So many aspiring bloggers steer clear of the fashion niche because the competition is fierce.
But if you’re like Christina Ehm and have a passion for shoes and accessories, you can build more than just a profitable blog – you can build an online empire.
Cristina Ehm’s ShoeTease blog generates over $17k per month… Read on to see how Christina uses SEO and Pinterest marketing to drive traffic to her blog and generate this monthly income!
Who is Christina Ehm of ShoeTease?
Christina Ehm is a designer and stylist based in Canada with more than 20 years of experience in the fashion biz. She was trained in Paris and has worked all across North America and Europe.
While she specialized in women’s design and pattern-making, she always had a passion for shoes and accessories. She spent some time working for Hugo Boss in Switzerland and Vestebene in Italy before she started freelancing with design labs and forecasting throughout Europe.
In 2009, she returned to Toronto and decided to launch her website ShoeTease. The name itself (“Shoe Tease”) was originally a play on words — keeping the “tee” in case she stuck with t-shirts — but today it’s become a recognized brand for fashion and styling advice.
Why leave such a lucrative and exciting career to start a blog? Because she was burnt out.
She started out selling t-shirts, and she built a blog along the way to help promote her products. But over time, her blog became more popular than her t-shirts.
By 2014, Cristina invested in SEO training, which became a turning point for her business. She mastered on-page SEO and later even offered SEO consulting services to other bloggers before focusing fully back on her own site.
How Much Does Christina Make?
Prior to the HCU update, Christina was making:
- About $14,450/month with Mediavine ads
- $2,500/month from affiliate marketing
- $250/month from digital products on Etsy
In November 2023, she had her best month ever when her earnings hit $23,088.43 in ads alone.
While Christina launched her blog in 2010, it wasn’t until 2019 that it started generating a lot of revenue, and she never focused fully on the site until 2020.
Her blog hit 500,000 monthly page views at its peak before the Helpful Content Update (HCU). Today, in addition to her blog, she sells curated capsule wardrobes on Etsy, continues to create updated capsule wardrobe guides, and is planning to expand into courses and styling resources.
What Can We Learn About Her Marketing Strategy?
Christina’s main focus has always been SEO, and until the HCU, search engine traffic made up the majority of her traffic (85%).
While SEO and keyword research have been her main strategy, she also uses:
- Pinterest as part of her marketing strategy. Today, Pinterest is her top traffic source.
- Topical clusters to drive more traffic based on popular articles.
- Interlinking strategically between posts and using keyword synonyms as anchor text.
- Shareable content, like quizzes, checklists and trending style guides to help increase her backlink profile.
- Email marketing to promote her blog
Her background in professional fashion design also gives her content a unique authority that sets her apart from most bloggers in the style niche. She isn’t just sharing trends – she’s teaching styling principles women can apply to feel confident in their wardrobes.
Christina’s site is still bringing in close to half a million visitors every month, and she’s brainstorming new ways to generate more revenue.
From an interview she gave to Niche Pursuits, one detail that stands out from Cristina’s story is that she works part-time hours on ShoeTease. Some weeks it’s 20 hours or less, yet the site has grown into a six-figure business. That efficiency comes from leaning into high-value SEO content, evergreen styling advice, and outsourcing tasks like graphics and Pinterest scheduling to her VA.
What are Her Favorite Tools?
Christina uses several tools to help run her blog and online business, including:
- Semrush to find keywords and analyze her competitors
- Canva to create the visuals for her blog
- ChatGPT occasionally to make her writing more concise
Final Thoughts
Christina’s story is inspiring for anyone who is feeling burnt out in the rat race and wants to take control of their financial future. She turned her decades of fashion design and shoe expertise into a thriving online business, proving that when you mix professional skill with smart marketing, you can build a brand that lasts.
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