Your Guide to Starting a Food Vlog

“There is no sincere love than the love of food,” – George Bernard Shaw.

Et Tu foodie? Does thinking about your favorite food gives you foodgasms? Do you find yourself scrolling through and drooling over food videos?

If you’re someone who doesn’t just like to hog on their favorite food but also wants to share their knowledge of food with the world, then food vlogging is the right avenue for you. 

To start a food vlog, you do not need to be a MasterChef but just be passionate about cooking and creating new recipes. A food vlogger is someone who usually films themselves while cooking, edits, and then uploads the video to social sites like Rizzle, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, etc.

Did you know that food videos are universally popular? Yes. You heard it right. People enjoy watching food vlogs. Here is what Neuroscientist and author of Why You Eat What You Eat Rachel Herz, Ph.D., has to say: “While they might not be able to eat the food they see on screen, it seems that they still want to snack on ‘something,’ so it could lead to a subconscious desire for consumption.”

According to a study conducted by Millward Brown Digital, Firefly, and Google in 2014, nearly half of all adults watch food videos, with millennials watching 30 percent more food content than other demographics.

Do you want to start your own food blog? Are you wondering how to get started? What dish should I cook in my first video? These questions might be going through your mind right now, and we want to help answer them for you. This blog will guide you on how to become a food vlogger and answer all the questions you may have about the world of food vlogging.

Here’s How You Can Begin Your Journey as a Food Vlogger

Just before you start cooking a dish, you need to assemble all your ingredients and cookware similarly before you set your foot on starting your food vlogging journey. You would like to work on a few things to ease the process.

Let us see what those things are!

Do Your Research Well 

As always, research is key to starting a new endeavor. It is important to take the time and conduct thorough research before you start. You may face a lot of competition in the market regarding food vlogging. So you should check out what other food vloggers are doing. Once you have a fair idea of what others are doing, you can start thinking about what kind of content you want to create for your food vlog. 

The best starting point will be to find your unique selling point. Your USP can be anything, from your cooking style to creating unique new recipes, the way you edit, even your personality. This may entail a bit of trial and test but fret not. You can ask your followers for their feedback and tailor your content style accordingly.

Prepare a Script and Shoot

Spending time on your script and other things you wish to include in your video is essential. It is best to write down the steps of your recipe and do a dry run before you start shooting. Preparing a  script helps you follow the steps correctly and saves you from unnecessary retakes. The script can also help you do a voiceover for your video.

You can keep notes of some easy tips and tricks that your viewer may find helpful while trying to make your dishes. This will help you form a bond of trust and a mutual connection with your followers. 

Gather Your Equipment

A camera, adjustable lenses, mics, and a tripod are essential pieces of equipment for your vlogs. However, you will find a lot of different types of these equipments in the market, so which ones to buy will totally depend on your budget and need. Food vloggers prefer to use 2-3 cameras to be able to shoot videos from multiple angles. This is to capture the overall essence of cooking styles, the ingredients in all their glory, and the coveted close-up shots. But if you are just starting, then you can simply use your smartphone as they come with high-quality cameras these days that can shoot up to 4K videos. 

Food vlogger Whitney Bond shoots her videos on her iPhone. She stabilizes her phone using a tripod. “Don’t think that you need thousands of dollars of equipment to get started,” Bond says. So you can begin shooting on your phone if you’re on a tight budget. 

After shooting the necessary video clips comes editing. You can either hire a professional or choose to do it yourself. If you decide to do it yourself, there are a lot of editing software tools available both online and offline that you can use to give your food vlogging videos that professional touch.

Connect With Food Vloggers 

This may sound weird, but you should definitely try to connect with other food vloggers. It will help you gain recognition among the food vloggers in the community. 

You can even team up with fellow vloggers to create videos. This will help you reach new audiences and broaden your horizons. 

You can connect with them by commenting on their videos or inviting them to do a collab with you. Collaborating with other food vloggers can also give your channel a little viewership boost, which is always good.

Reach Out to Sponsors

Sponsors can be helpful financially and also help you gain viewers. You can simply reach out to cookware or food brands, but before you approach them, do your research. Try out their products and see if they hold up to the advertised standards. 

Say your favorite brand of cookware came out with a new cookware set. In that case, you try that cookware range in one of your videos and give them a shoutout. Or you could tag your favorite brand of spices when you try their selection of dried herbs and seasonings in your next dish. If you make this a consistent effort, it will help you build a relationship with them. This can go a long way in benefiting you when you reach out to them directly. 

They may even notice your love for their brand and its products and reach out to you before you do!

Try as Many Recipes as Possible

Versatility is your friend. To reach a larger audience, try cooking dishes that cater to all sorts of tastes. When you start out, you should try your hand at different cuisines. This way, you can expand your expertise and credibility as a food vlogger.

Once you’ve tried making different cuisines and get the hang of cooking techniques, that’s when you pick a specialty. For example, you could be an expert on Chinese food, Italian cuisine, or delicious desi food. You could also try reinventing the old recipes in new ways with add-on spices or cooking them slightly different from traditional methods. You can always ask your viewers what they would like you to try next and give it a shot. This will help you grow as a food vlogger while establishing a close relationship with your followers.

Be Consistent

Consistency is the key to social media engagement. Vloggers who post regularly have higher engagement and followers than those who post only once or twice a month. To be consistent, the best way is to plan your monthly calendar in advance so this way you will be able to post your videos at least once or twice a week.

When planning your calendar, make sure your recipes are tailored accordingly. If some festivities are coming up, you can schedule your recipe suitably. For example, if it is Diwali, you could share Gujiya or other sweet recipes. Similarly, if it is Christmas or Eid, you might want to share baking or Sevai recipes with your followers. 

Like it takes time for flowers to bloom, setting up your successful food vlog may take some time. You can try new recipes, learn new cuisines, try out different cooking techniques, and develop new ways to engage with your viewers. You can connect with your viewers by asking them for their feedback on your recipes and replying to their comments. 

You must be creative and open to learning new things to be a successful food vlogger. You should definitely try Rizzle to create your vlogging content if you’re a newbie, as it has a ton of easy-to-use editing features to help you out. Who knows, you could be the next Tarla Dalal or Sanjeev Kapoor! 

Well, that’s all on food vlogging. Drop us a comment with your favorite cuisine below!