Inspiration for a new year

Last Updated on January 7, 2026 by Annie Bernauer

Today I received an email from a blogging newsletter I subscribe to that focusses on supporting the growth of us bloggers with helpful tips and encouragement. I always find these newsletters helpful and informative about the latest trends but today’s newsletter really hit home.

For many of you out there that are not immersed in the world of blogging or creating online content and websites, you may be oblivious to the trend in declining website traffic over the last couple years. This was especially rough this year for blogs created by real humans like myself and not AI.

Even if you were oblivious to this decline in visits to real human created websites, you probably noticed changes to your internet searches this year. You may have noticed that when you go into an internet browser search bar and type in your search words, the first thing that pops up now is an AI generated summary.

No longer do websites like mine pop up with articles related to your search query. In the past those search queries helped to drive traffic to our websites. Sure if you scroll down below the AI summary, you’ll eventually find links to websites like mine with helpful related articles written by real humans like myself. But most people find what they need in the AI summary and move on, never bothering to scroll further down to read our websites.

What this means for us real human bloggers is that our website stats have taken a HUGE hit. I did not mention this in any of my newsletters or social media last year but I’m telling you here. After the big Google algorithm update in the spring of 2025, my website stats crashed. I was absolutely devastated.

All the hard work I had been putting into my website for over a decade didn’t matter. All my hard work over the years of researching keywords, writing detailed helpful content about homesteading from our real life experiences no longer ranked me on numerous number one posts on internet searches. My stats tanked which meant that my income from the ads and affiliate links on my website took a huge hit.

This was absolutely devestating. I knew the income streams from blogging can vary as they always have over the years, especially seasonally for a homesteading blog like ours. But this was huge and the biggest hit I’ve ever taken.

It was especially hard to swallow for two reasons. First, I started off the year 2025 with a pretty big goal of doubling my income from my blog. Within the first three months of 2025, I had accomplished this. It was amazing! I felt so confident, energized and motivated to keep pouring my heart and soul into this website like I have for over a decade. I have tons of draft posts waiting to be finished editing and published plus a long list of other ideas for helpful content to share with you all.

The second reason this was a devastating hit for me is that 2025 brought about some major changes in our family. I am now a single mama striving to continue managing our homestead and earn a living working from home so I may continue homeschooling my two amazing children. The drastic reduction in website traffic to our blog meant a drastic reduction in income.

I learned years ago not to “put all my eggs in one basket” so to speak in regards to my income sources. Thankfully I had other income streams I could focus on which required me to pivot my time, energy and resources. I set the goal of sending out regular newsletters to our blog subscribers and spending a little time on Pinterest but beyond that I never finished any of those oodles of draft blog posts and hit the magic “publish” button.

I felt deflated, defeated, discouraged. I think you get the point! Until this morning when I read that blogging newsletter. The writer acknowldeged that it has been a really difficult year for all of us bloggers and taking huge hits to our website stats and incomes.

But what really spoke to me was her encouragement to keep at it. To write for you, my readers and blog subscribers. To not focus on the latest SEO or Google search algorithms. To just write from my heart what I want to share to help you all on your modern day homesteading journeys.

Wow did that shift something inside of me! I could have done that earlier this year but I felt too defeated and discouraged. I figured, “What’s the point?!” But the point is that there are still those of you out there who will ignore the AI summary at the top of a search query and scroll down to find helpful content written by us real life humans and not a computer generated robot.

I can write and publish the content that I want to write and no longer stress about having the perfect format or key words in just the right spots. I can write and publish my helpful how-to posts and share them to our newsletter subscribers. I can get that helpful content out there for folks to read and learn without hoping they will find it by miraculous chance on an internet search.

So here’s to starting a new year with new goals, new motivation and inspiration! If you’ve read this far, thank you. Thank you for taking the time to read the heartfelt words written by a real life human homesteading mama living the modern day homesteading life in Montana!