Letter from TeriLyn, January 2023

Hi friends! I was blown away by the love and support on my first Letter from TeriLyn. Thank you thank you thank you.

After my last letter, so many of you reached out via Instagram and email asking how to support my business with declining blog traffic. I cannot tell you how much that means to me, especially since I employ multiple people and if my revenue decreases, it makes me nervous about long-term stability and growth for my team, which is hugely important to me and not something I take lightly.

Here are ways to support bloggers and influencers:

And I promise you, they truly help and mean so much.

Visit my blog and spend 60+ seconds on a page before clicking to another page.

Every page load counts and time spent matters, both for ad revenue and for telling google that the content is good (vs. a high bounce rate where someone closes right away without consuming or clicking to another page)

Engage on Instagram.

Comments with 4+ words, tagging a friend or sharing a post with a friend, or saving a post. Those all help a LOT. Tagging a friend or sharing a post or reel in your stories especially helps my account since it exposes me to new audiences. Saving posts and leaving comments tells Instagram that it’s “good” content and the algorithm shows it more often.

Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, LTK, Pinterest and subscribe to my YouTube channel.

Even if you don’t regularly engage on a platform, one metric that brands look at is the sheer number of followers. In my experience, follower counts matter more when booking partnership and engagement matters more when rebooking brand partnerships. But follow counts definitely help open the door in the first place.

Use my links to shop!

I’m ALWAYS happy to send you a link to a site you’re shopping! It doesn’t cost you more (in fact, sometimes I have promo codes you can use!) but I get a small commission when you shop (usually around $2-$5) and they add up! It’s can be significant if it’s a larger purchase like a sofa or bed, so if you are buying any home decor, please let me know!

Buy influencers’ books and products.

I only have one product right now (The Rookie Runner) but if any of your favorite influencers have a cookbook or an ebook or sell jewelry or whatever, buy it! They’re usually around $20 or less so it won’t impact your budget too much, but every purchase makes a big difference.

Alright, let’s get into this month’s letter! If you need more context on any of the topics below, you can probably find it in last month’s letter. If not, feel free to leave a comment and ask anything!

Letter from TeriLyn, January 2023

Family

Tommy and I got away for a few days for our first vacation with just the two of us since having Thomas. We spent 4 days in Dominica at Secret Bay resort and it was exactly what we needed. I’m planning to do a blog post with more details and pictures from our trip (you can also see more on Instagram over the last few weeks), but in short, we had such a relaxing time. We sat on the beach, we got massages everyday, we kayaked and that was about it. It was heaven. It was also good to to relax before coming back to some more stressful stuff at home: namely, fertility treatments.

This month we had our first appointment to start the process of using a frozen embryo. I knew that I needed to have some initial testing done before they could transfer the embryo but given our situation, they want to do a “mock” month with medication to see how my body responds. That allows them to make sure the timing of the transfer is as precise as possible since I don’t have a bunch of embryos hanging out in the freezer. (Most people get 10-20 eggs when they freeze eggs, but given my premature ovarian failure, that’s not what we’re working with.)

All that means that we have to wait at least two cycles now before we can implant.

In the grand scheme of things, waiting two months isn’t that long, I know. But if you’ve tried to start a family or grow your family, you know that once you decide it’s time, it’s all you can think about and it’s just HARD. The waiting is the hardest part of the infertility process. And the unknown. And the fear. I don’t love the shots, but it’s certainly not the hardest part.

I started the medication for the “mock” month last Friday and I’ve not felt great since. I’m nauseous throughout most of the day, very dizzy when I stand up and I’m just EXHAUSTED as the day goes on. The best I’ve felt was the day I didn’t work out, so I’m going to pay close attention to the days I work out and don’t and the different types of workouts I do to see if that can help me manage the fatigue.

I’m trying not to get too far ahead of myself and I KNOW that God is in control but it doesn’t remove the fear and anxiety that I have of all the things that could happen. I already have so much to be thankful for and I love love love being a mom.

Work

I’ve been frustrated with decreasing blog traffic and the finicky beast that Instagram is and in my last update, I was frustrated with the performance of Pinterest. Well, I turned down the ads on my blog (which decreases my ad revenue) but it’s helped my traffic rebound. My SEO team suggested that and sure enough, traffic started slowly increasing. I hope that trend stays and I hope you enjoy fewer ads on the site! (My new website is in development and I’m hoping it will launch in March – it is beautiful.)

I chatted with my Pinterest team and we’re changing our strategy over there (and the designs of my pins) and I’m feeling really hopeful about the changes.

I’m also interviewing a few copywriters to bring onto my team to help with content since we have a lot that goes out! I’m so grateful I have such a great team and it’s always exciting to bring on someone new. There is always so much that happens behind the scenes, which is probably why I get questions like this not infrequently.

I can’t do much about Instagram other than to keep trying new things and trying to keep it helpful and fun.

But I realized I hadn’t post on my Facebook page in YEARS. I personally use Facebook for groups and to follow my favorite blogs (rather than going directly to their site) so I have leaned into those platforms for my own business. I hosted January challenges in my Online Friends group and my Beauty group and my Rookie Runner group (only for paid members) and it was so fun to connect with people in a different way! I’m also really enjoying sharing blog posts on my Facebook page and seeing that people are clicking through to read. So, if you don’t follow all or any of those, I’d love to have you!

I’m still really enjoying creating YouTube content, which is very new to me! It’s a totally different strategy and different group of people (or so it seems) and I’m enjoying the change. I’m no pro but it’s been really fun and I hope it gives people a bit more behind the scenes into my work and life, as well as provides more useful content that needs longer form video content (vs. super short reels).

I also hosted my annual Beautycounter team get together in January.

I have quite a few team members in Winston-Salem, and I even had a few women drive down from Virginia to join us! It was so fun to see people in person and it inspired me to start doing get togethers more regularly. I’m going to meet with my local leaders once a month to strategize the best way to help our team. We’re also going to invite others to come and work with us from time to time! When you work for yourself, it can be easy to get in a rut and/or get lonely so I know that will help me. I also hope it helps other consultants who are new or overwhelmed and don’t know where to start to sit and work with others to learn and get inspired.

I’ve been a bit frustrated with Beautycounter for the past few years and I’m finally feeling excited and hopeful again. Leadership has not been strong the last few years but we have a new CEO who is so dramatically different — in a good way — and it feels like we have forward momentum and the drama is gone. He also is going to help fill in the gaps in the product line.

While I still use a lot of Beautycounter skincare, I stopped using their makeup when they discontinued all their powders because I didn’t like how their cream products performed. I don’t know when but we are going to get powders back – hallelujah! He also promised that we’ll be getting new products regularly, which hasn’t been the norm for a while. New products is fun and helps the business, especially when you’ve been a consultant for 8 years like I have!

I also learned that Beautycounter’s annual leadership conference will be in Charlotte, NC this year!!!!

Almost every single event since I’ve been a consultant has been on the West Coast which is so hard to get to for us East Coasters, especially those of us with kids, so I’m thrilled and so is my local team! I can’t wait to see so many of my friends that I haven’t seen in years. So many of my closest friends are women that I never would have met without Beautycounter and I haven’t seen them in person since 2019. I’m so excited to see them again soon!

I guess the moral of the story with work is that I’d been in a rut and I needed to add new things to my routine to mix it up and get different results. And I’m having more fun too.

Faith

A couple of women in my community group at church invited me to join a DNA group. “Community Group” and “DNA Group” are new terms to me since those aren’t things the LDS church does but I’m really enjoying both. The DNA group is just a smaller group who gets together to go deeper into scripture and better support each other in life and faith.

I’m still doing The Bible Recap study program which goes through the bible chronologically. It’s not always realistic for me to read every single day (or listen to the corresponding podcast every single day) but at our last DNA group, one of my friends reminded me that it’s okay to not do it EVERY day. The goal is to create a regular rhythm of scripture study. So now I’m doing 2-3 “days” worth of reading each time I sit down to study, knowing that there will inevitably be days that I skip entirely. It balances out to keep me “on track.”

Bible | Study Guide | PJs | Heated mug | Bedding

I’m still loving our church and a sermon a few weeks ago was so powerful. I am NOT a cryer, but woah, I was sobbing by the end. Tommy knows I’m not a cryer and he kept asking me if I was okay, and I couldn’t even put into words exactly what hit me other than the need to hand fears over to God. Fears about infertility, work, family health issues… it can all feel overwhelming and what I bottle up all came out. If you want to listen the sermon, whether you’re a Christian or not, I HIGHLY recommend it. You can access it here.

Health

Running is still meh, but I do think the pelvic floor specialist I saw this month is going to get to the root of some issues. I did go back to the gym for the first time in almost three years and ran on the treadmill for the first time in 4 years. And I REALLY enjoyed it, even if I could barely sit down for the next 3 days after doing 65# back squats. I used to back squat 150-185# in my CrossFit days, but since 2020, I’ve only lifted at home and the heaviest weights I have are 20 lbs. It was such a nice change and I sort of enjoy being sore.

I’ve always loved the treadmill, but I really wished I had music. Airpods don’t stay in my ears when I run and while I had brought my Shokz, they weren’t working. They have a great warranty so I just need to look into that or buy new ones. Anyway, I’m already excited to hit the treadmill again! It’s so interesting because I LOVE running outside, but I guess it had started to feel like a chore, especially since hills aggravate my hamstring and hills are all we have around our house. The treadmill gives me a flat terrain and the option to cut my run short (vs. getting 3 miles out and needing to get back home!).

I’m still doing pilates and the megaformer and love those! I also love buying and wearing matching workout sets, which is not something I’ve ever done with running. I just bought these leggings and this top in navy blue.

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Alright, that’s probably enough for today. Thank you, as always, for being here. I am truly so thankful for you.