Socal Mom by Donna Schwartz Mills

Vlogamama: Because Even Mommy Bloggers Need Continuing Education

I'm pretty old school: I started blogging because I have a compulsion to write, and the easiest things to write about are the activities I pursue in my own life.

I never expected anyone other than family and friends to read this stuff. I certainly never expected to make any money doing this, or that my online endeavors would open up my little house-and-family-centered world to some interesting experiences (such as dining with the Vice Chairman of GM, visiting the corporate headquarters of Johnson & Johnson, or hanging out at the Oscar red carpet).

Blogging is like any profession or hobby: As time goes by, you want to progress - get better - and push the envelope. That is why in 2005, after keeping this blog for 18 months, I signed up for a little upstart conference called BlogHer... which opened up a whole new online world for me. I met some of the most fascinating, generous women I've ever known -- and discovered all kinds of amazing tools and techniques I could be using to be a better blogger.

I incorporated some of these right away: deli.cio.us, Flickr, Technorati tags (typing this out now, I'm blown away -- can you believe all of this was BRAND NEW just five short years ago?) But there were other areas that didn't feel right to me.

One of those was video blogging, which was being produced by a handful of pioneers even then (before pocket camcorders like the Flip made it REALLY EASY to do). I found the concept intriguing. After all, my college major was Radio-TV-Film.

Actually, my first major was theater - but I have a face made for radio. And after a disastrous exercise in freshman acting class - when I was told by the blind girl (!) that she hated my voice - I realized I wasn't going to make it as an audio performer, either.

But writing is something that has always come naturally to me, and I decided to focus on that. For several years, my writing efforts were concentrated on telling stories through visuals and dialogue... until the years passed and I realized it was time to get out.

For nearly seven years, this blog has been my creative outlet. While my friends engage in scrapbooking and cool crafts, I've self-published my weird little thoughts on the Internet. I've been accused of being narcissistic, and I suppose I am - but not any more so than anyone else who keeps a journal or writes a memoir. The difference is that I publish mine myself. I'm still kind of surprised when someone tells me she's read it...

...and I love it. I love the immediate feedback. I love the relationships I've built.

And yeah, I'd be lying if I said I didn't love getting free stuff. But while I didn't expect to earn an income from blogging when I started out, it would be really nice if I could. For one thing, I wouldn't have to keep defending my blogging activities to my husband, or try to explain it to my friends.

I could blog without the guilt.

Although I say over and over again that I don't really care about my stats or my standing or my popularity on the web, that's not entirely true. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, I can't help but think that I will someday create something of value from this obsession to write.

So I had a lot of reasons to sign up for Kimberley Clayton-Blaine's Vlogamama workshop, which was held on Saturday at the luxurious Montage in Beverly Hills:

1. Web surfers increasingly prefer to watch video over reading blogs. Text-only sites are becoming extinct. And I'm sensitive enough about my old age without comparisons to a dinosaur.

2. Search engines now have the ability to index video content - so having some can dramatically increase your rankings.

3. Can you say "viral"?

4. The blogging networks I belong to want us to do it.

5. Kodak gave me a beautiful HD camcorder for the red carpet interviews I got to do at the Streamys this month (previously disclosed!), and I would like to put it to good use.

6. After attending the Streamys, I've felt renewed interest in telling stories via visuals and dialogue again. But so far, all my attempts have been dorky -- especially after I saw what Sugar Jones did with her Streamy footage... all I can say is WOW.

I hoped Kimberley could point me in the right direction.

And I was right. Kimberley cut right to the chase with excellent tips and guidelines to make our little video blogs more engaging. She also showed us some best-case examples of what some of the more creative mommy blogging vloggers are doing right now and then told us how to get our finished product out and in front of an audience.

It was quite an eye-opener. Web video is a whole new world.

We finished the workshop with a hands-on session, where we partnered into pairs and took turns video-ing one another, trying to incorporate the guidelines Kimberley set forth.

I was only partially successful - and had even more difficulty when I tried to edit the goofs out. (NOTE TO SELF: Must find better video editing platform. And no, at this time, I cannot afford to purchase an iBook so I can use iMovie, which everyone says is THE BEST for this purpose.)

One other main flaw with the video attempt below is that I'm pulling it from YouTube. Vimeo (one of Vlogamama's sponsors) has superior quality - but I've exceeded my upload limit for that service this week, and I wanted to get this post up while the workshop is still fresh. I will replace this clip with the Vimeo version as soon as I have one:

Kimberley will be holding this workshop in other cities very soon. Information forthcoming on her website, here.

I would be remiss if I did not make mention of the level of service we received at Montage Beverly Hills. We've all had to attend meetings held at hotels, and often need assistance finding the meeting room. You are usually lucky if you can collar someone who will give you a meeting room name and point you in the right direction. You might not quite follow where you're supposed to turn and then get lost. (Well, that's what usually happens to me.)

At Montage, the question "Where do I find the meeting room?" did not result in directions. No, the hotel employee I asked insisted on escorting me there.

The same thing happened when I asked the wait staff where I'd find the ladies' room. I was not sent off into the hallway alone to look for it - I was led there.

From the beautiful luncheon spread to the golden pens we were given for note taking, all of the women in attendance were treated like VIPs.

And you can get an idea of how gorgeous the facility is from this video Kimberley made of the session.

Disclosure: My attendance at Vlogamama was paid for by Yahoo, as I am a member of the Yahoo Motherboard. But I didn't know that when I signed up! Kimberley had kept the cost of the workshop for non-Motherboard members surprisingly low. Knowing Kimberley and the scope of the material we would be covering, I felt I was getting a bargain before I discovered I wouldn't have to pay for it.

I have no affiliation whatsoever with the Montage hotel chain (much as I would like to!). I am merely a fan.

Double Standards for Bloggers and All Other Media

Yesterday, I received a really nice comment after I whined about my lack of professional qualifications:

I hear ya....carving a career out of talent and desire is lots harder than going to school to get some degrees that employers want. But checking out all the ads and widgets on your site, I have to say--you've already got a career. You're a writer.

"You're a writer." I live for comments like that.

But I had to chuckle a bit at Jane's observation that I carry a lot of ads and widgets on the site, because the revenue they bring in doesn't pay for my Typepad service. And I've finally concluded that some of them are more trouble than they are worth.

As of tomorrow, I will no longer be carrying ads from the BlogHer network. As I told them in my resignation letter:

I think it’s probably the best program out there and appreciate the fact that the only significant traffic I get are on the days when my posts are linked under the ads.

It is because I don’t get significant traffic that I don’t earn much from the program, and so don’t expect to earn more from any other program. I’m thinking of dropping ads from the blog entirely.

My reason for this move is the strict standards on when a sponsored gift can be written about. I feel I already disclose when I’ve received something (hell, I disclose when I talk about a product and I HAVEN’T received anything), and television programs and magazines are able to run ads for non-competing products alongside their freebies, which are only ever disclosed in very fine print at the end of the program/book. I realize this is a selling point for your team and I appreciate how successful you have been with it. But I’m tired of what I think is a double standard for bloggers and all other media.

The case in point was when I was asked to remove a post about what was happening during the holidays at Disneyland. Yes, I was able to review the offerings as part of a sponsored blogger event, so the tickets for me and my family were worth about $400. But the topic of my blog is life in Southern California – to some people, that’s synonymous with Disneyland. It’s relevant and a subject I would be writing about anyway (and have written about many times). I disclosed that the tickets were free. It was odd to move that post to the review blog (where it didn’t really belong). And travel publications/shows are given fam trips ALL THE TIME and it does not affect their ability to run ads from other destinations.

When I worked in radio and ran an interview with an artist, I did not have to disclose that I received his recording or attended his concert and received my two-drink minimum for free, courtesy of his record label. When I worked on the Tonight Show and we spotlighted interesting new products, we did not have to disclose that these were sent us by manufacturers eager for the free exposure. Movie critics go to private screenings… and some are flown out to press junkets to interview the artists. Yes, the larger news organizations insist on paying the way of their reporters – but not all do and they are not required to disclose and they are still able to run ads for competing movies.

I may or may not be a writer. I'm definitely not much of a businessperson.

I Hate Tuesdays, the New York Times and Other Rants

Whose big idea was it to let LAUSD kids out at 1:35 on Tuesdays? Don't they know how inconvenient it is - for ME?

After all, the minute my daughter comes home from school, I get to start neglecting her so I can work on my brand.

For those of you who are not clued in to the mom blogging community, that was sarcasm directed at the New York Times, which published yet another article about the audacity of mothers who are not content to just take care of the kids and the house and turn to blogging as an outlet for their creativity... community... and to (gasp!) earn a buck or two.

If you are a member of the community, you've already read the article and all of the really excellent analyses posted by women who are smarter and better writers than I. I'm not going to give the Times yet another link to the article - you can find that by following this small sample (and if you want to really understand the outrage, be sure to read the comments):

• Kelby Carr: Newspaper Bias Against Mom Bloggers
• Liz Gumbiner: Honey, Don't Bother Me - I'm Writing a Mildly Annoyed Letter to the New York Times
• Joanne Bamberger: An Open Letter to the New York Times

By now, there must be about 300 other posts about that article, too.

To be honest, my first thought when I read the piece was to admire the writer's way with words. She has style, and I like that.

My second thought was: I wish I had a brand to work on. 

I've been writing in this spot for well over six years. I'm on nobody's Top Mom Bloggers list. I don't have a book deal. And worst of all, I don't have the patience to write an SEO-friendly post (I recognize that mine are all over the place) with an SEO-friendly title.

My third thought was to remind myself that I don't care any longer about my rank in the blogosphere. Despite my desperate need for attention, I'm writing for myself.

But a lot of my friends care, and they saw condescension and ridicule in the article. Plus, they pointed out that once again, a piece that deals with the business of blogging was stuck in the Style section - because it was a profile of women. Not just women, but moms.

And that stuff does make me see red. It took me a long time to get used to the fact that once I left my full time job in the "real world," I had become invisible. I'd go to a party with my husband, and once I answered the inevitable question, "What do YOU do?" I'd been rendered uninteresting; not worth talking to.

I guess after 12 years of being a stay-at-home, work-at-home mom, I'm used to it.

Being a stay-at-home, work-at-home mom in my mid-50's just makes me even more of a non-entity.

I admit it: I have low self-esteem. I like to think that gives me a charming self-deprecating sense of humor, but I have a feeling that others just find it tiring. I am a socially awkward person and have a hard time expressing myself verbally... but find it easy to write. This causes friction between my husband and me, as he prefers talking to writing and doesn't understand why I have a hard time telling him about my day... and a compulsion to write about it.

I think in my husband's eyes (and those of the world), your value to society is measured in the dollars your endeavors bring in. I used to think I would never have to worry about money, because I was smart and talented and a hard worker.

It's been a long time since I earned any significant income. In the eyes of the world, I'm worthless.

I was an ambitious young person. My first job out of college was a gig writing a nationally syndicated radio program, and I worked myself up to producer before the show was canceled and I experienced my first bout of unemployment.

It was all downhill from there.

I am bad at selling myself and am terrible in job interviews -- unless I don't actually WANT the job. Then, of course, I exude something that looks like confidence and I get hired on the spot. So I got the big idea of getting my foot in the door in the entertainment industry by working as a production assistant while writing sitcom scripts in my spare time.

I actually sold two of those.

They did not get produced.

I have a card that states I'm a member of the Writers Guild of America. I cling to that membership because it's proof that someone once thought I was good enough to pay good money for something I had written.

But it's a joke, because I have no credits. I get no residuals. My former agents don't remember me.

I clawed my way to the bottom of the entertainment industry and stayed there until I was too old to be hired any more. Then I took a secretarial job in the "real world," worked my way up to a low-management position (as a conference and event planner) and had my last-minute child.

What little competence I felt I had flew out the window the minute I became a mom. For one thing, it's impossible to focus on tasks when my daughter and husband are around. So instead of an eight-hour work day, mine is squeezed into the time between when I get home from dropping her off at school and when I leave to pick her up.

And I also have to walk the dog. And plan meals. And do housework (although THAT always ends up LAST on my list!) And now, I'm trying to put workouts back into my daily schedule again.

So when school gets out at 1:35 (instead of 3:00), that translates into about three hours of time to do some actual paying work.

And that's why I hate Tuesdays.

ADDENDUM: Am feeling less negative. I guess I need to let loose with a self-pitying rant every once in a while. But also visited Twitter and saw some real time positivity among our community - the stuff that doesn't get reported in the newspapers, because it shows mom bloggers in a good light.

Want to see what Mom blogging is about? Visit Jennifer James' new Mom Blog Magazine - and while you're there, check out the article about the amazing Cooper Munroe and Emily McKhann, who FOR YEARS have been using their online presence to do good deeds and bring moms together.

I heard about the article from Liz of This Full House, who I've copied shamelessly for years (and IS on several list of top mom bloggers)... and still calls me a friend.

Blogging, Marketing and Getting Out of the House

Have you noticed that since the first of the year, I've stopped writing about how my life sucks?

Sure, I've been kvetching about the new dog and all the other little annoyances that get in my way, but that's normal. 2009 was the year that that my neatly defined little life turned upside down. In the space of a couple of weeks, I found myself dealing with health issues, family issues, financial issues and the realization that the one place where I felt safe -- my home -- was in danger of getting eaten by a science fiction-worthy giant mushroom that could not be killed.

It's no wonder I was feeling a little depressed. OK, a LOT depressed.

When I have the blues, I tend to hibernate. I'm not any fun to have around when I'm in that state, and I don't have the energy to make the effort. Plus, when I did have the desire (like, when BlogHer rolled around), I didn't have the time (because the work on the house was all-consuming) or the money (ditto). It was a vicious cycle, because the antidote to feeling sad is to get out and DO things with people you like. And so the more I hid, the harder it was to climb out of the hole.

But now we're into a new year, and I feel like I want to connect again. I looked into what it would take to get to last week's Mom 2.0 Summit, but as disposable income is lacking, I had to pass. That's why I was so excited when the gang at Silicon Valley Moms Group announced they were holding a party here in SoCal for the contributors to Los Angeles Moms Blog and the soon-to-be-launched Orange County Moms Blog.

I didn't even really care that one of the purposes of the gathering was to meet marketers who wanted to reach out to mom bloggers. (Well, not all that much.) I was just looking forward to getting out of the house and being part of the world again. And it didn't hurt that the shindig was being held at the gorgeous Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel.

For one thing, how can anyone be depressed when the view from the window looks like this?

A Post That's NOT About the Dog

I haven't been posting as much as I'd like. It's not that I have nothing to talk about -- it's just that I've been busy LIVING my life (instead of writing about it). So this is an attempt to get somewhat caught up:

1. It took me all of last week, but I finished my for-hire website project, and I'm pretty pleased with myself. See it here.

It was a WordPress installation, something I've only done once before. But that time, I was stymied when it came to working with WP templates. This time around, I was fortunate enough to figure out that the Atahualpa theme was highly customizable. I guess that's why it's been downloaded like, a zillion times.

2. Even so, that modest little site kept me busy for the better part of a week, and then I had to go full steam into hosting mode, as my niece was in SoCal for the weekend... which meant her mom and dad - my sister and brother-in-law- also came down. So I had their family of five. Plus Carly's aunts and uncles from her dad's side of the family. And a few of their friends.

And we all know how well that turned out. (Yes, my previous post. About the dog.)

Aside from Sunday night's drama, I think everyone had a pretty good weekend.

3. I may have been mired in an alphabet soup of HTML and CSS -- but I still found time to eat. I returned to the Santa Monica Farmers Market on Wednesday (this time, with THREE friends in tow), and purchased a lot of goodies that were put to good use over the weekend. And I also made time to do a restaurant review.

4. My blog is not the only thing I've been neglecting lately. I have been mostly away from social networking sites - checking in with Facebook and Twitter sporadically (usually when I'm sitting in the car waiting for school to get out. WHATEVER did I do before I had a smartphone?) So when I started seeing a bunch of location tweets posted from foursquare, I didn't know WHAT that was. And when I investigated, I didn't know WHY I'd bother.

But then I saw my friends acquiring "badges" and getting named "Mayor" of places. And being something of a competitive jerk, I thought I'd give foursquare a try. And for the last couple of weeks, checking in has been something of a compulsion.

And I've even been named "Mayor" of a couple of places I frequent. The sad thing is, these are not cool restaurants and nightclubs. No, I'm "Mayor" of Gelson's in Northridge and Ralph's in Porter Ranch, which tells you that the most exciting thing I do most days is go to the supermarket.

I have a feeling that I'll soon add another grocery store to my list of mayorships: Yesterday, I attended the opening of the new Fresh and Easy store in Northridge. I've been waiting for this store to open for MONTHS. Years, really. You see, I'm a big fan of the chain's parent company, the UK grocery giant Tesco. So there's a confession for the books: I even end up hanging out in supermarkets when I visit other countries. In fact, one of the first things my husband and I do whenever we visit his family is head out to our favorite big Tesco Extra in Cardiff. I've even posted pictures of it on this blog. And we used to fantasize about how nice it would be to transplant a Tesco here in the States.

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So you can imagine how pleased we were to learn that the big grocery chain had decided to gain a foothold here with their concept of fresh and prepared foods. We've been following Fresh and Easy's progress since they broke ground on their first Los Angeles stores... and were downright excited when we noticed that one would finally open in our own part of town.

The Grand Opening was yesterday - and it did not disappoint. As I still have a ton of food left over from all those guests last weekend, I only purchased a few things (mostly fresh fruit). But I love the way the store is laid out and I KNOW I'll be back to pick up some of the prepared meals for those nights I don't have time to cook.

Now... if only we can get Marks and Spencer to open some Simply Food stores here, life might be perfect.