Today’s mothers are using social media and online advertisement to spread information, provide tips and advice, and pad their bank accounts – without ever having to change out of their pajamas! Oh, wait…nevermind. These ladies probably make enough cash and have enough clout from their lucrative (and self-made) gigs to afford the latest Louboutin creations by the truckload.
Take for example Beth Blecherman, founder of Techmamas.com and one of several powerful moms profiled recently by Working Mother. A mom of three sons, Blecherman was rocking her way into executive management at audit giant Deloitte when she made the 180-degree career change to found Techmamas back in 2007. It was a risk that paid off: Almost 18,000 people now follow Blecherman on Twitter, and she was on Time Magazine’s list of “140 Twitter Feeds to Follow” in 2010. And to leave a cushy corporate gig to pioneer an all-new career when you have three kids? That is ballsy.
Speaking of pioneers, take a look at Ree Drummond, aka The Pioneer Woman. Drummond shot to relative fame in 2006 when she started a blog about her unique life on a ranch with her husband (affectionately nicknamed “The Marlboro Man”) and their four kids. The former Los Angeles social butterfly quickly acclimated to the simple, rustic lifestyle of living on a remote Oklahoma ranch with no grocery store within a half-hour. She started blogging about her adventures on the ranch, and in less than half a humble decade, Drummond has amassed nearly 300,000 Twitter followers. Her website gets nearly 23.5 million page views per month. Adding to the visual appeal of Drummond’s rapidly expanding empire is a branding “look” that is uniquely tongue-in-cheek and 50s-housewife-inspired. There’s also a few New York Times best sellers, a Food Network daytime TV show, etc. And with the advent of even more visual platforms like Pinterest, Drummond’s star is probably still mid-ascent. And in the interest of journalistic transparency: some fans of Drummond are so in love with the rustic-meets-modern aesthetic she espouses that they are even planning to pretty much copy her entire kitchen renovation in their next home. Fans like – ahem – me.
So how are social media moms putting themselves at the top of the list of influential bloggers, Tweeters, and style makers? In two words: camaraderie and relevance.
“I just want to let other parents out there know that they aren’t alone. I want to remind moms that we all experience the daily struggles, chaos, and joys of childrearing,” says mother of six and founder of BecauseISaidSo.com Dawn Meehan. And though we can’t all be tech giants or blogging stars, these powerful women and moms show us that sometimes inspiration is found in the place you last expect, as Drummond indicated in a 2011 interview with The New Yorker.
“It’s definitely a thriving business. If I were a single person living in a city, I could support myself, but I probably wouldn’t have a blog, because I would have nothing to blog about.”
