COMMUNITY: Hannah's Socks Holiday Drive Begins

MommyBlogExpert Encourages Everyone to Help
My entire family, including DH and my 4 kids (Triplets, 12 & Big Brother 13) will be joining me in this wonderful effort to lend a hand to those in need.  Please consider joining us.


Hannah's Socks is a charity that began with an inspirational story. During Thanksgiving 2004  four-year-old Hannah Turner helped her mom serve food at a local homeless shelter. While there, she saw a man with holes in his shoes and no socks.  Hannah asked her mom if she could offer the man her own socks. The next day, Hannah’s mom took her to buy/distribute socks to local shelters. 

Soon mother and daughter had collected and donated over 100 pairs of socks in their Midwestern town. Two years later, Hannah -- with the help of her Mom, family, and friends -- distributed 10,000 donated pairs of socks to shelters.  To date, Hannah’s Socks has collected 100,000 pairs of socks for homeless and domestic violence shelters. Now, the organization has kicked off the 2009 Hannah’s Socks Holiday Sock Drive to collect socks and funds for the upcoming winter and holiday season.

Inspired by Hannah’s story, The Clorox Company became a sponsor of Hannah’s Socks this season as the non-profit's goal is to gather and donate 10,000 pairs of new socks to underprivileged children’s programs in addition to continuing to help the shelters it already works with. As adults, this is not only a great way for us to help people who really need some assistance right now. It is also an opportunity to teach our kids about giving back to the community.

Please spread the word to your community to collect socks at home, school, work, or church for this great cause. Families can also donate funds and find out more about Hannah’s Socks and the Holiday Sock Drive at www.hannahssocks.org. In addition, a pair of socks will be donated in the names of the first 200 Moms who sign up here.

We also hope to spread the word on Twitter with Tweets about Hannah’s Socks by using the hashtag #HannahsSocks and to follow the charity on Facebook at www.facebook.com/hannahssocks and Twitter at www.twitter.com/hannahssocks. Please email Allison at aparker@momcentral.com if you have any questions or feedback.

Looking forward to you joining me in helping to make the world a better and warmer place during this holiday season!

Content is King, Whether It's for Traditional Media or Blog

This is the response of Janis Brett Elspas of MommyBlogExpert to the story that appeared in Advertising Age October 26, 2009, As Media Market Shrinks, PR Passes Up Reporters, Pitches Directly to Consumers

It's not whether the media is earned or not.  In many cases, it's not even about who is writing it -- traditional media, independent blog or a brand that seeks direct communication with its audiences.  In a single word it's about something much bigger: Content.

As a PR pro w/ several decades of corporate and agency experience, I am now transitioning to full-time professional Mommy Blogger as I raise my triplets & one more, all born within a year.

During my PR career I learned early on that you must have a compelling story to tell if you want to get substantial media to produce meaningful coverage. If the story you are trying to place just gets "face time" with a local throw away (or even with a media outlet that's off target for the audiences you seek to reach)...it's just a waste of time and money.

Through the new experience of writing my own blog MommyBlogExpert.blogspot.com now,  I can see that the same principle still applies. You've got to be providing information readers want and need and nothing less, AKA content.

Too many bloggers in almost every niche right now are over dosing the public with self-serving material.  I, for one, have made it my mission to ensure that my blog first and foremost provides substantial original content that is not brand driven. Then, I complement those stories with straight forward (but entertaining) product reviews, book reviews, movie reviews etc, being sure they don't read like consumer product news releases.

Whether it's traditional or new media, it is not about who is writing.  It's WHAT is being written, and reaching the desired audiences with true content, not chest-beating about a company or brand's view of themselves.

I look forward to hearing everyone's take on the original Ad Age story as well as on the opinion I've expressed above.  Please leave your thoughts in the comment box below.

FREE Fun Expert Troy Corley in upcoming Time Warner Segment

  Free Fun Expert Troy Corley, editor & publisher of Free Fun Guides (pictured at right) will be featured on a segment of the Time Warner Cable Show 28:30, November 10, 2009, airing on Channel 36 WEHO.


Corley publishes Free Fun Guides for Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Francisco. I am currently reading all three guides and will be doing book reviews on each book on my blog, so bookmark this page now.  The first book I'll be reviewing on MommyBlogExpert is The Free L.A. Fun, 2nd edition, which features 400+ fun free things to do in the Los Angeles metro area.

Watch MommyBlogExpert for upcoming Reviews on each of the books in the Free Fun Series