I have long been lamenting the dwindling interest in historical sites and events in my area. Places that hold memories of my childhood where I was in wonder at this world around me. Places that this new generation is missing, stuck behind a Wii or TV.
How to reach out and get them out there? Somebody has to do something. What can I do? Ideas were "bandied" about and, there being strength in numbers, an idea for a group project formed fuzzily. No definite plans made, it remained a hazy possibility.
Then I heard about
a group of moms who make it their business to know about all the family-friendly happenings in their locale, and who publish a weekly e-newsletter "designed to entertain, stimulate and exhaust your kids".
Macaroni Kid provides the entire infrastructure - from website, publishing tools & fantastic tech support, to a media kit & marketing materials. It helped me to know that there was an active group of fellow Macaroni Kid moms who share ideas and resources, some of whom I already knew from the world of blogging.
Perfect! After a few weeks of hearing about it, and reading the BNET.com article on MK, I took the plunge and joined up.
I hate cold-calling
For my business, I have to call people to try to establish new relationships, and find new markets. Sometimes I get to talk to people I already know. Sometimes it's a totally cold call. I hate it. If you approach me looking to match a need with a solution - I can help. We can chat for hours. To approach you and tell you that I have the solution to the problem I know you've been facing..... Yeh not so much.
Branding
I would have never been brave enough to approach these companies on my own, without MK's advice. Would not have thought about getting on lists to be the first to know about new activities or special events. Nor would my communication have been so clear. I knew I could work really hard on getting the newsletter and tracking down events but
I would never have considered myself important enough to initiate contact with anyone more senior than a counter clerk or supervisor. Labour intensive and grassroots would have been my approach.
I tailored and adjusted MK's communication templates so that they reflected my voice, my concerns, my mission, but when I sent out my emails and made my calls, I did so on behalf of the wider group. I couldn't just do it for me. It wasn't enough that I was passionate about what I was doing and justified in requesting information. It was as though I needed permission... to be me! Or rather
permission to be Me, the Brand.
Becoming a Brand
After pouring my Self into the emails and telephone scripts, personalized to each target, it was so much easier to present when I could step back and say that I was backed by this larger thing. Larger than lil ole me. MK gave me permission to Be the Brand.
At the
SITS Girls' Bloggy Boot Camp, Heather and Tiffany hold talks on exactly this - Becoming a Brand. I think for most of us who use our blogs as our online journals, it's hard for us to think of our "followers" as fans. We think of them rather as friends. At least that's the way it is for me.
It’s sort of like being a teenager now starting out, trying to establish yourself and build a sense of confidence that you are in fact your own person. How do you translate the self-confidence you have inside into external credibility?
Building the brand is all about figuring out what you will stand for, and committing yourself to a quality blog, even if no money comes out of it. Most mom-bloggers aren't in it for the money (in my experience). Most are in it for the community, and if there's a way to bring something in to the family by way of product or advertising dollars that's a plus. For these people the product that they bring in will be a part of their homes - not something they want to harm their families. It’s the perfect target for marketers.
Embracing the Brand
Former e.l.f. cosmetics CMO
Ted Rubin knows firsthand about embracing the blogging community.
e.l.f. doesn’t use traditional marketing methods. You won’t see them in magazines or billboards. They save that marketing budget and keep their overheads low, passing on those savings to the consumer and delivering high-quality cosmetics at a much lower cost than their competitors (or a much higher quality than their price-point competitors – depending on your perspective). Ted was instrumental in maintaining those online relationships and building e.l.f.’s user base using social media and the power of referral relationships.
Ted is now on the Board of Advisors for
The Opensky Project – an initiative seeking to provide “Relationship Commerce for Everyone”. The idea is to bring together Sellers, Suppliers and Shoppers in one place where there is dialog. It’s a new idea, and I’m curious to see how it works out. But with Ted as an advisor, I’m sure great things will come out of this.
The grapevine has been around as long as there has been “society”, and has just found its new form of expression in social media. Taking it one step further, consider “girl talk”. Turn on the television or open a magazine and look at how many companies selling products to women show their product being discussed over “girl talk”. In this model, marketers want you to believe that their product is special enough to occupy that space. They try to spark exactly what their ads depict. They know that “girl talk” is a marketers dream. It's where you want your product to be.
When that translates into the social media world, “Mom Blogs” are the place to be. We are women, and mothers, and sisters and daughters. We talk, we debate, we share.
Evolution of Social Media
Unfortunately there does seem to be an upsurge in “Mom Bloggers” looking solely to score "free" goods. Charging in blindly, they overlook the delicate social rules of community, in search only of increased numbers of followers as a means of obtaining the Almighty Freebie. As irksome as they are to the rest of the blogging community, we know that the rate of attrition is very high. The cookie-cutter Freebie-only model is not sustainable and few bloggers of this nature stick around. They’re like advertising-only channels - very few of them will stand out. Blogging is takes time and commitment and the ones who are able to successfully market the products of others usually have a clear vision of how they are perceived and they know their own value. They understand that they are their own Brand.
Marketers who throw a shot in the dark and seek out just any blogger will inevitably end up missing the mark, and after enough product is essentially wasted on people simply looking for freebies, they will be forced to reign in their social media budgets and rethink their strategy. My prediction is that over time this will all level out and there will be a more managed approach to understanding and seeking value for money, as new means of measuring blogger "value" emerge.
As a matter of fact, it makes sense that these means of determining blogger media value will come from the very people who understand it best. Look to marketing companies who specialize in social media working in conjunction with groups such as the
SITS Girls,
Macaroni Kid and
Opensky who have all committed themselves to exploring ways to add value to by leveraging relationship-based marketing taken to a whole new level via social media tools such as Blogging, Twitter and Facebook.
The fact is that until Corporate America begins to really commit to understanding and appreciating the value of Branding via the "new" social media in a more meaningful way, it seems doomed to throwing darts at its targets blindfolded - a shot in the dark with no clear success strategy.
For companies that dabble, or ignore social media altogether, maybe Heather and Tiffany's
Bloggy Boot Camp and
Ted Rubin/
Opensky’s conferences are exactly where you want to be.
. I loved him too. There is something so heartfelt in his music. Human emotion captured precisely and transposed into melody and chords. This part of my childhood is full of emotion. And it was followed by life-changing moves and much turmoil for years to come. I remember that one of the few lines I could understand and sing along with was "Don't be a bad girl" and I would sing it with conviction and promise as if to reassure my mother that I would indeed be a good girl.
. Don't ask me the names!
. This far south they raided mostly for supplies. Not gold and spices like elsewhere on the Spanish Main. 
did spend some time here. She would look out from the hill at Fort George, overlooking the harbour of Port of Spain (now the capital).
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