. You might prefer another business model or you don’t believe in yourself enough to stick to your project. But these reasons have little to do with the earning potential of your website. If you have a vision, if you’re in the right niche, are creating content and really want to make money as a blogger and believe this is the right business model for you, then you can only give up on this after you’ve tested all the ways to grow and monetize your blog. Why your blog might not be growing It could be that you haven’t created much content in that one year or that you haven’t optimized it well, so it never started ranking in search engines and bringing you traffic. It could be that you have no strategy in place and are just doing random things, following everyone’s advice, following trends and just doing what others in the industry are doing. But with such lack of focus, you probably won’t be able to successfull...

    9 min

  8. SEP 7

    Blog Monetization Myth #3: I can’t earn from my blog without social media.

    This is the third post in which I bust common blog monetization myths with the hope of empowering you to take more action and earn from your platform sooner rather than later. Here are the first two: * Blog Monetization Myth #1: It’s too early to monetize my blog. * Blog Monetization Myth #2: Affiliate marketing is the only way to make real money blogging. Today’s one is a big deal because I hear it all the time and it’s often even stopping people from actually starting blogs.  Most bloggers are introverts and so am I. That means we don’t really want to be the face of the brand or to take pictures of ourselves often or to share every little detail from our daily life and feel like an influencer.  We would much rather avoid any video content and photos and just write blog posts, optimize them, use email, take courses, listen to podcasts to learn more about the industry and so on. Social media can be draining. It can be too much most of the time and we just compare ourselves to others. We see how slowly our following is growing and we end up posting because we have to, not because we want to. Not to mention all this actually takes us away from the real business activities. The income generating blogging tasks such as content creation, content optimization, content marketing, email marketing, affiliate marketing and so on.  Well, I’m here to tell you there are other ways and you can indeed grow a blogging business without social media, without Facebook or Instagram or TikTok. That, of course, is only in case you don’t want to show your face there and don’t want to keep up with others or be an influencer in any way. Because that’s how I am.  If you enjoy any of these channels and creating content regularly for them sounds fun and it doesn’t take you away from your actual blogging tasks, then go for it. But if you’re looking for another way, this post is for you. I actually have two articles on that topic that you might want to check out after this one. The first one is from 2022 when I was just done with Instagram yet again and explained how social media for business is draining me, why I’m done with it and what I’m doing instead. I shared how I’m making my blogging business more interactive but without socials. As well as how social media hurts us and the price we pay for endless scrolling and where to promote your stuff if not on socials. Check it out here. The second one is from the beginning of this year and it’s all about how I promote a new offer without social media. That’s in case you have paid offers in your business, most likely digital products.  I used the membership as an example and talked about the exact ways I was and am promoting it directly and indirectly, how to give potential customers many points of entry and how to do all that naturally without being too salesy or annoy...

    10 min
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
4 Ratings

About

Welcome to The Free and Fearless Podcast where we talk about having more freedom and income than you know what to do with, creating digital products that people love, and making offers that sell themselves, all while serving your purpose and living your best life. I’m your host, Lidiya, a business mentor and founder of LetsReachSuccess.com, and I’m here to help you build your dream business and be bold and unapologetic.

Information

  • Creator
    Lidiya Kesarovska
  • Years Active
    2020 - 2024
  • Episodes
    127
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2024 The Free & Fearless Podcast
  • Show Website
    Free and Fearless

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