When I started my vegetarian recipe blog in 2011. I couldn’t have imagined the ripple effect and the positive impact that decision would have in years to come. I was in third year of journalism college – juggling marriage, frequent visits to the hospital due to my late father’s illness, lectures, exams, writing articles and interviewing people for my university assignments, and cooking vegetarian food on a daily basis in Bosnia and Herzegovina (country where even ‘vegetarian’ pizza was available on the menu in only one place in my city and there was no ‘isle’ with vegetarian products in shopping malls and stores, like today). 

Luckily, when I got married to my Indian husband, I traveled to India and got familiar with plenty of vegetarian recipes and spices, but I was aware that many other people in Balkan were struggling with the same challenges as I did in the beginning. My desire to help others who were facing similar challenges like me in the beginning lead me to start a Facebook page, and later on a blog Vegetarijanska Kuhinja, where I shared recipes and advice about vegetarian cooking. 

In the beginning, I barely had 100 followers and my blog posts 50-ish views, but I kept on posting helpful content regularly. Over the next two years, my audience was growing organically, and my blog ‘suddenly’ went ‘viral’ in 2013. I became a ‘famous vegetarian blogger’ (as media outlets and other bloggers were referring me) in the region. The link for the download of free vegetarian recipes digital cookbook that I put together with the recipes I shared on the blog had 57743 clicks. 

Thanks to the success of my blog and popularity of my articles, I started getting a lot of media features – from TV appearances to press. Thanks to the success of my blog and the popularity of the articles that I was writing for online health magazine Kreni Zdravo, I got an opportunity to start earning as a freelance writer for different magazines before I even graduated from Journalism college. 

In 2015. even though I achieved a lot of success with my food blog, and I was a sought after writer in the niche of healthy nutrition and vegetarianism, while running an online magazine ‘Sretna Zena‘ dedicated to women’s mental health and personal growth, that I co-founded in 2013., I realised that what I’m even more passionate about was self development and decided to become a life coach. Thanks to the previous success that I had with my blog, articles, and magazine, I was able to become successful as a life coach very fast and attract amazing coaching clients, as well as become the columnist for major magazines like COSMOPOLITAN. 

Looking back, I can say that the blog I started in 2011. was the igniting catalyst for the success that I had achieved over the years. 

In this blog post, I wanted to share success lessons that I learned from becoming a famous blogger and my blog going viral: 

You can start from zero and with nothing – and achieve an extraordinary success, growth, and impact

I started with no money and zero audience, with a Facebook page and free blogging platform. If you want to make a positive impact in your community/ country/ region/ the world, there has never been a better time. All you need is a FREE social media/ blog/ podcast/ YouTube account. You do not need a fancy website, stunning visuals, a lot of money and a big team, but what you do need is passion, mission, courage, and self mastery to stay consistent. 

We can impact other people more profoundly with our message and our work than we can ever imagine

It never crossed my mind that my ‘recipe blog’ could help someone in their cancer recovery. I get mind blown every single time when I read someone’s message or an e-mail saying how my article(s) helped them to quit alcohol, leave the toxic relationship, or get a small glimpse of motivation when they were struggling with depression or chronic illness. I couldn’t have imagined that my articles on the topic of self development could help someone quit drinking alcohol, but in some mysterious way our message can transcend the topic and our original heart-centred intention for the message in the way we cannot comprehend. 

Success is a compound effect of every decision and actions step that we take

If I did not start the blog, I probably wouldn’t have become a columnist for Kreni Zdravo, and then a freelance writer. Thanks to the audience that I had and magazines that I was already writing for, I could leverage that for growing my coaching practice. People still find me, order my book, enrol in my online programs, or reach out to work with me – thanks to the articles that I wrote 5, 7, or 9 years ago. My blog, as well as my audience, was growing very slowly in the first two years, and then it suddenly ‘exploded’. If I had quit in the meantime, I probably wouldn’t have witnessed the success that I have had and impacted and reached over a million people with my work and my message. 

You need to have courage, mission, and passion

I was on a mission to help others. I created a Facebook page, blog, co-founded an online magazine, and wrote hundreds of articles, in order to share the information that can help, inspire, educate, motivate, and add value to other people’s lives. 

I was having passion, and my passion fuelled my motivation to keep on creating content regularly even though I was having very few likes, clicks, and views in the beginning. To regularly blog and write articles even though I wasn’t getting paid a $ for it (for the first 2 years), or getting ‘noticed’ much. 

I had the courage to get myself out there. To dream big. To start a blog. To start an online magazine (!) with zero funds as a college student. To be more visible. To speak in front of audiences and TV cameras. To talk about the topics that matter that were not talked about a lot or at all. To create trends, instead of following the trend.

My story is the proof that you CAN impact millions of people even if you start from zero and with nothing. Of course, if I had stunning visuals, high-end tech solutions, big team, and a lot of money – I might have achieved everything that I did much faster and easier. But, I didn’t. My story proves that you can impact millions and make a difference in your community/ region/ world even if you start with no/ very few resources. But you will need mission, passion, courage, and the discipline to be consistent (solid self leadership).

Consistency is the key to ‘viral success’

Most of the people quit before they ever build the momentum and see any results. The question is, do you have solid self leadership to stay consistent, and keep on posting/ speaking/ sharing your message even while ‘no one is watching’/ reading / listening in the first few months/ years.

Those who stay consistent, get to tell the story in the years to come about their success, impact, and evolution.

If you desire to help and impact MILLIONS of people with your work and your message, GET MEDIA FEATURES (have your articles published + get podcasts, radio /TV shows interview invitations), 10X YOUR VISIBILITY this year, so that you are no longer ‘the best kept secret’ in your industry, become known for what you do, and have your ideal clients reaching out to you asking how they can work with you, I created a collection of resources that can help you – BUY ‘IMPACT MILLIONS + 10X YOUR VISIBILITY + GET FEATURED IN MEDIA’ BUNDLE (you’ll thank me once you become sought after and famous, lol).