Blog Tips, Blogging, Blogging Success, Mom Marketing Coach |
Become Local Influencer Mom Blogger
Marketing experts have conducted interesting research to determine how millennials pick products or services to purchase. It shouldn’t be a surprise that old-school forms of advertising do not speak to people in their thirties. Instead, they are more likely to be swayed by the advice of a knowledgable person in their circle of social media friends.
Marketing experts are using this knowledge. Instead of making appointments with TV stations to buy local advertising spots, they are reaching out to local influencers to try to develop a relationship. Of course, this relationship will ultimately benefit the company as well as the influencer.
How do you become a local influencer with your mommy blog? It is important to know that becoming a local influencer is not going to happen overnight. It may take years of work until you are in a position of power.
Here are some tips on how to become a local influencer.
Find your niche.
We have said it before, and we will repeat it. One sure-fire way to increase the number of followers is to find your mommy niche. The choice may be yours, or it may be thrust upon you.
Examples of niches may include
Children’s fashion
Topics about ADHD
Childhood nutrition
Vegan children
Kids with peanut allergies
Special needs children
Homeschooled children
Children with dyslexia
Children with sleep issues
Musical kids
Kids who love crafting
Children and horses
Teaching kids to garden
Teaching your kids about the tenants of Catholicism, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc.
Country kid issues
Raising your child in an urban area
Kids who love soccer/dance/gymnastics/volleyball/football/wrestling/lacrosse/swimming
The possibilities of niches are endless.
- Grow your blog.
Work hard to give your blog some substance. Add photos. Write snappy copy. Give your readers valuable information.
This takes time and patience, especially if you have multiple kids or a full-time job. As you grow your site, you can scroll through your work with satisfaction. You will celebrate each time you meet a milestone of followers.
- Schedule a consultation with an SEO expert.
Once you have worked on developing your voice, consult with an SEO strategist. Tell the strategist that you hope to become a local influencer.
There’s no need to find someone in your local area. Instead, look for someone who can assist you with your content strategy. He or she should be able to give you a list of keywords and phrases to use in your blog to make sure it can be easily found by people searching specific kid-related topics.
- Improve your content.
Take the advice you received from the SEO expert to improve your content continually. He or she may recommend that you add more tutorial videos to add to your blog. Perhaps the expert will encourage you to develop Pinterest-worthy posts. Maybe the photography on your blog is mediocre and needs to be improved. Regardless, learn a little bit each day to create the best mom blog that you can. - Check out influencers from other areas.
Do you want to write the ultimate blog for parents with dyslexic kids in Baltimore? Check out the work that is being done in other areas of the country. See how other bloggers present tedious information regarding state education mandates and tutors for dyslexic kids in your area. - See what websites pull up about your subject in your local area.
Learn from the websites that appear on the first page of a Google search in your area. What type of content appears on these sites? How is the information presented? - Finally, reach out to businesses in your community.
Once you have developed a following and your rank has continued to grow, reach out to businesses in your community that serve the same population as you do. Discover ways you can work together to give your readers and their customers quality information that would be mutually beneficial to both of you.
Perhaps you will agree to share a link on your page for private horseback riding lessons in exchange for discounts for your child. Maybe a local kids boutique will give you items at a discount for a mention on your blog. Perhaps the local plant store will donate seedlings for your children’s garden in exchange for a shout-out in your blog.
Final Thoughts
Your newfound deals and status as a local influencer may cause you to relax a bit and not post as much new content as you did previously. Unfortunately, followers are fickle. Take care to make sure you are consistently providing brand-new content for your readers, so you can keep the relationships with the companies that you developed.
This article was originally posted at Mom Marketing Coach.
Blog Tips, Blogging, Blogging Success |
Your Mommy Blog and The Kids
We are living in an interesting time. Many of us clearly remember what life was like before the internet, and we can see how much has changed because of it.
This is not going to be a rant about the evils of technology. I love having access to the world’s knowledge at my fingertips. I love checking my bank balance and transferring money from my smartphone. I love being able to text and email people instead of spending time on the phone. I love keeping in contact through social media with grade school friends (and teachers) who live far away.
Although there have always been freelance writers, I can’t imagine how difficult it would have been to make connections before the internet. I owe my living to the world wide web.
If you are considering starting a mommy blog, you must love technology as well. You must be enamored about connecting with others who are going through the same things as you are. You may love the idea of making a few extra bucks through affiliate marketing or promoting products or services through your blog. Maybe you need a creative outlet because you miss the working world.
These are all excellent reasons to start a mommy blog. We support you on this decision, and that’s why we have created this website to help you on your journey.
But recently, we have run across articles about some of the negative aspects of mommy blogging. Some of the stories were written by ex-bloggers, and some were accounts of young teens who discovered that their childhood traumas and heartaches were shared with the world.
On the one hand, you want to provide your readers with authentic accounts of life in the trenches. You want to make connections with others who have similar struggles as you.
On the other hand, how will your mommy blog affect your child — especially as they become teenagers and young adults?
We don’t have all the answers, but here are some things to consider as you start in the blogging world.
1. You may have a difficult time determining what is embarrassing or not.
Most mommy bloggers would say that they would never share “embarrassing” things about their kids, but we all know people who do. We see it on social media all the time.
We cringe at posts from the mom who shares that her 16-year-old is “refusing to go to school again.” We roll our eyes when a mom writes about the verbal screaming match she had with her 11-year-old daughter. And then there are all the discussions about potty training, bed wetting, and other bodily functions.
The fact is that you may not know what is considered embarrassing or not.
2. You may struggle with drawing a line between helping others with their journies and oversharing.
Let’s say that you have discovered that a reaction to red dye causes your daughter’s bedwetting. You want to shout this from the hilltops because others may be having the same struggle with their kids, and you want to help them fix the problem. Doing so would mean that you are sharing this embarrassing information with others about your daughter.
What if your child has a learning disability? Perhaps you have discovered techniques or strategies that have helped your child. You want to share this information, but doing so will reveal to the world your child’s struggles.
What if your child makes bad decisions and gets into trouble? You know that many people out there have similar experiences, and you want to connect with them. How do you do so without sharing too much about your situation?
3. You may find yourself teetering on the line between authenticity and perceived perfection.
Since you don’t want to be accused of oversharing or posting content that could be embarrassing, you may find yourself only writing about those lighthearted parenting moments.
Instead of telling your readers about how it took you an hour to get the shoes and socks on your screaming toddler, you share about how your family had a magical time at the local petting zoo.
Instead of discussing how hard it is to be the parent of a goalie in soccer because you have to hear the comments from other parents sitting in the stands, you post photos of your daughter making fantastic saves.
Final Thoughts
We think that mommy blogs are a great way to share your parenting journey with others. We love how blogging can provide extra income to struggling families. But as you embark on this journey, be thoughtful of your content.
This article was originally posted at Mom Marketing Coach.
Blog Tips, Blogging, Blogging Success |
2020 Top Momy Blogs
One of the ultimate authorities on Mommy Bloggers is this list that is periodically updated. You can scan this list to learn about the content and focus of the websites. You can learn about how many followers each one has earned.
While this list gives a quick summary of information, we would like to share a more in-depth look at some of the top mommy bloggers out there. We will discuss their appeal, and what you can learn from each as you begin your life as a new mommy blogger.
Please note that when making our list, we tried to narrow our choices down to blogs that seem to be operated by fewer than five people. Some of the blogs that receive a considerable following have staffs of people, such as Scary Mommy and Moms Rising Blog.
We mean no disrespect for the women who grew those blogs from scratch. In fact, we are impressed with the work they have achieved. We just know that as beginning bloggers, you may connect more with the bloggers who are achieving some success while just starting in the blogging world.
About A Mom
About A Mom was created by a mother and daughter living in the south. The content is pretty straightforward. Visitors of the website will see recipes, simple craft ideas, and Florida travel tips.
About A Mom uses affiliate marketing links well. For example, in this post, where she describes how to make a sundae bar, she provides a link for the galvanized trays she shows in the photos.
She’s active on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. She is savvy with each platform. Her topics may appeal to older moms and less to those who are just entering the parenting game.
One thing that we love about this blog is that it is well crafted. We know that she is trying to make a living by providing useful content.
We also like her writing style. She’s upbeat without being braggy. She asks interesting and helpful questions of her readers periodically. She uses photos of herself and her child, but we don’t feel as if she is oversharing. She makes no claims of having a perfect life, but you can tell that she works hard to provide content to make ours better.
Design Mom
Design Mom is a mother of six living in Oakland. She has won a ton of awards for her blog and has received serious accolades for her work.
Her blog focuses on interiors (she is a designer), parenting, foods, crafts, style, and travel. But most of her posts are hard to categorize. She has written about women who have lost sexual desire and dentist scams. She writes a lot about women’s issues, religion, and politics. It’s easy to get sucked into her website.
She uses affiliate marketing to sell products related to her life. For example, on one post about lice (ew!), she has a link to a metal lice comb from Amazon. Many of her blogs have no affiliate links, so the marketing side hustle is not over the top.
It’s hard to tell if she has a staff assisting her with her blog. It has a ton of content, but she’s been in the business for over a decade, so that’s not surprising.
We love this blog, but it may not appeal to everyone. She is “fancier” than most middle-class moms. Her kids are older now, so she doesn’t write about breast or bottle. What is most appealing about her work is that her topics are unique.
Baby Boy Bakery
Looking for sweet stories about a young family? Baby Boy Bakery offers a blog that describes life with young ones.
Written by a mom of two living in California, the blog focuses on family, food, and fitness. Besides covering these topics (that you would expect in a mommy blog), she also shares personal stories as well.
Instead of offering affiliate marketing links, she has a page on her website called “collaborations.” By clicking the “shop now” buttons, you can purchase jewelry, shoes, clothing, and swimwear.
Unlike the previous two examples, Baby Boy Bakery shares a lot about the children. There are many photos of the young family. She also shares cooking videos as well.
As a beginning blogger, it would benefit you to spend a great deal of time looking at the most successful mommy blogs out there now.
But don’t try to mimic these three examples. Find your own voice.
This article was originally posted at Mom Marketing Coach.
Blog Tips, Blogging |
The Mommy Blogger You Wanna Be
We just finished the holidays. In fact, many of you may still have a few needles from your Christmas tree scattered throughout your house. The end of a new year (and decade) and the beginning of a new one often cause people to pause and think about how things change.
Usually, when change occurs, it is gradual. Your favorite jeans feel a bit tight. They get shoved into the back of your closet, and when you try them on three months later, and you can’t get them over your thighs. That change didn’t occur overnight. It happened one bagel at a time.
Mommy blogs have changed over time too. It didn’t happen overnight. This change was written about by Washington Post columnist Sarah Pulliam Bailey.
Bailey said that at first, mommy bloggers wrote and posted content to their own websites. These bloggers would write about a wide array of topics, from mom guilt to the best car seat systems. There was no need to be perfect. In fact, the more authentic a blogger was, the more likely she was to have a loyal following.
Gradually, things started to change. Money, of course, drove this shift. In the early years, a blogger could make decent money from the ads that were placed on her website. Now, mom bloggers make money by receiving sponsorships from companies to advertise a product or by promoting products through affiliate marketing.
This change in compensation altered the look of the most popular mommy blogs. Bailey, who has studied the evolution of mommy blogs, has noticed that the trend is to focus more on photos and less on text. Fewer people are creating their own websites for their blog, and more are posting directly to social media accounts.
It is not a surprise that this industry has changed so much in the last decade. The mommy blog pioneers aged out of the enterprise only to be replaced by a new group of young moms who were seeking to become social influencers in a different way than the blogger of the past.
So, now you are interested in entering the mommy blog industry. Here are questions that you need to ask yourself before you jump both feet into the enterprise. There are no right or wrong answers to these questions, but they are worth considering before you spend a lot of unnecessary time and money heading down the wrong path.
1. Why do you want to be a mommy blogger?
This is the most critical question you should ask yourself regarding this endeavor.
- Do you want to be a mommy blogger so you can have a creative outlet while staying at home with your kids?
- Maybe you want to blog so you can share your kid’s adventures with extended family and friends.
- Maybe you want to utilize your time at home with your kids to become a social influencer.
- Or maybe it is a combination of all of the above.
2. How important is it that you bring in money from your blog?
If you are using your blog to supplement your income, then you need to consider what will make you the most money.
Don’t feel bad about needing to make money, but know that if you want to have companies sponsor your blog or accounts, you may not be able to be as forthright about your life as you would wish. Some companies do not want to be affiliated with messy lives or controversial subjects.
3. Are you more of a photographer or a writer?
If you are happiest when trying to get the best shot of an event, then perhaps you would be the happiest blogging through Instagram. If you want to go this route, it would be helpful if you, your spouse, and your children were particularly photogenic. It would also be beneficial if your children liked being photographed and fussed over at times.
Maybe you want to blog because you want to share the ups and downs of parenting. This may not be very easy to do from a single image. This means you might want to have a traditional website that enables you to combine your diatribes over kid birthday parties with photographs.
Regardless of how you answered the above questions, take time to look through the posts of Mom’s Marketing Coach. Our previous posts will assist you on how to start a website from scratch. We will also give you ideas on what to write about in your blogs. Finally, we will also get you started with affiliate marketing, should that be your focus.
This article was originally posted at Mom Marketing Coach.
Blog Tips, Grow Your Audience, Mom Marketing Coach |
Using Pinterest to Promote Your Mommy Blog
Last week, we began our discussion on how to use Pinterest to promote your mommy blog.
We advised you to create a free Pinterest business account. From there, we told you to develop a niche for your Pinterest Page so that followers could find your board based on their needs. We then gave you instructions on how to create a Rich Pin, which gets more attention than a regular pin. Finally, we discussed how to write a Pinterest bio that was rich in keywords.
Sorry to leave you hanging, but we have more ideas on how to use Pinterest to promote your blog.
Here are the next steps of the process
Determine the best blogs to pin.
Look at the content you have created. Which articles do you feel would be best for the Pinterest audience? Do a little keyword research by playing around on the website. For example, if you type “potty training” in the search bar, the first thing that comes up is “potty training boys.” The next is “potty training girls 2 year old tips.” The fourth search option is “potty training puppy.”
Do you have any content that would help anyone with those scenarios?
If you have decided to only post articles on your board offering nutrition advice for kids, you may search Pinterest for “hiding vegetables in kids food.” Others have searched for “hidden vegetables” or “picky eaters.”
Do you have any articles that would help anyone feed picky kids?
Although every type of content can be found on Pinterest, you may have the most luck with “how-to” pieces that other moms may pin to reference over time.
Choose an image to accompany the pin.
Choosing the best image to accompany the pin is one of the most critical steps in this process. Some bloggers develop a specific style that they use for each of their images. Having a style helps brand and identify their blogs. Others experiment on what images receives the most clicks.
Regardless of what image you choose, you must include text with your image. Otherwise, your beautiful photo that took 45 minutes to get right will be meaningless to the person browsing Pinterest.
If you have a rich pin, at least there will be some surrounding text to explain the image, but don’t rely on it. We told you last time that it sometimes takes Pinterest a few days to process your request for a rich pin.
Write a description of your pin.
Once a person clicks on your pin, he or she will see a description of what type of content they would receive once entering your website. Write a clear, concise sentence or two about what your reader will learn. Use different keywords to describe your content.
Pinterest allows you 500 characters when writing a pin description, but don’t feel as if you need to use every single character. Use hashtags to describe your pin as well.
Make sure your pins are searchable.
It would be a pity if you went through all this trouble only to find that your pins weren’t searchable. Go to your account settings and make sure the search privacy setting allows users to find your content.
Engage.
If you are an experienced mommy blogger, you know what “engage” means. If you are new to this gig, “engage” means to follow the people who follow you. Like and comment on your followers’ pins. Repin items that would appeal to your audience. Respond to comments on your own pins.
In short, become a part of the Pinterest community just as you did with the blogger community. Bloggers do not work in isolation. They work together to promote each other.
Make sure you have a “pin it” button on your blog.
There are a variety of online tutorials teaching you how to create a “pin it” button on your blog, but probably the easiest way to do it is to WordPress plug-in.
Having a pin it button will enable your subscribers to help you gain a larger following.
Rinse, Lather, Repeat.
Why stop with one Pinterest board for your blog? Have one board highlight children’s nutrition. Create another board to focus on the cheerleading mom community. One board can focus on potty training, and another can focus on strategies to help your child with homework.
Soon you will have created a one-stop-shop empire that will answer all the questions that have plagued parents since the beginning of time. Or at least you will be able to teach moms how to hide spinach in their child’s chocolate cake.
This article was originally posted at Mom Marketing Coach.
