MamaBlogga

Friday morning I was suddenly reminded that the event of the year for my industry, Search Marketing Expo Advanced (SMX), was impending. I’d wanted to buy tickets long before, but frugality, homebodiness and an insatiable need to be with my son won out. Tickets were sold out now, plus I’d have to travel to Seattle.

I lamented my case to my husband, who recommended that I e-mail my boss, Andy, to see if he had any extra passes. I demured. And that afternoon, Andy posted on the blog—he had come across an extra pass. Did any readers want it? I said I did, but so did a couple other readers, who wouldn’t have to travel.

Andy decided I deserved it (how deeply flattering!). And now I’m in Seattle.

Saturday I’d convinced myself that I deserved/needed/would enjoy some time away from Hayden. Not that I don’t love him, of course (I know you understand). But ever since he was born, I realized that motherhood was the one job I’d never be able to take a vacation from, no matter how burned out I got.

And here I am on vacation (ish).

So, we shall see how my son and I hold up apart. A huge thank you to my friends who are watching him today and tomorrow. I’ll be home very early Wednesday morning, and back into motherhood.

But today, I’m playing the part of the experienced professional. Oh, and I’m also pretending to be outgoing and friendly, which is a lot harder in person than it is online and in print. (Luckily, an opening social last night broke the ice, so I should be okay. I hope.)

Blogging may be a bit light until Thursday, but I’ll try to get a couple posts in.

This week is the eComXpo, a virtual tradeshow for Internet marketing. This marks the third time I’ve attended the semiannual event. It’s strange to think how much things have changed over that time period:

1. Early April, Hayden’s 2 months old. I sit at the computer, Hayden is next to the desk on the floor. He gets a little tummy time, too. The nursing pillow cuddles him until he starts to get fussy. Then I lay him tummy down across my lap and pat his back. He had a little bit of a cold. He sleeps on my lap or on the floor. I can attend pretty much as much of the show as I can stand.

2. Late October, Hayden’s almost 9 months. Was he around that week? Poor kid is totally neglected since I not only have the eComXpo but an entry in the prestigious SEM Scholarship Contest at Marketing Pilgrim that I have to drive traffic to. Luckily, I do both at once and send hundreds of vCards and invitations to view my entry. Every little bit helped—I won by only 3 visitors. When I couldn’t stand to sit at the desk anymore, I tried to listen to presentations and panels while playing with Hayden; this didn’t work.

3. This week, Hayden’s 13.5 months. We’re in day 2 of the conference. There’s not as much that I’m interested in this time around. I no longer get paid by the hour (well, not to attend the conference, at least), so I try to listen to sessions while researching and writing blog posts. This doesn’t work either. I’m interested in the two panel discussions this afternoon; I’m not sure if I’ll get anything out of them if I try to listen while Haydie’s awake. And they’re conveniently scheduled right before and right after his normal nap time. There’s no way I can hope to do my thing while Haydie sits passively by.

Sigh. Yep, just sigh.

Now, from the professional side of the experience:

So, my time filling in for Andy Beal at Marketing Pilgrim has come to an end. I’ll still be a contributor and he and I will have to talk about my getting more involved, but for now I’m ready for a little break. (Just a little one, though.)

Overall, it was pretty much a great experience. I got some compliments from some other prominent bloggers. See?

• Lisa Barone of Bruce Clay said: “If you’re looking for some more blogging resources, Jordan McCollum (who has been doing a stellar job filling Andy Beal’s shoes lately) posted some invaluable Resources for Corporate Bloggers, which are worth checking out.”
• Kim Krause Berg said: “Thanks Jordan. . . . Kudos on the amazing job you’re doing at MP while Andy is off, btw “
• To which Lisa responded again: “And Jordan, if you’re checking in, Susan and I second Kim’s comment about what a stellar job you’re doing while Andy’s been away. You’re a breath of fresh of air over there at MP! We love it!”

Lisa really meant it, too. On Friday she posted about how many of the prominent blogs in Internet and search marketing brought on young female bloggers:

And then it hit them! They needed a hip female to ‘man up’ their blog. That will bring the masses. That will bring the links!So they did it. Rand hired Rebecca, and Bruce took me on a month later. And you saps fell in love with us. Ha!

Next thing you know, Jordan has us laughing at Marketing Pilgrim, Tamar has Chris Winfield under her spell, and Rhea is blinding the boys with her charm and stories about the disgusting things she’s done to tortoises. Forget Danny and Barry. Combined we are the IT girls of SEO blogging. The inner circle of female bloggers has brought a fun, fresh look to this often-too-techy industry. And we’re pretty too! Huzzah!

Every time I read it, I get a buzz. I’m an IT girl of SEO blogging? In the inner circle? How in the world did I end up here? (And she said I was pretty! Wow!)

Perhaps best of all, while Lisa was writing this and working away in the SEO trenches, I was probably changing Hayden’s diaper or vacuuming the living room.

Some people have all the luck. (id est, ME!)

Oh, and perhaps most importantly, Andy was pleased, too. (It is his blog, after all.) Something along the lines of “excellent,” and “fantastic.”

Okay, enough with the name dropping and “praise party” (the opposite of a pity party).

On the minus side, as I mentioned yesterday, I sometimes let my family slide. I justified it by saying that I had a commitment to MP and I needed to fulfil it, and it was only for a couple weeks. (The truth might be that I’m a crazy overachiever.) This includes time with Ryan, time with Hayden (to a lesser extent), and cooking dinner (which I regard as my job, but I also enjoy providing food for my family and cooking in general. My domestic goddess.).

Also a minus, I felt the need to conform to the Eastern time zone work day. Being in the Mountain time zone meant that I either had to get up between 6 or 7 to get blogging (and while getting up early is a beautiful thing, there are reasonable limits to everything!) or write posts in advance and schedule them (which meant my first posts of the day were usually not time-sensitive or news-related. I did a series on corporate blogging, among a few other things.).

On the whole, it was pretty awesome. I laughed, I cried, I made snide remarks and used plenty of sarcasm and suddenly broke into the inner circle. Yeah, pretty awesome.

This morning after we got back from the gym, I fixed Hayden’s breakfast: applesauce. I thought he might like something a little “fancier” (and a little more substantial) so I added a little bit of baby oatmeal. I went to add a little cinnamon, too. But we have this giant honking bottle of cinnamon. I can never add just a little. So I added too much.

Now, I don’t know what I was thinking, but I took it over to the sink and blew on it to get the extra cinnamon off. Cinnamon and baby oatmeal flakes flew everywhere—most especially my eyes. They’re still recovering. And I’m an idiot.

In other news, I’m taking over for Andy Beal at Marketing Pilgrim while he’s off in Australia speaking (and then in Tahiti, vacationing: lucky!). I’ll be the main blogger on the #7 marketing blog in the world (at least in Todd And’s opinion) for just over two weeks. Wish me luck!

It’s no secret: Hayden is a nursey boy. He loves solid foods now, too, but sometimes the only thing that can make the world an okay place to be is a nursey.

In search marketing, there’s another nursing mother who’s far more prominent than am I: Jennifer Laycock. Have you heard her name recently? Perhaps you’ve heard of her blog, the Lactivist? Perhaps you’ve heard one of the slogans from her pro-breastfeeding T shirts, “The Other White Milk”? And perhaps you’ve heard of the very nasty cease-and-desist order the National Pork Board issued to her?

No? Check it out: Overzealous Big Pork Stomps on Breastfeeding Blogger.

UPDATE: The Pork Board has since apologized and even conducted a fundraiser to raise money for Jennifer’s pet cause, the Mother’s Milk Bank of Ohio. They donated $1000.

Alright, I know what you’re thinking: what am I looking at here? For the uninitiated, this is the homepage of Digg. Okay, technically, it’s the bottom of page 2 of Digg. For the really uninitiated, Digg is basically a website where people submit (“digg,” v.) cool stories for other people to read. If others like the stories, they also “digg” them. The most popular stories make it to the Digg homepage. This sends lots of traffic to the page, which may or may not be a good thing, depending on the purpose of your site and how well-received your story is.

Okay, now you’re thinking: so what? Well, my friends, that middle story there, “Most SEOs are Crooks?“, which reached the Digg homepage about five hours ago now, was written by yours truly.

And also quite wonderful: Rand Fishkin, whom I’m sure you’ve never heard of, but whom I pretty much worship (professionally speaking, of course), commented on it. Sure, he directed his comment to Andy, the guy who actually owns and runs the blog, but I’ll take it. I’ll take it.

I know, you have no idea how I feel right now. Let’s just say when I got the e-mail from Andy telling me I’d made the homepage, and saw the e-mail notifying me of Rand’s comment,
I ran to the back where Ryan was with tears in my eyes.

You see . . . I have arrived. I am awesome. And I’m going to charge more for my Internet marketing services (j/k… maybe…) . . . y’know, if/when I get any clients. And yeah, I’ll have to start playing the “Hey, over here, my name’s not Andy and no, I’m not a man” game (I hate to be called Mr. McCollum). But that’s a heck of a lot better than the “Hey Google/Yahoo/MSN/Digg/readers/anyone?, my website is over here, pay attention to meeeee!!!!!” game in this industry.

(Grr to husband’s employer for hiring someone else without giving me the chance to pitch to you! I have awesomeness on my side. I have linkbait ideas. I have experience with your company and much success. Now you have overpriced, inferior services. Grr.)

You may congratulate me now.