I Got Flown To Adelaide And All I Got Was This Lousy Ego Boost

I have just got back from a whirlwind trip to Radelaide with my BBFF (Best Bloggy Friend Forever) Georgia from Parental Parody. How whirlwind? Well, I'm glad you asked. From take off to final landing was a mere 30 hours. I was unaware, until that point, how much you can actually fit in to such a short time period, especially when sans-child. The next time you do a 30 hour out of state trip try to do the following:

• Get told off for talking too much during the safety demonstration on the plane. Blame your travel companion's mother who has made you each a "Survival Kit & Barf Bag" containing a mini Jim Beam, a packet of chips, a chocolate bar, a scratchie and the all important paracetamol and Berocca for the morning after!
  
  
• Walk for absolute miles past innumerable number of homeless people, possibly comatose drunks and laneways with the heady aroma of stale urine (in heels!) because the receptionist has given you the wrong directions to the markets that she also forgot to mention aren't actually open on a Sunday. To make up for it, find a great little Chinese restaurant and order some lovely meals and some "Chaaaaar Don Aaaaay" for $4. Please note that drinking of said $4 "Chaaaaar Don Aaaaay" will not make your feet hurt any less.
  
  
• Take an iPad with you, even though you don't have 3G connectivity and use it as a fancy pants note pad. Feel free to shit stir your travel companion who uses ye olde paper and pen to cover the fact that you should really be doing that too but after a $4 "Chaaaaar Don Aaaaay" you can't read your own writing.
• Go to dinner with some lovely Adelaide bloggers Kellie, Tatum, Lauren, Bianca, Fi, Jodie and Alyce. Have your travel companion introduce herself as not only a blogger but your personal assistant in charge of holding hand bags and fending off the paparazzi. That way, when you remind her that she should write about something funny that just happened everyone will think you're getting her to take notes FOR YOU and think you're either slightly cool or a complete bitch.
  
  
• Find a 24hour pancake parlour and go there with said travel companion and brand new friends Tatum and Lauren. Make stupid jokes, come up with fabulous ideas for guest posts, laugh so much you cry, meet an amazing LadyBoy waitress who laughs at your dumb jokes and joins in on your fun all at 10pm in a particularly seedy part of town. Of course the eating of pancakes or waffles is compulsory.
  
  
• Attend an awesome brunch held by Kelloggs who have paid for you to fly all the way over there but don't actually demand you write anything about them in return. Speak about sugar, salt and fibre. Get quoted on twitter as saying "Sugar doesn't make you fat... sitting on your arse and eating shit makes you fat". Be told that your hair looks fabulous and take numerous requests for a vlog on how to achieve your particular look. Feel your head swell with ego but make a mental note to not let it swell too much lest your hair doesn't sit right any more. Say plenty of great-to-meet-you's and lovely-to-see-you-again's to some fantastic women and really, truly mean it.
  
  
• Have a quick look around Rundle Mall so you can pose with the giant balls and the pigs while you wonder if tax money gets spent on public art just so tourists can take compromising photos with each piece. See the world's most amazing busker - a burly bikie playing classical music on the flute - and give him all your coins for being the best walking contradiction you've ever seen.
  
  
• Look down at your enormous, painfully engorged breasts as it comes on the 26th hour away from your breastfeeding toddler. Marvel that while your rack looks completely amazing, you would do almost anything to relieve the pressure and consider hand expressing in a Maccas toilet.
• Arrive home to a gorgeous husband and child, your parents and your sister who have all chipped in to help you have an amazing 30 hours free of your usual responsibilities. Thank them and tell them about your trip while you shove your child, who seems to have forgotten you but not your ability to produce milk, to your breasts to relieve the discomfort. Wait til they all leave or go to sleep before you break out the Haigh's chocolate and enjoy it while you think about what a kick ass trip you just had and that you feel like a total rock star. 

And if you're wondering what spending 30 straight hours with me is like... this is what Georgia looked like as the plane landed:

Get me away from this crazy Glow!

DPCon2012

There are a few letters and numbers that can excite me greatly.

For one, the TV show Letters and Numbers (I want to have a giant love in with Richard, David, Lily and a giant dictionary).

But the other letters and numbers that make squeee are DPCon2012. Ohhhh yeah, baby, it's time to get excited because the Digital Parents Conference has just launched and I'll be there with bells on (bell company sponsor, anyone?).








This year, because over commitment is my forte, I'm actually part of the organizing team and it's my job to fill the expo hall with exhibitors. Ya-huh we get an expo hall!! How cool is that?! There is also a massive two-stream program and of course a Gala Dinner. I'm practically hyperventilating with excitement!

It's a great opportunity and I get to work along side the most amazing, talented women and we are all going to work our butts off to bring you a fantastic conference.

The website went live this morning so you can check it out now and even buy your early bird tickets. In an effort to exude professionalism my full name is on there. The lasts strands of anonymity have frayed and the veil is lifted... I'm not entirely sure, but I think I feel liberated. Or shit scared, I can't quite tell.

So, will you be joining me in March? 

Check out the posts of the rest of the faaabulous team (linked as they go live):
Tina, Kirrily, Grace, Maria and Brenda

How To Create a Kick Ass Media Kit that Glows

Oh hello, fancy seeing you here. Are you here for the all the boob and lady parts talk? No? Oh right, maybe the post where I rant about dickhead doctors or my boy's wonky noggin? Hrmm not that either? OK how about the schmaltzy posts that are obviously written when I'm high on hormones? Wow not that either! Oooh I know why you're here. The kick ass media kit!

If you were at Blogopolis or were following #nnb2011 you might have heard that Andrew Hughes of Reprise Media mentioned that I had a good media kit. He went as far as saying it was better than some of the professional ones he's seen. Woah. That's one hell of a compliment, I had no idea it was coming and it left me blushing (though I was also having an allergic reaction to seafood at the time so maybe it was just that).

If I hadn't been sucking down on antihistamines I would have taken a screen capture of all the tweets that followed and stuck it on my mirror instead of those "You're a wonderful, worthy person" post it notes that are meant to send you down the path of enlightenment. Because a wall of Tweets from other people saying you rock absolutely kicks "Live each day to the fullest" to the kerb.

My inbox has been jam packed full of requests to see it ever since. I have shared my media kit, sponsorship request letters and the like with lots of Bloggers before because it's only fair I pass on the knowledge that was shared with me when I was starting out.

So here we go... this won't be what you're expecting...

Why yes that IS my award smack bang in the centre
so you know right away I'm awesome!

There was one person who was amazingly helpful when I first started looking for sponsorship, who sent me her kit and then looked over mine when I'd put only the smallest of personal touches on it (like my then follower count of 82). That woman is Tina Gray from TinaGray{dot}Me and the PR Friendly Aussie Blog Directory.

It's been about a year since Tina looked over my kit and gave it a nod of approval. In that time it has changed a lot and morphed in to something that is truly my own. The flesh is different but the bones of it? Well they are still the same and it would be dishonest of me to claim that I am some fancy pants media kit creator when it was her framework that I built upon.

Now I bet you weren't expecting an attention whore like me to say that, were you?

I encourage you all to check out Tina's eBook about how to create a media kit and then build on it so that you end up with a finished product that reflects you and your blog.

All I can add was the feedback I received from Andrew about why he liked it. He said I "communicate all of the important things that I needed to know quickly and up front – then all of the detail was there If I wanted".

In my now infamous kit I have all the important stuff on the front page including:

• a section about my blog written in my usual "blog voice" so up front you know I'm rather tongue-in-cheek. I will admit this less than professional tone could lose me some business, but I want a company to know what I'm like
• a section about me, also written in my usual "blog voice"
• a section about my audience demographics and level of reader engagement in a more professional tone (well as professional as someone like me can get)
• a section about why a company should choose to go with me as a Mummy Blogger
• a table with all my stats and where they came from 

Yep, all of that one ONE PAGE. If you can't fit that all on one page you're saying too much. If a company likes what they see there, they can flip over and read more. If you make them go searching through a massive kit for the information they need, chances are they'll pop you in the 'too hard basket'.

Over the next five pages (ya-huh, it's loooong!) I have:

• links to the websites I've been featured on and a list of the magazines I've been featured in
• a list of the awards I've won (OK so it was only one but it totally deserves a section)
• a testimony page showing reader engagement and praise for my sarcasm writing 
• terms and conditions of running a review/giveaway/sponsored post and links to examples of each
• sponsorship packages currently available and a summary of previous ones
• advertising rates and payment options
• contact details

So there you have it. Anticlimactic much?

I wanna say a massive thank you to everyone who linked to me in their Blogopolis wrap ups and of course to Andrew for mentioning me in the first place. My site stats have jumped about 25% because of it and it's both  completely awesome and overwhelming at the same time. My ego is so freakin big right now that I'm needing a neck brace to support my fat head. So, um, in closing, if you're a blogger, go make your Media Kit Glow. If you're a company... you should totally sponsor me to go to BlogHer12 with Zoey and Louisa.

Market Research 101

I did a product survey yesterday. I do a lot of them. I'm not talking about the cool Bloggy things, I mean the focus group type surveys.

Aunty Penny works in marketing so whenever these things come around in my inbox I think about how some poor schmuck has gone to so much effort to put this survey together, and I feel a bit sorry for them. What if no one fills out their survey? What if they get fired because of that? It would be my fault, since the world revolves around me and all. So I take a few minutes to fill it out.

I also do the phone surveys that "only take two minutes" that actually take ten minutes. You can look me up in the phonebook under "Sucker".

Though telemarketers are a different story; I'm never ever rude to them, since I was one, but dude, do NOT call me during dinner and then get huffy when I say no thank you. That is a one way ticket to phone slammage. It's a word, trust me.

But I digress.

Yesterday's survey was about a new shower gel. It asked me how exciting the product was.

Um, excuse me? Exciting? No. It's shower gel. I don't get in the shower, turn to see my shower gel then shout out whoopeeeeeee just because I've seen that it's some new organic crap in a fancy pants recycled hemp bottle with added essential oils. It's just shower gel.

So, marketing gurus, take note; here, for your benefit is the list of questions and answers I would like to see you ask about your brand spanking new product the next time I get your survey:

1. Based on our carefully worded spiel and fancy air brushed pictures of the new shower gel, are you:
a) Very impressed
b) Slightly impressed
c) Not very impressed
d) Dude, it's shower gel. Put an elephant in the bottle and then I'll be impressed.

Why elephant? I dunno, sounded good in my head

2. Based on the lovely description but complete lack of price details, how likely are you to purchase this amazing new shower gel when you're next at the shops?:
a) Very likely
b) Somewhat likely
c) Unlikely
d) Dude, it's shower gel. If I've run out, it's on special and cheaper than everything else I will buy it.

3. Which of these phrases describes how new and different you think this product is compared to what is available?
a) Extremely new and different
b) Somewhat new and different
c) Not very new and different
d) Dude, it's shower gel, it's not new or different at all. A funny shaped bottle doesn't make you cool.

4. How relevant is this super duper shower gel to your house hold?
a) Very relevant
b) Slightly relevant
c) Not relevant
d) Dude, it's shower gel. I shower, therefore it's gotta be a bit relevant, right?

There you have it, marketing gurus. You can send your cheques to me now!

Are you a sucker? Do you do marketing surveys? Do you want elephants in your shower gel?
No elephants were harmed in the making of this post.