Blog of the Week: The Pioneer Woman

It is no secret that I have a blog addiction. I often peruse through food blogs, getting hungrier and hungrier as the pages move forward. My latest blog discovery is one worth sharing. The blogger’s name is Ree Drummond, otherwise known as The Pioneer Woman.

She identifies herself as a  “ lover of butter and Ethel Merman” blogging about her home, garden and most importantly, southern cuisine. In fact, this pioneer has been on quite an adventure in the past few years. Ree’s blog was named Weblog of the Year in 2009 and 2010 at the Annual Weblog Awards and has been featured and discussed on Good Morning America, The Today Show and the View. In addition to writing articles for the Ladie’s Home Journal and Southern Living magazine, Ree published her first cookbook in 2009, stemming from some of her most popular online recipes, and now stars in her own daytime television show on The Food Network entitled, Pioneer Woman.

The rapid success of her blog, which only started in 2006, reportedly earned over 13 million page views a month!! This number grew in 2009, as her monthly reach exceeded 23 million viewers!

I admire Ree’s determination towards success. Time magazine named The Pioneer Woman one of the top 25 best blogs in the world in 2009, an outstanding accomplishment for such a small town girl (or anyone for that matter!)

In my opinion, the visually descriptive recipes and high quality, captivating images is really what drives viewers towards her blog daily.

The tantalizing images of southern cuisine seem so real, that you almost feel as though you can reach into the page and take a bite!!

Through blogging, twitter, a facebook page dedicated to the Pioneer Woman and a TV show, Dee is an inspiration to any blogger wishing to hit it big! Putting yourself out on the internet can be difficult at first, and southern cuisine does not appeal to everyone (especially the health conscious, do you have any idea how much butter is used? Yikes!) However, Dee has successfully used information systems to promote a brand and lifestyle that is flourishing year after year. The key is to use multiple sources on the net in order for a multitude of people to connect with your product. Now, she’s spreading her knowledge (and recipe for beef with creamy cheddar gritz) for the world to learn how easy it can be to be a chef, home-maker and woman on the frontier.