Thursday, February 24, 2011

It's Happened More than Once or Twice...

...that I had a favorite smaller blog...one of those best kept secrets of the blogging world...where nearly every post was really inspirational, do-able, and down-right fun to read...

...and then (cue scary monster music) they got bigger, and bigger, and BIGGER...

...and then they started getting sponsors, and hosting lots of giveaways, and such...

...and there were fewer and fewer inspirational, do-able, and down-right fun to read about projects.  In some cases, I stopped reading the blog all together.

I don't want that to happen here.  You may have noticed that when I redesigned my blog last week, I've included a space for sponsors.

I've gone back and forth with myself about accepting sponsors for a while.  Of course it's enticing for my own benefit...but one of the main themes of my blog is being frugal and creating beautiful things for your home and fun things for your kids while spending little to no money...that doesn't jive well with advertising.

"So why did you do it?!?" you ask.  Well...I've had several good friends start up shops and online businesses...ladies I know personally, who I know to be wonderful and accomplished people who are providing unique, high-quality handmade products at reasonable prices.  I want to help them get the word out, and I want to let you know about products you might be interested in.  In every case, they are providing products at prices I would be willing to pay.

For the time being sponsors are by invitation only as I've seen shops with products I think you'll love and provide products that are hard to find.  I'll be introducing them individually to you as their products work into projects I'm working on, but I wanted to give you a quick run down of who each of these ladies are and why I think they're awesome.

Lisa of Lily and Oak is one of my best real-life friends.  We commiserated during our own student teaching and teaching careers as well as putting our husbands through their undergraduate and then graduate degrees in chemistry.  Lisa makes some of the best scented wax melts, pendant necklaces, and glass tile magnets you'll find.  


 

I've known for Shirleen of Shirleen Bland's Art Studio for years, but just recently became familiar with her amazing art work.  She has beautiful, reasonably priced prints of her own paintings available for sale, or she can paint you custom painting.


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I know Maile of Boutique Academia from Hubby's days in graduate school at UC Berkeley.  She has amazing taste and her shop carries beautiful jewelry and other fun things relating to all things in math and the sciences.  
 
Katie at From The Red Kitchen is my very own sister and best bloggy friend.  She got me into craft blogging in the first place, and she is just plain awesome.  Her blog Notes from the Very Red Kitchen is way funnier and better written than mine.  Her shop carries an ever changing variety of pretties...most recently she's specializing in adorable (and affordable) handmade buttons and zipper pouches.
myshop

Coley and Crista of Twin Stitchers are my only sponsors that I don't know personally.  I've been searching around for the perfect line drawing graphics for a Christmas project I'm planning (more on that to come soon).  Not only did I find what I needed in Twin Stitchers doodle people embroidery patterns, but they had so many other adorable patterns that I contacted them to see if they'd like to be a sponsor. 
 
 
So here's where you come in...I need your feedback to help me effectively let you know about my sponsors' products without being annoying or compromising the content of my blog.
  • What are your pet peeves about sponsors/advertising on blogs?
  • What kinds of sponsored posts do you like to see?
  • What kinds of posts do you generally skip over?
  • And finally check out my sponsors...tell them hello, and let me know what you think of their products.
Right now I'm not planning on taking on more sponsors.  However, if you're interested in becoming a sponsor, feel free to contact me, and I'll save your contact information to let you know when/if I decide to open up sponsorship more generally.

4 comments:

  1. This is quite similar to what I recently did. I overhauled my blog and (Thanks to a couple emails from interested parties) made a spot for sponsors. I emailed a couple of my blog friends with shops or (In the case of Nuno) magazines and offered them a free space. I am not really posting much content (hence the free space), but I actually took a physical-in-real-life creative break for some time. Now I am slowly getting back at it but the late winter lighting in our new place is murder on the photos, I can barely get photos of what I made, let alone enough photos to create a tutorial! But, the warmer weather is coming and I can take my photo back drops outside.......
    Anyhoo, what I wanted to say was I completely understand this post from both sides. I also believe that your creative and inspiring posts will not trickle down to nothing.

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  2. This seems a very reasonable place to be with sponsors for your blog - some good products for you, and great links for the rest of us - I see this kind of advertising as a service to your readers, not an annoyance. By the way, I tried to let your sponsors know I'd read about them in this post, but some of them don't have easy ways to give comments from the links here. Not a big deal, but I thought you (and your sponsors) might like to know.

    What I like to read on craft blogs? I like the tutorials with lots of photos, and a glimpse into people's "real" lives - how they interact with their children, etc.

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  3. I think it's great! Make some money, mama, and help those other mamas promote their business. It's a win-win for all. (Just please don't kill us with too many giveaways. :)

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  4. I agree that it's great to make money, but I am also glad you are thinking about the "blog monster", because there are several sites that almost never have their own posts (always have guest posts) or it's a sponser "love" day or it's a giveaway, that I NEVER win...I love looking at ideas for making my life more beautiful.... the giveaways are nice, but only if it's like the BEST giveaway EVER. IMO... guest posting is nice, but not more than a couple of times a month, I follow blogs for what the Author of the blog does.

    Thanks for such a cute blog!

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