Miss Lori talks rates: Ads are prime real estate on your blog

Last week I published a post about determining your blog worth. After Blogher 10 and speaking at The 2nd annual Social Media Master’s Summit I realize that this question is heavy on many people’s minds. Social Media has empowered all of us in an economic time that was making many of us feel powerless. With the communication explosion that is social media comes opportunity. Opportunity has been knocking on the door of a number of bloggers. So the big question is how do you get opportunity to come to your neighborhood? That’s exactly what we’re examining.

The first step, as I mentioned last week, is to understand who you are and what you have to offer. We do that by examining our own blogs. But since it can be hard to be objective about ourselves I encouraged you to buddy up and evaluate each other’s sites. Hopefully you have taken some time to look at your blog and other people’s as well. Was it hard? Looking within, really looking within, can be uncomfortable at first, but ultimately it’s a great lesson. The goal is to understand what you are projecting to the World and make sure that is in line with what your inner intent is. On top of that you want to make sure that your blog functionality is in place. Do you have your contact points, disclosures, pr guidelines etc… Chris Brogan has an in depth article posted this week with some great suggestions always worth reading.

Now armed with a better sense of the real estate you have to offer it’s time to talk numbers. [Read more...]

Miss Lori is talking rates; How do I know what I am worth

Okay, it’s time to talk seriously folks. Brands, PR and most especially Bloggers, it’s time to talk worth. Right off the bat let’s get one thing straight…your services are never FREE. Say it with me… “I never work for free!” NEVER! Even when you are doing something “Pro Bono”, you aren’t working for free, you are simply waiving your usual fee. I can hear some of you mumbling, “That’s just semantics Miss Lori.” That may be true, but they are very important semantics, because they speak to your self worth. And let’s be clear, they are not only speaking to you, but to the professional World you are trying to work in. What you think of yourself has a huge effect on what the World thinks of you. If you want the World to take you seriously, to see you as a professional, then act like one. You’ve heard the term “dress for success”? That’s what this is. You are dressing for success.

Now a couple of weeks ago I started by talking about how you should be B.I.G. with brands when you meet them in person. Then earlier this week I talked about the pages you should have on your blogsite. Now we are going to talk about RATES. [Read more...]

Miss Lori lists her 5 top pages every blogger should have on their site

This week I had the great pleasure of speaking on a a panel about brands and bloggers at the second annual Social Media Master’s Summit conducted by Windy City Social. The panel included Kim Moldofsky of Mom Impact, Danielle Smith of ExtraordinaryMommy.com and Esther Crawford of ShePosts.com. We were brought togetehr to offer our expertise to an audience filled with bloggers who want to work with brands and th brands who want to work with bloggers. We covered a lot of ground during our one hour panel. coming away form the presentation it became clear to me that there are still many bloggers out there who don’t know how to set up their blogs to be a magnet for opportunity. So I have compiled a list of the top five pages that I believe a blogger needs to have on their site to attract opportunity and be information ready for the future. [Read more...]

Miss Lori is speaking at the Social Media Master’s Summit August 24th

Next week Tuesday at 1130 I will be doing one of my favorite things to do , talking. I know big surprise huh? I do love to talk, especially when talking helps others. That is certainly the goal of the panel that I will be speaking on at the Windy City Social Social Media Master’s Summit at the Blackstone hotel in Chicago. I am siting on a panel with some really AWESOME women: Kim Moldofsky of MomImpact, Danielle Smith of Extraordinary Mommy and DanielleSmithTV, and Esther Crawford of ShePosts. We’ll be talking about brands and bloggers, and how they can do more together.

Of course I hope you will join the Summit to see me, but there are many other, even more impressive people to come out for. In fact, we are thrilled to announce that David Aramano of Edelman and Ramon Deleon of Dominoes have joined the amazing Social Media Masters’ Summit Line-up.

David will be talking about building your brand through community management and Ramon will talk about WOW! Marketing, infusing your brand with an energy that people can’t resist.

More details are below.

EARLY BIRD PRICING ENDS TODAY! [Read more...]

Miss Lori wants you to be B.I.G. with brand representatives

I just returned from Blogher and boy are my arms tired! (Hee! Hee! that was for Liz Strauss! ;) SMILE!) Actually they are from all of the stretches I was doing at the Go Red For Women Better U Program booth. But that’s another post for later. What I want to talk about here is why I am ENERGIZED. I’m energized because on the expo floor at Blogher I had some really thoughtful, productive conversations with brand representatives from P & G, Pepsico, Nintendo, Johnson and Johnson, Nickelodeon, and 1800Flowers to name a few. Almost all of the representatives were new to me, and only a handful had first hand knowledge of my work on PBS and with Miss Lori’s CAMPUS. So I was going in COLD, as we say in sales. Yes, sales, because that is what I was doing, selling myself. (Wait, that didn’t come out right.) I was selling my BRAND. (That’s better.)

When I visit booths on the expo floor I am shopping for a connection and then I am selling my expertise. I’m not there to grab as much swag as I can, (says the girl with the 48lb suitcase.) No, I am there to do business. Network. Connect. How do I do this? Well there’s a long answer to that short question, which I am going to delve into in a series of posts here over the next few weeks. But for our purposes today I want to talk about one idea. That is to be “B.I.G.” on the expo floor. “What do you mean Miss Lori. I have to wear high heeled shoes?” No, (although I won’t lie to you being tall has it’s advantages in a crowd), you need a “B.I.G.” presence and approach. I will spell it out for you. [Read more...]

Miss Lori says you need to care about your health so you’ll be around to care for your children

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Miss Lori announces final batch of #blogbaskets winners

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I’m finally home! What a weekend. So much went on my head is still spinning. But you don’t want to hear about that, you want to know who won the rest of the #Blogbaskets from 1800Baskets.com. Well, I don’t blame you. Saturday and Sunday I did a number of kamikaze contests involving pics and video. As a result some great people came away winners. [Read more...]

Day 3 Winners Circle for Miss Lori’s #Blogbaskets Blogher Giveaways with 1800Baskets

Goooooood Morning! My goodness it was a long day yesterday. I never even got a chance to get over to my own site and join the #Blogbaskets conversation. No worries though because there were a dozen people who were brainstorming creative ideas for new 1800Baskets Gift Baskets. There were three women in particcular who were conversing away, exchanging ideas and building on each other’s thoughts, Robin, Petula and Sarina. And since they all THREE did such a great job, I’m going to call all THREE of them WINNERS of the Day 3 #Blogbaskets giveaway! CONGRATS!!!

Would you like to know what you have won? Step right this way! [Read more...]

Day 3 of Miss Lori’s #Blogbaskets giveaways at Blogher with 1800Baskets

Morning Everyone. Ar you here just to see me? Nooooo! You’re here because you want some more 1800Baskets gift Baskets aren’t you? Well, of course you are. And I don’t blame you. So enough with the small talk let’s get to the rules for today’s giveaway. We had such an amazing conversation on my facebook fanpage yesterday I wanted to have a similar one here for all the WORLD to see. (LOL!). So the contest is about conversation. We’re going to talk creatively about giftbaskets. I want to hear your ideas about what kind of fantastical, (now I know I made that one up!), gift baskets you would love to see available and what AWESOME names you would have for them. And I don’t just want you to post your ideas. I want you to feed off of other peoples ideas as well, comment, add to, improve, whatever! Let’s brainstorm together. Then at the end of this day, 10pm ET, today Friday August 6, we’ll see who has contributed the most to the conversation and they will win. Clear and simple. What will they win? Cue the curtain… [Read more...]

Miss Lori’s top 10 things to carry in your purse at Blogher

Working in the performing arts and social media means that I travel a lot and goto a lot of events. As such I have to have a well stocked, functional purse at the ready for me. Next week I am headed to NYC for Blogher conference. A perfect time for me to clean out the purse and get ready to be social! Here are the 10 most important things that I carry with me. [Read more...]