When she’s not working for her sorority or toward a career in marketing, junior public relations major Madeleine Wilson spreads style and smiles with her successful lifestyle blog, Small Town Roots and Cowboy Boots. The site caters to college-age women interested in fashion, beauty and more, but its origins aren’t exactly glamorous.

“I started (my blog) as a class project, actually,” Wilson said. “I originally started out blogging about professional development, like social media strategies, how to do an interview, stuff like that. As I continued doing it I just really enjoyed it, so I wanted to continue past the class.”

With the thousands of blogs available, Wilson knew that to create a successful and online space, she needed to decide on a concrete focus. After trying out topics geared toward college-aged professionals and healthy eating, it became clear: Her blog was going to be about something she truly loved.

“The one thing I have always been passionate about is fashion and beauty, so I decided to start writing about that,” Wilson said. “I started out with some posts on beauty, and then it formed into more of a fashion focus. It was like a four month process of narrowing it down, but once it got there, it felt really cohesive.”

Small Town Roots and Cowboy Boots in its current form was finalized in January 2014, but Wilson said she knew that her blog was far from reaching its full potential. She got connected with blogging networks in a stroke of marketing genius. One of them, called Her Campus Blogger Network, became the conduit through which her burgeoning audience found her voice.

 “Basically your blog gets listed on their site in a directory of other blogs that meet a certain criteria,” Wilson said. “I got my blog listed on Her Campus Blogger, and from there I started getting contacted by companies that were looking for promotions, giveaways and people to facilitate those.”

Senior communications major and fellow lifestyle blogger Allyssa Griffiths of Kent State University in Ohio met Wilson through the Her Campus Blogger Network. The two shared a sense of style and a love of blogging, and they immediately bonded.

“The bloggers in the group spend a lot of time talking and sharing experiences, advice, guidance, etc., and Madeline and I clicked,” Griffiths said. “We talked on a regular basis and even collaborated with some style posts last year.”

Meanwhile, Wilson was busy discovering just how productive running her own blog could really be.

“I realized I could reach out to companies and people I wanted to work with,” Wilson said. “I started small by researching Etsy stores that I admired and said, ‘If you send me something I can style it, take a picture of it and post it on my blog. It will be mutually beneficial for both of us because I get a free item that I want and you get a lot of new people coming to your site.’”

The more stores she contacted, the more traffic Wilson noticed that her blog was generating. Her big break came when she managed to snag a campaign with clothing retail giant Charlotte Russe.

“That was kind of like the tipping point of what set my blog apart from more amateur bloggers,” Wilson said. “I would get a box once every two months just stuffed full of their latest trends and that was really cool. I’m doing (a campaign) right now for Necessary Clothing and that’s going to be really good. I’m really excited about the items I get to feature for that. I’ve done a lot of campaigns on my own too.”

Senior science communication major Renee Hausske, a friend of Wilson’s, said that it’s her background and her identity as a college student that makes her stand out in a sea full of online insincerity.

“The fact that she’s local makes her more real,” Hausske said. “A lot of bloggers don’t seem connected to the real world and that makes what they write harder to relate to. Madeleine is a student from a small town in Washington. She’s someone that her readers feel like they know.”

From the perspective of another tried-and-true lifestyle bloggers, Griffiths said that it’s Wilson’s quality and variety that makes her blog so appealing to readers.

“My blog … focuses solely on fashion and sometimes beauty. Madeline does a great job at incorporating tons of different topics and content, which is something I feel I should start doing,” Griffiths said. “She does everything from fashion to beauty, reviews to recipes. I love the diversity in her blog.”

Wilson said she originally posted new content to her site every day, but has readjusted to a doable goal of once a week in lieu of her hectic schedule. She finds the accountability of her fellow bloggers helps to keep her in check, but also enjoys the structure of professional campaigns.

“I have a super busy schedule, so any free time that I have is devoted to blogging. Having a planner and scheduling out when and what you’re going to be posting is really important,” Wilson said. “I’ve seen a lot of blogs start out and fail because they don’t keep them updated. It’s definitely a balancing act.”

To her friends and loved ones, it’s the personal aspect of Wilson’s writing that’s best.

“My favorite post that she’s done so far is the one she wrote about heartbreak that was published on Zooey Deschanel’s website, Hello Giggles,” Hausske said. “Her blogs are more often just outfit inspirations, they aren’t usually so personal. It was great to see her open up like that.”

At the end of last year, Wilson decided to write a blog on a personal issue and saw it turn into one of her most successful posts to date.

“I’d recently gone through something that was very emotional and brought turmoil into my life. I decided to write about it. I really wanted to make it something that was applicable to a large audience, not just about my specific issue but something that you would see go viral online,” Wilson said. “I wrote it and I got a really good response from it on my blog and from people in my life. They were like, ‘This is really good, you should find a way to share this somehow.’”

Wilson sent her article, “15 Absolutely real lessons I learned about heartbreak,” in as a contributor to online lifestyle giant Hello Giggles, where it was accepted and published. The article is currently sitting at more than 7,000 Facebook likes.

“It’s reinforced a lot of my ideas, and made me feel confident in where I’m supposed to be. I’ve had this ability to explore a passion of mine and find that it’s actually something that can be productive,” Wilson said. “It’s really given me a lot of opportunity to learn about marketing, building an online community, digital design, and those are all really applicable to what I want to do in the future. So much of it has been self-taught, I feel like it really prepares me to be competitive in the job market in the future.”

Her writing has a sincere tone that makes her blog fun to read, Griffiths said.

“I’ve loved watching her evolve over time and am so excited to see her blog grow in the future,” Griffiths said.

Through all the initial success of her blog, Wilson still sees the potential to expand. Her next goal is a weekly feature of WSU students who share her passion for fashion and to get on board with the WSU community of fashion design majors. And for all those interested in gaining the same kind of momentum in their own projects, Wilson offers her own take on internet success.

“It’s an intimidating thing when you think about it, to see people that have been so successful and you’re just like, how do you get from here to there?” Wilson said. “Just start writing. Write everyday if you can. Spend your free time doing that and you’ll slowly develop what you want to talk about. You’ll find your voice.”