Comments (22)

By Little Mummy, May 21, 2009 11:43 pm

There’s a lot of chatter about PR trips, freebies and paid blogging at the moment. I thought I’d add my own views, because that’s what us bloggers do isn’t it.

PR Trips

A few interesting conversations have come about recently, mainly off the back of the Disney trip. Should PR companies target bloggers. Should bloggers accept trips. Can reviews be trusted if the blogger has been lavished with freebies. It certainly seems to be on people’s minds as even when a journalist was interviewing me for the Times those very questions came up. Did you consider declining? Did you feel obliged to give a positive review? How did it fit with your other blog content?

When I accepted the Disney trip it was because I knew that it would be a good fit, after all I already have my own (paid!) trip to Disney looming and my tagline says “life, parenting and trying new things” I like to think that’s my clever way of covering all bases, but seriously, if you’re a parent blogger then Disney is definitely in your topic range .

Did I consider declining? Don’t be silly. An all expenses paid trip to Disney and the chance to hob nob with the some of the best British bloggers, I don’t think so. I’ve been writing this blog for three years, a little perk here and there is justified, no?

Then there’s the biggy, did I feel obliged to do a positive review? Eh, no. Yes, Disney flew me to Florida, they put me up in a 5 star resort, fed me gourmet food and paid my exorbitant wifi bill, but I didn’t sell my soul. I never once considered, before or after that I would need to write a positive review, in my mind a review that doesn’t find at least some constructive criticism of a product or destination is pretty useless anyway and probably fake. Disney World was no exception, there were things I thought could be better, I said it while I was there, and I’ll say it again here (eventually, when I get to that bit). It would be unnatural if everything we wrote was positive, Disney realised this when they decided to have no input into what we wrote, we had no word count, and no guidelines. The moment anyone asks anything other of me is the moment I’ll say no to the product or trip.

Freebies

Recently the British blogging scene has seen a big rise in the freebies for review, first there was the Lego Duplo, then the Disney DVD’s and Blu-Ray players and just today it’s been the Skoda test drives. As always the Americans are one step ahead of us, they’ve had the freebies for review for a while, the new trend is to start a seperate review blog for this type of thing, Suburban Turmoil (who was on the US Disney bloggers trip) was talking about it just today.

I don’t think we’re at that stage and I hope that we can navigate the waters more successfully so that this sort of thing is unnecessary. I don’t think that a seperate review blog really helps the marketers, the bloggers or the readers, is the point not that the freebies are used and trialled as part of everyday life?

Sponsorship

Finally there’s the question of having advertising on a blog, whether it be in the form of adsense or banner advertising (as you can see in my sidebar), some say that on a ‘mummy blog’ it’s distateful, yet others go further and accuse mum bloggers of cashing in on their role as a parent.

I disagree with this viewpoint and I don’t see that a few ads is really ‘cashing in’, it costs money to keep a website going and if you can make some of that back as far as I’m concerned that’s a good thing, because every penny that remains in this household goes towards things that make my daughter’s life more comfortable anyway.

So that’s my viewpoints on everything, what do you think?

Comments (13)

By Little Mummy, May 5, 2009 9:15 am

I arrived back yesterday to an excited daughter, a relieved husband and a large box. What could it be? Mickey Mouse? No, too small plus he has a really nice pad in Disneyworld. I’ve become accustomed to lovely treats over the past week so I immediately thought it would be something good and it was.

We’ve been sent two sets of Lego Duplo, a police themed set and a polar bear set with penguins and a slide! Erin doesn’t have anything Lego-like so she was thrilled with it all, she particularly liked the light and sound police van and the polar bears complete with iceberg-style bricks.

At the moment we’re playing with the sets seperately and her imagination is running wild with stories of police chases and penguin playgrounds, can’t wait to see what happens when we mix the sets together, naughty penguins spending a couple of nights in the slammer? Policemen skiving to go play with the polarbears at the zoo? I’ll let you know.

In the meantime you can check out the Lego Duplo Blog for
more reviews.

The Giveaway

I have two sets of Lego Duplo to giveaway. All you need to do is sign up for my newsletter and you’ll receive an automatic entry.

Once you’ve signed up, leave a comment on this post for an extra entry.

Giveaway is only open to UK residents.

Random draw will be made on Sunday 10th May 2009.

Oh! and if you win, you too can have a box to play in, kids and boxes eh!

Comments (2)

By Little Mummy, April 22, 2009 4:50 am

I’ve been asked that quite a bit over the last few days. Along with;

Do you need a travel companion?
Can I come in your suitcase?
Do they need any extras?

and the most popular line…

“I’m going to start blogging”

So how do you land an all expenses paid trip to Walt Disneyworld Orlando?

Well first you need to have a blog and secondly (for this trip anyway) you needed to belong to Think Parents.

And that’s it.

What are you waiting for?

Comments (9)

By Little Mummy, April 20, 2009 1:08 am

Time for some primping and preening in preparation for my big trip (you know, the one I might have mentioned once or twice!)

I received these Aveeno goodies ages ago so it was good to finally have an excuse to try them out. First up the colloidal oatmeal bath, every time I mention colloidal I think it sounds like a nasty hospital treatment. I have to say the reality of the bath wasn’t much better. See video

I think it’s only fair to take the good with the bad so I hopped in and the, um, scum went away a bit, which was nice. The smell did subside a bit too, it started out like a hops smell, my husband thought I had started my own home brew in the bath. The result was pretty good though and my skin felt nicer afterwards, not sure it was enough for me to try it again though. I bet my bath needs a good clean now.

The moisturising cream was much better though, the consistency was quite thick to look at but when I started smoothing it over my skin it was absorbed really easily, leaving no residue or that familiar wet feeling.

I’m not sure where the cream was meant to go but seeing as I’d just done a facial scrub (I’m really ramping up my efforts in a bid to look half way decent while I’m away) I decided to put it on my face. All the products are fragance free and their selling point seems to be their ‘naturalness’.

Now to the good part, I have five of the sets you see above to giveaway. All you need to do if you’d like to be in with a chance of winning one is sign up for my newsletter. You’ll automatically be entered into this AND all future giveaways (no catch, just enjoy!)

BONUS

For an extra entry, leave a comment on this post (only newsletter subscribers will be given the extra entry).

Competition closes on Sunday 26th April

Update: Open to UK residents only

Comments (8)

By Little Mummy, December 30, 2008 2:16 am

Yesterday I wrote about the new Baileys with a hint of coffee. The picture shows the coffee cream crunch desert I made which was sooo good.

I have two bottles of Baileys with a hint of coffee to give away. You could make the recipes here, drink it or even give them as gifts. Entry is simple, you only really need to do step one…

To Enter

1. Sign up for the newsletter

Your email is confidential and you’ll receive an email newsletter around twice a month. You’ll also receive automatic entry to future draws as well as the chance to win an Amazon gift voucher if you’re the 100th subscriber.

2. Leave a comment on this post for a bonus entry

3. Open to UK and Ireland residents only. Competition closes on Tuesday 6th January. Draw will be made by random number generation.

Good Luck!

Comments (1)

By Little Mummy, December 11, 2008 2:12 am

Peggy from CooKin Kids approached me about her Ebook Cookin Kids.

You may be like me, a busy mom, who’s grown tired of picky eaters, bored kids, and fast food. Now there’s a way to solve these problems; please let me explain…

My kids were 8 and 10 when I realized that they really didn’t know how to cook and I was doing it all. This was no good – I was either wearing myself out making hurried and boring meals that they were tired of, or we were ordering delivery pizza and doing fast food. Plus, my kids weren’t learning an important skill to help them through life.

It was time to get serious about cooking yet have a good time with it. I searched high and low and couldn’t find many recipes geared towards these in-between years, so I decided to start a newsletter with easy kid-friendly recipes and fun ideas.

I was fortunate enough to receive a free ebook to review. The ebook includes recipes as well as lots of facts and educational ideas for extending knowledge and interest in both cooking and cultures. The ebook is based around six themes;

The American Diner
Mexican Food
Russian Cooking
Picnics to Go
Native American Dishes
Hip on Hawaii

It’s 110 pages long so there’s plenty to work through. I enjoyed looking through the ebook and feel this is ideal for a homeschooler or for structured weekend afternoon activities, as to get the full benefit you really need to engage the ebook fully, preparing the meals and then following up with the activities.

I have 2 Free Ebooks to giveaway

I’m going to keep this really simple.

1. All you need to do is sign up to the VIP list in the sidebar (you will be entered into other prize contests on littlemummy automatically).

2. Leave a comment on this post for a bonus entry.

3. Open to worldwide residents. Draw will be made by random number generation. Draw will be made on Monday 15th December. Winners will be notified by email.

Good Luck

Comments (2)

By Little Mummy, November 24, 2008 2:30 pm

Hello loyal subscribers,

I’ve been receiving increasing offers of freebies, voucher codes etc… I know, it’s a hard life
I’ve decided to set up a VIP list to give away prizes, promote products and publicise voucher codes. Become a VIP by visiting the site and completing the sign up form in the right hand column, your details will not be passed on and you can unsubscribe anytime, you know, if for some strange reason you didn’t want freebies anymore?! Simple, no catch. Get on the VIP list now , takes me back to my clubbing days saying that hee hee…