On October 28th I hosted the season opener of Mrs. G’s VIB (Very Important Blogger) Blogger Series. Mrs.G’s VIBs are influential bloggers that live regionally within the Tri-State Area- NJ, PA and NY. I read about many blogger events hosted by various companies. Obviously, it’s great social marketing 101 to introduce bloggers to a product/brand and get them excited about it. No different then inviting the press. I host many events, especially for kitchen specifiers, to get them excited about Mrs. G’s including ASID, NARI, NKBA, AIA and Chambers of Commerce but this Blogger event is near and dear to my heart. I want to be a blogger so badly but just could not get started until now. This event is the inspiration I needed. I love reading blogs, admire bloggers and consider most of the bloggers I follow – celebrities.
I’m a late bloomer in the digital world following bloggers when I jumped into Twitter in March, 2009. I struggle with the written word (can you tell?) so I felt right at home with Twitter’s 140 characters. Soon enough, I discovered the link. The link that connected me to a blog. How clever. After reading so many terrific blogs I knew I must eventually start a blog to show the digital world all the wonderful events going on at Mrs. G’s and the latest and the greatest on everything I know – appliances and TVs.
Via Twitter I met Hilary Morris, a.k.a. Mrs. Mo’s NJ, a highly respected blogger and well connected in NJ’s blogger world and one who gets invited to many blogger events. Jealous! Why not one at Mrs. G’s? I asked and Hilary rose to the challenge to help me create the best Blogger Event in the area. Of course it was the first one so it had to be the best! Hilary came up with Mrs. G’s VIB Bloggers. Brilliant! We decided to create a series of 5 events including the season opener tour of my showroom then 4 fabulous keynote speakers spread out over 10 months. I wanted this to be special so I reached out to Electrolux Appliances to see if they would be interested in co-sponsoring. No questions asked! They were in.
This event was spectacular! We gave it the old college football theme starting with a college varsity letter font for the logo. In football you have to have a Playbook. The Mrs. G VIB Playbook included bios of the Coach, that’s me, Assistant Coach, that’s Hilary and all the bios of future keynote speakers. We included a play-by-play calender so everyone can look forward to future events. Of course with the wonderful generosity of Electrolux I was able to craft a contest to win a fabulous Electrolux dishwasher and to offer lots of great Electrolux goodies for the goodie bags. As a bonus I threw in my power point, “It’s Easy Being Green,” to give bloggers content about energy efficient appliances or TVs which is a popular subject. The Playbook was bound beautifully by my local Staples. It was a masterpiece!
Life is hectic, so Hilary and I planned a minute-by-minute game day schedule from 10 to 11:30am. However we found it was impossible to keep to the brief intervals since there was so much excitement when the bloggers meet one another. Most of them have been following each other on Twitter for some time and have never met until now. It was so much fun! The room was buzzing!
We had a lot of fun in the TV room, the first stop on the tour. TVs are the new eye candy. Check out those new LED LCD ultra thin TVs. It’s a women’s sport now! I favor plasma TVs for best picture quality but the sexy look and crisp picture of an LED LCD make them more popular. I’m crazy about the latest Blu-ray players with internet capabilities. We showed this great comedy skit by Brian Regan shopping for a refrigerator on the Unisen Mitsubishi 52″ LCD via a Samsung Blu-ray.
Then we showed a video of the history of Mrs. G’s and of course we had to show parts of the movie “Coraline” in 3D on the new Mitsubishi 83″ Home Theater TV connected to an Aspen Media Server with 3D glasses. So very Cool!
Electrolux was patiently waiting to show off their fabulous washers and dryers. Joe Visicaro, our wonderful Electrolux rep (he’s a Harley guy), led the bloggers in an engaging discussion of the appliance features. Imagine you have a load of laundry in your hands, you bump the door open with your “butt” like your dancing, kick the pedestal drawer open, elbow the soap drawer open. No hands allowed. It’s all about convenience and saving time. Just like those Kelly Ripa commercials. Bloggers were in awe when Joe mentioned Electrolux’s second floor guarantee. The washers also have a fresh air vent and an anti-bacterial coating on the gaskets to prevent mold. Of course it also boasts the largest capacity and fastest wash time in it’s class. Totally blowing everyone away!
We moved on to the cooking demo that Electrolux so graciously put together by their marketing representative Leigh Donadieu. She planned a healthy menu of tomato bisque, baked salmon, roasted Brussel sprouts and for a something sweet – dried fruit dipped in chocolate. The perfect way to demo an induction cook-top is to melt chocolate. Again everyone was so interested in all the beautiful products and great features. We tossed our schedule away and everyone stayed as long as they wanted. When your guests stay way past the ending time you know you’re throwing a great party.
Here is everyone’s blog links:
- Ed Tseng
- Katie DeVito
- Sue Gordon
- Robin Birkel
- Warren Bobrow
- Nicole Feliciano
- Bay Staley
- Jennifer McLaughlin
- Michelle Kennedy
- Nora Jemali
- Lynette Young
Thank you all for coming and writing fantastic blog posts. Good luck with the Electrolux Dishwasher Contest. I truly loved meeting everyone. Thank you Hilary Morris for making this event possible and a special thank you to Lynette Young for being the video wizard and also the great creative force behind my blog.
Future Mrs. G’s VIB Blogger Events Keynote speakers:
- January: Joanna Dolgoff, M.D. www.DrWeigh.com Healthy Choices, Health Children
- March: Suzanne Kantra, www.Techlicious.com Tech and Gaget Trends for 2010
- June: Jenny Hein and Bridgette Polmar, www.SqueezeItin.com, Take Your Workout to the Kitchen
- September: Surprise event hosted by Electrolux
Dates to be assigned shortly. Stay connected!
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