Dove has been listening and caring for women for 60 years. So it was a perfect fit to have Dove be the title sponsor for this Mom blogging event. This year Dove is launching Real Beauty Productions and sharing personal stories that redefine beauty at DoveRealBeauty.com. Dove’s message to us was that beauty is not defined by size, shape or color. They want us to feel like the best version of ourselves. During the conference we shared photos of ourselves and our experiences while using #RealBeauty to express what we feel is the definition of beauty.
Our Dove Swag
When we checked in at registration we were given a beautiful bag full of Baby Dove products. Even though my babies are now 8 and 9, I will still use the Dove products on them and even on myself! I already fell in love with the moisturizer for my body. The main ingredient is water, and the lotion feels so saturating and moisturizing when you put it on right after a shower.
The Dove #RealBeauty Suite
Just before the Cabana party on Thursday night, I scurried down to the Dove Real Beauty Suite to enjoy a dry styling of my hair for the party. It was the perfect time to visit the suite and enjoy a glass of champagne while a stylist put my hair into a curly updo.
“Meet Cathleen”
Dove has recently released a new film called “Meet Cathleen” at Youtube.com/DoveUS. Cathleen has a group called “Fat Girls Dance”. She loves to dance, and dancing has sparked a new relationship with her body. She shares this with women everywhere to teach them that we need to define what beauty is for ourselves. It is not a specific dress size or hair color.
Cathleen says, “We need to start defining what beauty is for ourselves. And I think the definition of that beauty is you.”
What is your definition of beauty?
Do you love yourself? Are you happy with your definition of beauty? If you have children, it is very important to make them feel beautiful about themselves at an early age. I am always careful not to criticize myself in front of my children. I also make sure that I live a healthy lifestyle so that they can see that lifestyle and mimic it.
I am so glad I took the jump to attend the Mom2.0Summit held in Orlando, May 10-12. A week ago I was awake at 3:00 a.m. to catch a 6:15 a.m. flight to Orlando. I don’t do early flights anymore; but I didn’t want to miss a minute of this conference! I don’t usually attend blogging conferences. The last one I attended I was invited to by Disney Social Media moms. But I want to grow my network; learn new skills and begin with with affiliates and brands. So I needed the guidance and education from a conference just like this to get the education I need.
How I found the Mom2.0Summit
I stumbled across the conference in my Facebook news feed and learned that someone needed to back out of the conference and could transfer their ticket to me. I jumped on the opportunity right away! I was so excited, did some shopping for a few new outfits, as most women usually do. Then I had to face the fact that I had to tell the kids I was going away during a school week. They are usually used to me travelling for races, but they were having a hard time with this trip. It meant that I wouldn’t be there when they woke up for three school days. But I was going to FaceTime them as much as possible.
Highlight number 1 – the Ritz Carlton Grande Lakes is beautiful
WOW!!! From the minute I arrive to the Ritz Carlton Grande Lakes via Kia’s curbside pickups, to the time I had to shove every possible gift into every inch of my luggage, I was blown away. This conference was INCREDIBLE! I loved the room I had. I unpacked all my carefully packed items so they weren’t going to be wrinkled, hung them in my closet, laid out everything for the week, set up my diffuser in my room for my essential oils at night and then went down to the pool for lunch.
Highlight number 2 – Everyone is so welcoming!
I knew of two people attending the conference that I met at the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration and also knew from runDisney; but other than that, I was going solo. And this was my first time attending this conference. But I approached it like I do everything else. I had an open mind, a smile, and a positive attitude. When I reached the pool bar and didn’t see a large crowd there, I asked two women if I could join them for lunch. They were very welcoming and next thing I knew there was a crowd of six of us enjoying lunch and a cocktail before registration opened. I met Lizz Porter, Mona Darling, Jenn Belden, Sharon Rowley, and Michelle Price.
Highlight number 3 – The jump start workshops were fantastic!
I was going to attend the newbie workshop but Mona from lunch recommended the program to “Find, Own and Monetize Your Expertise”. Great advice, thanks Mona! I loved the idea of jumping right into learning and decided that I wanted to do that instead of a newbie overview workshop. I was a sponge and I wanted to learn, learn, learn. I also attended “The Art of Negotiation”, “Strategies for Creating Consistent Affiliate Income”, and “Taking The Mystery Out Of Blog Campaign Reporting”. The workshops were great. I’m still trying to wrap my brain around everything I learned and formulate a strategy for how to move forward, connect with third party media agencies and become an affiliate to various brands.
Highlight number 4 – The Swag
As soon as the workshop was over, I went back up to my room, changed into a party dress and plugged in my devices to charge them up for the night. When I arrived to the room I had a gift waiting for me from Olive Garden. Then not long after that there was a knock at the door. It was a swag bag full of goodies from all of the vendors who would be at the Marketplace throughout the week. I am glad I packed a semi-empty carry on to bring home all of the extra goodies with me!
Highlight number 5 – The Florida SunFest Welcome Party
I went down to the pool and bumped into my lunch buddies again, picked up a delicious cocktail called the Sunrise, and then got into line for the book signing of Everything, Everything by Nicole Yoon. I hooked up with Kori Lusignan, Kristina Grum, Michelle Albright-Peters, and Jenn Labit, while waiting in line for the book signing. Then after we ate I met Erin Peloquin, Lori Strong, and Sara Strong. The food was wonderful, the night was beautiful, the conversations were easy, and the drinks kept flowing. I really had a great time and was so glad to meet such great people. I also spotted Cat & Nat from #MomTruth and wanted to go up and say hi to them, but someone else was talking with them and I didn’t want to seem like the stalker I was!
The party ended around 9:30 and we all went back to our rooms. We had a busy day planned the next day with a 6:45 a.m. yoga class out in the garden. I was looking forward to that. Thankfully, I didn’t feel or look like I had been up since 3:00 a.m. that day. I think the adrenaline of the conference kept me perked up. So far Mom2.0Summit was more than I expected and I was so glad to be there.
My husband and I are celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary of our Disney wedding today. I am so blessed for all of the years we have had together so far. The memories, our beautiful family and the fun that still awaits us. So much can happen in 15 years, yet we have remained by each other’s side, our love is strong and our children bring us so much joy. I have everything I always wished for. I can’t wait for what lies ahead.
Here’s a little video recap of our wedding day. It was a picture perfect day and I wish we could redo it every year.
I travel with my parents to Walt Disney World every January for marathon weekend. Here are some tips from my guest blog post at the Mouse For Less about traveling with grandparents. It’s kind of like the days when you were touring the parks with your toddlers. They need to take a break sometimes and sit in the shade and have a snack, or in my parents’ case, a cup of coffee!
Please read my latest guest blog post on the Mouse For Less Blog about how to participate in runDisney events on a budget. Great tips on how to save money and still have a fun filled race weekend!
I am excited to attend the Mom2.0Summit hosted by Dove in Orlando, FL next week. I have to prepare for the conference this weekend. That includes packing, selecting the sessions I want to attend, and finalizing my travel itinerary. In addition to this conference, I will be attending the #BLOGHER17 conference at the end of June. As I continue to build my blog audience and social media presence, I want to take this opportunity to network with several other bloggers. These conferences are also being sponsored by many major product brands. Prior to attending a conference there is a lot you should do to prepare.
What are these conferences about?
The Mom 2.0 Summit
This professional conference features educational programs, social gatherings, and the fostering of relationships between influencers and major brands. This year the attendance is expected to be around 800 leading influencers. That’s a large conference. I hope to gain some insight on how to build relationships with large brands and maybe even get a sponsorship opportunity with one.
BLOGHER
#BlogHer17 is also focused towards social media influencers. The focus of this conference is on highlighting the skills and talents of women who are creating online content. #BlogHer is the world’s largest conference for women and content creators. Pairing so many women with so many brands will create the most opportunity for me to me connections.
What Happens At These Conferences?
I have been fortunate to receive an invitation by Disney to attend the Social Media Moms Celebration in 2015. At that event I met many bloggers and have remained in contact with them. I am so excited that I will be attending both of these conferences with some of the women that were also at the Disney event. The conferences are a great platform to become inspired by the keynote speakers and by the friendships and conversations you have with other women at the event.
There are also several educational sessions at the conferences. These sessions will help me step up my efforts in growing my brand, creating a stronger network and developing relationships with other brands. I also read that there is a lot of fun activities scheduled into the agenda. I am looking forward to the yoga on Thursday morning and the run 2.0 on Friday morning at the Mom 2.0 Summit. These are nice times to network with other women in a smaller, more intimate and casual gathering.
Preparing For A Conference
Begin Networking Off Site
After I registered for these conferences one of the first things I did was follow the conference twitter accounts. The second thing I did was get connected to the conference private Facebook groups. This lends me the opportunity to begin networking with others attending the conference weeks before I even get to the conference. It also keeps me abreast of the latest news and announcements related to the conference, such as the guest speakers, new sponsors, event information, meetups, and travel information.
I built several Twitter lists for each event. These lists contain the conference speakers, attendees and sponsors. I also created a spreadsheet with everyone’s social media contact information including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook pages, LinkedIn, blogs, and Pinterest accounts.
Another tool that I was introduced to from the Mom 2.0 Summit is Flipboard. I have been saving articles that I read online or on social media as links and copy them into my Flipboard so I can read them when I have more time or refer back to them later on for more details.
Twitter Parties
Mom 2.0 Summit hosted several Twitter parties each week to help the attendees learn more about what they will be presenting. It also drums up the excitement prior to the event and encourages others to get to know one another. There is a Virtual Packing Party on Monday night on Twitter. I can’t wait to see what is said during this party to help me prepare for the event with last minute details.
Business Cards
If you don’t have business cards, you need them! I redesigned my cards and can’t wait to pass them out. When I was at the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration I collected business cards and put them in my name badge holder. I learned a little trick for these upcoming conferences. I will take photos of the business cards I collect, with notes about the person on the back, and upload them into my Flipboard so that all of my contacts will be in one location.
Update Your Media Kit
If you don’t have a media kit, you should create one. I didn’t have one and began creating mine. I need to finish is so that after I network during the conferences, if I a brand wants to work with me, I will send them my social media stats. I asked the Facebook group for some examples of blogger media kits and Andrea Updyke shared this great link with us!
Learn The Dress Code
My fellow blogger friend Claudia Krusch from Trendy Latina did a Facebook Live broadcast to help conference attendees know what to look forward to when attending a conference. In her video she talks about dress code and how it represents you and your brand. Take that into consideration when packing for your trip. Also, consider your footwear. As much as you want to look good in your shoes, make sure they are comfortable. Pack a pair of flats in your bag so you can make a quick change should your feet get tired.
Select Your Learning Tract
If the conference has workshops, review the schedule ahead of time and highlight the training sessions that you want to attend. This is one of my favorite parts of conference preparation. It’s like picking our your college courses before the semester, but the are all great classes! I have also engaged in some conversations with attendees of the conference who want to have sidebar conversations. So we have to schedule that into our calendars so we can get the most out of our time there.
Packing For The Conference
How To Pack
One of my favorite social media influencers is Chalene Johnson. I listen to several of her podcasts and she recently had an episode on how to pack for stress free travel. What I found useful was her travel itinerary sheet and her packing list. I travel often for running races in several different locations, so I am used to packing with just a carry on bag. When traveling for conferences, I need to consider my dress code and packing so I don’t wrinkle everything. I also have to use larger luggage because of all the swag I may receive from the sponsors.
What Not To Pack
Something else Claudia mentioned in her Facebook Live and blog post was what not to pack. One point in particular was not to bring your nice camera. I have the iPhone 7 Plus which does portrait photography, so I hope that I can get blog-worthy photographs at the event using just my phone. I do plan on bringing my Surface Pro with me for taking notes; but will be leaving my larger laptop in my room for after hours.
It’s Time To Rise
The theme of this year’s conference is Rise. This is perfect for me as I Rise up to work on enhancing something I enjoy doing, writing, networking and socializing. Remember to bring a positive attitude, an open mind, a notepad and pen, and enjoy the opportunities in front of you! I can’t wait for what I will learn during these next upcoming months and I look forward to meeting everyone I have been communicating with and also meeting new people on site! I just learned today that Julianna Margulies is going to be the welcome keynote speaker. She will share her experiences in front of and behind the camera and her thoughts on media and representation of women. There is so much to look forward to. I know I am going to come home energized and inspired and I can’t wait!
