I'm speaking at the Youth and Family Marketing Mega Event

Once again, my professional experience as a marketer and my (increasingly less) unique perspective as a mom blogger have converged and won me a speaking engagement. This time I'm talking about "The Love Affair between Marketers and Mom Bloggers: From Romance to Reality" at the Youth & Family Marketing Mega Event, which will be at the Hotel Sax in Chicago May 10-12.

How exactly am I supposed to prepare a presentation on a subject that's evolving every minute? Well, I'm going to start by providing the audience of khaki-pants-wearing brand managers with a brief history of the sometimes graceful (Leapfrog and Graco jump to mind) and more often awkward (Nestle, Motrin) middle school dance between mom bloggers and brands.

I want to get people thinking about who's leading us across this crowded dance floor. Is it the global corporations, who can wine and dine a stay-at-home mom, getting her to pimp their product in exchange for a box of frozen meals? Or is it the influential mommyblogger, who can bring an appliance manufacturer to its knees over a couple of angry tweets? How do the new FTC regulations come into play? Is the FTC an effective chaperone, or it it just moving the hanky-panky from the wide-open blogosphere to late night Twitter parties?

What does the future of marketing to and with mom bloggers hold? Will there be a retreat from blogger retreats? Could contests and giveaways go away? Will the stream of poorly-targeted "Dear Blogger" spam-pitches ever abate?

Can we look forward to an era when marketers and mom bloggers can work together in a way that both fosters connections among a community of moms and helps marketers deliver solutions that moms want to buy? Will more marketers hire moms to bringing their authentic voice to brand sites? Will the moms who jumped on the blogging bandwagon for free stuff abandon their sites when the freebie train leaves town, or will they focus their blogs on their passions and build an audience of fellow moms of toddlers, crafters, Crock-Potters or working mothers?

I've got a lot to share, but I have so much more yet to learn. Please, please drop me a line if you've got a case study or tidbit you'd like to share. I'll be sure to thank and link to all. Also, if you'd like to attend this conference or the concurrent Life Stage Marketing Summit, you can save 20% using these codes: FAMILY2010AK and LIFESTAGE2010AK.

Day one of the M2Moms Conference: who we're NOT marketing to

Everyone's marketing to moms, but three key groups of mothers are being ignored: moms of special needs kids, second-time moms and grandmas.

Nadine Vogel of Springboard Consulting emphasized that reaching mothers of special needs kids requires sensitivity and etiquette (i.e. don't kneel or stand when you're talking to someone in a wheelchair; sit down next to them), but they're fiercely loyal to the companies that reach out to them with solutions and communications that demonstrate compassion and an understanding of their and their children's particular needs. She was followed by Gianna Locasto, Sephora's Director of Store Marketing, who shared with us the beauty emporium's outreach to the disabled community. They gave the moms of special needs kids some much deserved pampering and treated disabled teens and adults to make-up lessons and beauty consultations in a private, supportive environment. What they got, in addition to the warm fuzzies, was new, loyal customers.

Norma Blatto of American Baby talked about second-time moms. Even though they're spending big bucks on cars, home improvements, home electronics and additional baby gear (double strollers, clothes for a child of a different gender) and their established status in the mommy community means they're responsible for generating a lot of word of mouth, most brands are so wrapped up in their efforts to reach the first-time mom that they miss out on the opportunity to make a connection with this bigger community of women pregnant for the second, third or fourth time.

The award for most memorable speaker of the day (at least in my book) goes to Jerry Shereshewsky. The CEO of Grandparents.com, he made the point (which I can anecdotally support) that today's Boomer grandmas and grandpas are healthy, wealthy and very generous with their grandkids. They're funding 529 college savings plans and helping their children furnish nurseries and buy clothes for the babies. Not only that, they're buying high chairs, pack n plays (even Wiis!) for their own homes to make the grandkids feel welcome. Yet aside from a handful of companies who are embracing this demographic (one standout example was Pepsi, who encouraged Grandparents.com members to give their free Pepsi song downloads to their grandkids) -- most marketers leave this group to the drug manufacturers. And that's a shame since, unlike Gen X and Gen Y moms, they're easy to connect with: just address them as grandparents.