It’s Election Day in Arkansas. Hopefully, you’ve already taken advantage of Early Voting and cast your ballot for the best Arkansas candidate. If not, why not hop on over to your polling place and do that right now. What an important freedom we have to participate in the electoral process.
You may be as tired as I am of all of the campaign ads (which, of course, will be with us through November anyway), the political flyers and events, and the robocalls. Hubby just told me that I was wasting my time trying to carry on a conversation with the robocall guys. But I figure if they can get all personal asking me how I’m going to vote, then I should return the favor and ask about whether or not they have on clean underwear and all. My momma would be so proud of me for that.
In addition to voting for your public officials, it’s also time to enter your the Arkansas Times “Best of Arkansas” vote, and I seriously hope you will take a moment from your day to go do that. The voting ends on June 23.
While you’re there, could you take an extra minute or two to locate the Best Blog category? Keep moving on through the pages. I promise it will eventually show up. Your vote for ArkansasWomenBloggers.com would be lovingly appreciated. Or, any of our #ARWB member blogs if you are otherwise inclined.
I promise. (Don’t most politicians do that?) There will NOT be any campaign materials sent to you through the mail. Nor will you receive yet another robocall. Actually, I won’t even friendly call you. Sorry. You don’t have the time for that, and I probably don’t either. Retirement does have a way of keeping me busy.
Anyway, it’s probably raining again today so you can’t get outside to lounge around the pool or plant zinnias or marigolds in the garden. While away your time by filling in at least 10 of the voting categories on the “Best of Arkansas” form (online or in print)…it will at least be an interesting read.
Since November we have been hinting to you about a gathering this spring. Well the time has arrived!
We want to extend a formal invitation to all of you to join us at the Historic Arkansas Museum in downtown Little Rock for an official Arkansas Women Bloggers meetup! Mark your calendars for Saturday, April 28th and don’t forget to bring all your bloggy friends! Here’s our agenda for the day:
9:00am – We’ll break into small groups lead by the ARWB Gals to discuss the blogging topics most important to you! Help and be Helped by your fellow Arkansas Women Bloggers!
10:00am – Learn a little more about the Historic Arkansas Museum, which has graciously stepped up to host our meetup.
10:30am – Time for refreshments, networking (that means chatting), and exploring the museum.
12:00noon – grab your ARWB friends, new and old, and head out to lunch in the downtown area. There’s something for everyone within easy walking distance. Then, save room for dessert and head across the bridge to the Argenta Market in North Little Rock and hit the Foodie Bloggers Charity Bake Sale (watch our website for more info on this event)!
We’ll also be giving away an attendance spot for our ARWB Conference scheduled for June 1-3 at the Ozark Natural Science Center! We’ve got some other goodies and fun in store too. In support of the Food Bloggers Bake Sale, anyone who brings baked goods for the sale to the meetup (we will transport them to the sale for you) will get an extra entry into the conference giveaway!
The Historic Arkansas Museum has reserved parking, so save your meter/garage parking money for the Museum’s fun gift shop, which is full of fantastic wares made right here in Arkansas. You can go here to RSVP for the meetup on Facebook, or you can leave a comment to let us know that you’ll be attending.
A lot of you probably have set new goals for your blog with the new year, right? Maybe you want a new layout, or you’re going to participate in a new meme, or you want to expand the reach of your blog. Each of these goals takes time and effort, so you’ll want to see the payoff of all your hard work. But, how do you measure the results?
Alongside your own level of personal satisfaction, understanding your blog stats can be a great way to measure the impact of improvements you make to your blog. But, stats can be difficult to decipher, and culling out the valuable information is sometimes a chore. Here’s a quick primer on blog stats.
How Do I see My Stats?
If you are running on a free platform like WordPress.com or Blogspot (aka Blogger), your stats are built into your blog dashboard. If you are running a self-hosted site, your host provider likely provides a stat interface like AWstats or Webalizer. Probably the most commonly used site stats tool for self-hosted blogs is Google Analytics, which is what I primarily use.
The Main Dashboard for Google Analytics
Unfortunately, each of these methods breaks stats down in different ways and formats, so we won’t give a specific tutorial on moving through your stats interface here, BUT, let’s talk about some of the most standard statistics that you’ll want to track on your site.
Daily Visits – This is usually the easiest stat to see when you get into your stats interface. It’s useful because you can see which days had more visitors, and hopefully, correlate an increase in visitors with something you did on your blog, like writing a fantastic post, or linking to your blog from Facebook.
Unique Visitors – This is the number of different people (computers) that access your site. Usually we track this on a monthly basis. If your number of “uniques” is going up, you’re getting more people coming to your site! You can increase your unique visitors every month by utilizing SEO techniques and/or by promoting your blog on social networking platforms.
Visits – This is different from unique visits in that it counts the number of times that your site has been accessed. So, if your Mama visits your site every day for a month, she counts as one unique visitor, but she’s given you 30 ticks on your visits stat. Ultimately, you want your “uniques” to come back to your site over and over. The best way to do that is to give them a reason to come back!
Page Views – This is how many pages have been viewed by your visitors. So, if your mom comes to your site and just looks at the newest post, that’s one page view. But, if she clicks around on your archives, topics, bio, etc…your page views will go up. Easy ways to up your page views are to put links by post category in your sidebar, or to link to your own related posts in each post you write (Like I just did in the two bullet points above).
Bounce Rate – The bounce rate is the percent of visitors who come into your site and then leave your site without clicking on anything. For bloggers, this number is usually pretty high because our newest content is usually on the first page that visitors get to, so they don’t need to go anywhere else to find what they are looking for. However, a lower bounce rate means that your visitors are interacting more with your site, and that’s definitely a good thing!
What About that Alexa Chick?
You may or may not have heard of Alexa, which is another form of site ranking. Alexa ranks websites based on a number of components, including number of visitors, geographic reach, and the number of websites that link in to your blog. You can get your site’s Alexa rank at Alexa.com. Or, you can download the Alexa tool bar, which enables you to not only see your own site’s Alexa rank, but also the ranking of every site you visit.
Why Do I Care?
As I mentioned, stats are a good way to get feedback on how the work you do on your blog is paying off. If you want to work with companies or other PR efforts, the folks you will be working with will likely want to know the key components I listed above.
That said, don’t get too tied up in your stats. Spend some time in your stats interface to learn how it works and where to find the data that is important to you, and then mark your calendar to check it every week or two. Unless you are in the middle of a major campaign or change on your blog, there’s no reason to check your stats daily, and you’ll end up wasting a lot of time. Also, unless you are trying to make a business out of your blog, don’t put too much weight in your stats. Remember what your purpose for blogging is in the first place, and use your blog stats to help you meet your goals.
If you have specific questions about anything related to blog statistics, please leave them in the comments and we will do our best to answer them! (If you’re wondering about something, there are probably several other bloggers who are too!)
This post was written by Fawn, ARWB Managing Editor and blogger at Instead of the Dishes.
Sometimes writing blog posts can seem challenging because we aren’t sure what to write. I’m not talking about writer’s block (that is a whole other post someday), but am instead talking about what kinds of posts to write. Sure, you can just use it like a Hello Kitty diary and write whatever hoops in your heart, but maybe you are trying to mix it up a bit and want to add a different spin to your blog. Not only that, there is some science that folks click on different kinds of blog posts. So your chances of gaining more clicks improve when you mix it up a bit. Here are 5 types of blog posts that you can start interspersing into your blog:
1. How To’s
The number one kind of post that is searched on is how to do something. Really, anything. People look up how to hem pants, how to cook omelets, how to fix the dripping sink, how to dance like Brittany Spears, and on and on. There are a few ways to do the How To post that draw attention. First, you can do it straight like a recipe and just spell it out in text. That works for some people and if you are doing your first how to it might be where you start. Second, you can do a detailed photo post. This has step by step instructions. Pioneer Woman is famous for these and the visuals really draw you in and convince you that you can make that amazing Moroccan Meat Loaf. Third, step into the land of video. Video is, hands down, the most searched vehicle on the web. Show people how you do something and you will draw hits over and over. Your videos do not have to be perfect. They don’t have to have TV studio production values… in fact, it might be better if they don’t. Just shoot it and post. You will see magic numbers happen.
2. Reviews
Sure, there are a million reviews out there, but if I read your blog and I am getting to know you I want to know what you like. I am building a relationship with you and I want to know what kind of toothpaste you are into. Seriously, you might think that your reviews or ideas about products are only useful if you are getting paid to post them, but the blogosphere has allowed us all into your supply closets. So, tell me about the sheets you have, the restaurant you went to, the new spice you are using – anything that you love/hate and I will be interested. Just remember if you are or are not compensated tell me that too. I want to know if this is an unvarnished opinion.
3. Show & Tell
One of my favorite things is show and tell. I am just a grown up kindergartener. I know that. But really, if you go shopping at Sephora, unpack your little bag on video and show me what you got. I love it. Did you just redecorate a corner of your house? Show me. I love to see what people are doing. Are you working on a new work project? Show me that too. I can’t be with all the bloggers I read, but I love to peek into their lives. And the more you show the more interested I am – well, keep your pants on. I don’t want to see that.
4. A Rant
Yep. Get personal. Get loud. Get passionate. If you rant about something, anything, people will read it. Get on your soap box and tell me about what you love, hate, want to fix, think someone else should fix and you will get hits. People love to watch a hissy fit from a distance. Rant away.
5. Projects
Involve your readers in your projects that you are tackling. This especially works with projects that you do every day. “30 Days of Drawings”, “40 Kinds of Soups”, “30 Days of Photos”, etc. Whatever you are doing make a project out of it and invite other people to participate. One way to do that is to create Flickr group that allows them to post their photos which creates a community around your project. You can also link back to posts that participants are doing – creating a lot of link love!
There are hundreds of kinds of posts, but I encourage you to try one of these and see what results you get. I know that one thing that will happen is that you will post more frequently when you commit to trying something different, experience some kind of rise in blog hits, and start to find your niche. Don’t ever feel like you are stuck doing one kind of post – it is your blog and you can mix it up anyway that you want to. That is the beauty of self publishing. Now go write posts!
Jacqueline Wolven blogs at MoxieWorks: Real Life Marketing for Small Buisiness and Small Towns and MoxieLife where she explores the beauty of living in the South and being in her 40’s. Her passions are doing good work, zen business, gtd and living the life you create. She left a successful career in San Francisco as the director of marketing to build her own, personalized, studio dedicated to helping small business. What she left behind were pointless meetings, red tape, and budgets that were astronomical. What she gained was a sense of living my life on my own terms, the ability to help clients have real success, and the joy of saying yes or no when she needed to.
There’s a scene in the 80’s classic movie, Beaches, where a fledgling theater company opens a show and has a post-show party. Mid-party, someone runs into the theater with a pile of newspapers, just hot off the presses, and everyone devours the reviews. Lines from the reviews are quoted, and they include lofty philosophical posturing and big words designed to make eloquent cultural statements. The reviews are good, so everyone is happy, and the star actress goes on to a successful career on Broadway.
When I entered the arts administration world a few (ok, 11) years ago, the tradition of the theatrical review was still more common than not. The Beaches scene wasn’t actually that far from the truth. A show opened a multiple week run, and on opening night, a reviewer or critic came to the show and wrote a review that was published the next day. If it was good, sales went up, and if it was bad, the marketers buckled down and designed a plan to convince everyone that the critic/reviewer was wrong.
Much has changed since then. In most places, including Northwest Arkansas, where I live and work, reviews in the newspaper are a thing of the past. Our dogged arts reporters try to keep the tradition alive by posting online reviews and blog entries, but they certainly don’t have the influence of vaunted arts critics like Ben Brantley of the NY Times or Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, and even those legendary reviewers are becoming less important in the average consumer’s decision to attend an arts event.
Opinions vary on if this is a good thing or not. Here’s an emotional article from someone who believes the latter, but many believe that in the age of facebook and instant (and often anonymous) comments, audience feedback is the most powerful tool marketers can harness (here’s an example of what I’d call “extreme patron reviews”).
The debate about the demise of the theatrical review will likely continue, but what does this mean for the average blogger? It actually means great things, because marketing types like me are always searching for new ways to connect to our potential customers, and popular blogs can be an excellent way to meet this goal. At Walton Arts Center, we’ve enjoyed some fun partnerships with blogs and bloggers over the past few years, to the point where creating a promotional giveaway for certain very high traffic blogs is just a regular part of our marketing efforts.
So, if you’re a blogger with a pretty good following (ie, more than just your parents and close friends), and you have a love of the arts, you might consider blogging about the art that you see and experience. Depending on the philosophy and marketing tactics of the arts organization, you might find yourself with opportunities to get free tickets or early access to shows, or have your blog featured on the social media platforms of those organizations.
Here are some tips about how to form a partnership with an arts organization:
1. Don’t be afraid to call us or email us; we’re pretty busy, and it might take a time or two for us to be convinced you’re the real deal (see #2), but if you are, we’ll definitely get back to you.
2. Know your statistics, and who’s reading your blog, and try to determine if they match the organization’s target demographic
3. Offer to blog about a show, or host a giveaway, in advance of the performance date
4. If it’s a show with multiple nights, offer to come on “press night” and post a “review” the following day
5. Put a link to the organization’s main site, and their blog site, on your blog (simple, but valuable!)
If you do decide to do a “review”, you’ll endear yourself to the arts organization if you:
1. Do your homework; know the kinds of shows you like and can talk intelligently about, and read reviews from other critics
2. Be professional in both your praise and your criticism, and don’t make it personal if you disagree or dislike something you see or experience
3. Try to say more than “I liked it,” or “I hated it.” Try to reflect on the audience and the context in which the performance happens (ie, did the audience seem to engage with the content, did it speak to larger issues in the community and society?)
4. Ask lots of questions of the marketing staff; we love to talk to you and brainstorm with you.
Most of all, have fun and be open to new ideas. Marketers are really interested in the audiences you are speaking to, especially if you’re a trusted voice in your readers/subscribers lives.
Jodi is a former actress/producer turned arts administrator who looks to blogging as a creative outlet since she’s no longer on or backstage. Originally from New England, she came to Arkansas by way of Wisconsin, collecting a master’s degree in business (and an appreciation for mild winters) along the way. She currently lives in Fayetteville with her shelter dog, Sadie. She spends her days as Vice President of the communications department at Walton Arts Center in downtown Fayetteville. You can hear Jodi Thursdays during the noon edition of Ozarks at Large on KUAF 91.3FM and can check out her personal blog at http://carominus.blogspot.com/.
Arkansas Women Bloggers has been at its new home for three weeks and what a whirlwind it has been. We have been giving prizes and hoping to entice the 400+ members of our old site to head on over and join us here. If you have not taken the time to join us yet, we hope you will soon! There is power in numbers and we have several deals in the works that will be sweeter, the more members we have. If you have joined us, THANK YOU! We hope you will continue to encourage all your bloggy friends to join us as well.
We want to take a moment to congratulate all of our recent winners and to sincerely thank all of the sponsors of the great giveaways that we have had so far. We will be having many more giveaways and exciting events in the near future.
Recent Winners on ARWB
Jackie W. won the Cooks Illustrated – Best Make-Ahead Recipe from Lyndi of NWA Foodie.
The Pinterest Challenge Wreath Giveaway, sponsored by Gina of Desperately Seeking {Gina}, is still in progress. Please click here for more information on how you can enter to win.
Please help us to show appreciation to our sponsors by taking a moment to visit their websites and follow them on Facebook, Twitter and other social media.
We’ve experienced a paradigm shift in the blogging world over the past several years. When I began blogging, most of my peer sites read like personal journals, long blocks of text with little to break them up aside from an indention and a hard return. These days, if you don’t have an eye-catching photo to kick things off, you are likely to get passed over, no matter how good your writing.
Early in my experimentation in digital photography, a fellow blogger complemented me on my shots and lamented her lack of high-end photography equipment. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that I was using a basic point-and-shoot that set me back about a hundred bucks. Years later, I’m still using that little work horse, but I like to think I’ve progressed a bit and learned a few valuable tips.
Shoot a lot of photos.
Seriously, go to the edge of ridiculous and then shoot a few more. Unless you are shooting on film (in which case you probably know far more about photography than I do) there really is no longer an excuse to be stingy with your shots. Few things are more frustrating than getting a photo that is almost perfect. Even the best of us occasionally lose focus or inadvertently crop out a bit of our subject. Additionally, you don’t want to end up with the perfect vertical shot only to realize in editing that what you need is the perfect horizontal. Finally, there are few exercises more valuable than looking at dozens of shots from slightly different angles and from varying distances to figure out a style you like, not just for that shot, but for future shots. With over six years in, I still take about thirty shots of any still life that I set up.
Natural light is your friend, and the in-camera flash is your last resort.
Mid-morning sunlight is a photographer’s dream, and mid-afternoon is a close second. Shoot during these slots whenever you can. Photos will have a natural depth of field and shadows will be soft and diffuse. Sunlight during the rest of the day will be sharper, but with screening and bounces, you can still use it for great shots. Whatever light you have to deal with, you can help it a bit with bounces and screens. The goal with these techniques is to even out your light, giving you fewer hot spots and shadows. About ninety-percent of the time, I’m shooting indoors in front of a large window. This gives me one major light source. Since I’m shooting a three-dimensional object, it stands to reason that I want to get light all around it. I do this by putting a bounce opposite the window and beyond the object I’m shooting.
Just about any large, flat expanse of white with work as a bounce. I have a fabric draped pvc frame I use for big projects, but I encourage you to use what you have. When I’m enjoying a meal out, the company and food come first and the photos come second, so I don’t like to carry lot of gear. That said, I don’t hesitate to use my water glass as and impromptu tripod or my white napkin or bread plate to bounce light. In a pinch and see someone in a white t-shirt? “Excuse me, sir!”
I use screens far less than bounces, but they are invaluable in particularly harsh light. Unlike a bounce, screens are placed between the light source and the subject. Screens will block some light, bounce some light, and let some light straight through. The overall effect is much softer light and less harsh shadows. I use a tulle covered pvc frame as my screen for most projects, adding layers of cheesecloth or thin cotton fabric if needed. A flour sack dish towel draped over the window works as well. I almost always use a bounce when using a screen.
These photos taken of the same subject during the same time of day show the difference between results with the in-camera flash (left), natural light from a single source (center), and natural light using a bounce (right).
Explore and experiment with your camera’s settings.
I love my camera’s macro setting. It is perfect for the many close-ups I shoot, allowing the camera to focus clearly on objects within a fraction of an inch from the lens. Although you have less control with this automatic feature than you would with a special lens, you can still create some great effects through a bit of trial and error. Most cameras will indicate which area of the frame will be in sharpest focus, so you can adjust as you shoot. Find your own favorite feature of your camera!
A very simple shot can be made a little more interesting with the macro setting which puts the area of the subject closest to the lens in sharp focus and slightly blurs the background.
Photograph things you love.
Just as with writing, it will be obvious from your photos if you are passionate about your subject. If you are trying to copy others who have better equipment, more training, and a bigger budget, you doom yourself to failure and discontent. If you are creatively pushing your limits to capture a subject the means something to you, most likely you are enjoying life and getting good pictures.
My mom doesn't like photos of her hands, but from her wedding ring, to the veins that run in the same pattern as mine, to the fact that they are always doing something for someone else, I think they are beautiful.
Play with your photography!
Take plenty of shots of anything that interests you and make use of natural light and the features of your camera. The more photos you take, the more you will begin to develop and eye for the kind of photos you want to take. What are your best photography tips?
Stephanie, originally from Wonderview, AR, now lives in our state’s capitol. A freelance graphic artist and a local-food
activist, she enjoys gardening, photography, and cooking. You can indulge in more of her musings by visiting her blog, Proactive Bridesmaid , which celebrated its sixth anniversary in June. Stephanie was Arkansas Women Blogger of the Month in December 2011.
One of the easiest ways for you to get involved in the Arkansas Women Bloggers community is to write for us. We have said this before but I want to remind you that ARWB is about YOU, our members. Our goal is to provide a community where you can connect with other like-minded women. We want you reading each other’s blogs and a great way to let everyone learn about you and your blog is to write a feature article for us! Hopefully we can offer some answers to the questions you may be having about writing for ARWB.
Why should I write for ARWB?
In every article you write for Arkansas Women Bloggers we will provide a short bio of you along with links back to your blog. Many ARWB readers will click through to your blog. This helps to build your personal readership.
Guest writing for another blog can also help to build your writing skills. When I (Julie) began guest posting on other blogs I brought my writing to a whole new level. I became more aware of my ‘voice’ and more aware of my writing style. I wanted my pieces to be their absolute best. This
new found quest for ‘perfection’ carried over into my own blog and I found myself writing more meaningful pieces all around.
What can I write about?
Write about what you love. You don’t have to change your style or your preferred genre to write for us. Write in your own voice, make it
authentic. We are open to myriad topics but will also provide you with an editorial topic each month to help you get started. We intentionally leave the topics slightly vague to allow you to interpret it in your own way. You can find the list of upcoming topics in the sidebar of our website.
Upcoming editorial topics:
Handmade Holiday (December) New Year, New You (January) Love Story (February)
Other topics you might consider:
Photography Tips
How-to’s and Tutorials
Great Blogging Tips
Cool Apps
Recipes
And many more!
Can I publish something I have written before?
We’ve done some research on SEO and how Google and other search engines rank pages. It turns out that duplicate content is really detrimental to BOTH pages on which the content appears. Since our goal is to drive traffic TO your blog we have made the decision not to post duplicate content. We will ask you to refrain from posting the content you submit on ARWB on your own blog or in any other online source. However, each Wednesday will be Retro Wednesday on ARWB. We will provide links to your favorite posts for others to enjoy.
How can I submit a Guest Post or a link for Retro Wednesday?
Before submitting a post, please check out our Guest Post Guidelines. Everything you need to know is outlined there. Once you have
completed the checklist you can email guest posts to Julie@arkansaswomenbloggers.com with the words ‘Guest Post Submission’ in the subject line.
If you would like to submit a post for our Retro Wednesday feature please email a short excerpt (300 characters or less) along with a link
to the post to Julie@arkansaswomenbloggers.com with “Retro Wednesday” in the subject line. Please be sure to also include your name and blog title. Please note that we will keep an ongoing list of Retro Wednesday posts and may not be able to notify you regarding the specific day on
which your link will appear.
Please help grow our community by writing a guest post for us! Any questions can be directed to Julie@arkansaswomenbloggers or any of our other lovely ladies.
Stephanie, Fawn, Beth and myself are all pretty fond on Arkansas Women Bloggers and we think you are too! Well it turns out that we have another fan, a pretty famous fan! Ree Drummond (yes, thePioneer Woman) thinks what we are doing is pretty cool and has offered two autographed copies of her books to two lucky members of Arkansas Women Bloggers! Pretty cool, huh? We think so!
We will be giving the autographed copy of Ree’s cookbook, The Pioneer Women Cooks, to the member of Arkansas Women Bloggers who refers the most new members between 7am TODAY through 7pm on Sunday, December 4th.
We will be giving the autographed copy of Ree’s love story, Black Heels to Tractor Wheels, to the member of Arkansas Women Bloggers who refers the most new members between 7am Monday, December 5th through 7pm on Wednesday, December 7th.
It’s that simple! We have added a ‘Referred By’ field to the registration form to make it easy for us to keep track. All you have to do is ask your local women blogger friends to list your first and last name or the name of your blog in the ‘Referred By’ field!
Here are four suggestions to help you drum up some referrals:
1. Tell Your Friends
When you are chatting in person, through email, on the phone, or via IM to your gal-pals tell them about Arkansas Women Bloggers and invite them to join. Make sure to tell them to put your name in the ‘Referred By’ field.
2. Blog About Us
Chances are there are at least a few local bloggers lurking around on your blog. We would love for them to find out about us and reading about us on your blog is a great way for that to happen. Please urge your readers to check out our site http://arkansaswomenbloggers.com and to join us by filling out the registration form on our join us page(http://arkansaswomenbloggers.com/join-us/). Make sure to tell them to put your name or blog name in the ‘Referred By’ field.
3. Facbook About Us
Here is a sample status update:
Arkansas Women Bloggers is a great place for women bloggers to Gather, Grow and Connect. I’ve joined them and think you should too! Sign up with them and tell them (insert your name or blog name) sent you! http://arkansaswomenbloggers.com/join-us/
4. Tweet About Us
Here is a sample tweet:
I joined @ARWomenBloggers & think u should 2! Tell them (name or blog name) sent you! http://bit.ly/u1AE1V
And of course there must be rules!
You will be awarded ONE referral point for each person you refer to Arkansas Women Bloggers regardless of the number of individual blogs they register. You must be a registered member at the new Arkansas Women Bloggers website to win. If you haven’t registered yet, you may refer yourself for one referral point. All currently registered members will automatically be awarded one referral point. You will only be eligable for referral points for registration entries AFTER you have registered. Since we are trying to grow our Arkansas based membership you will only recieve referral points for registration entries within the state of Arkansas. All registrants must have vaild blogs. In the event of a tie for the most referrals, the referrer with the first valid referral point that was not themself will be declared the winner. Each contest will be seperate and only entries recieved during the times indicated above will be valid. Prizes will be mailed to the address provided by the winner on the registration form.
The Arkansas Women Bloggers Leadership Teamhas been eagerly anticipating this moment: the debut of our new site! We have grown up and moved over to WordPress, mercy, help us now girls, we are loving it and learning something new constantly.
While the Arkansas Women Bloggers launch year, 2009, was not that long ago, it is amazing to realize how much we have grown and evolved. With 430 women bloggers throughout the state of Arkansas hopping on board, a fantastic conference held at the Ozark Natural Science Center this past June, and a wonderful meet-up in Little Rock under our belt, we wanted to have a site that will help all our members to have a place to Gather, Grow, and Connect in this bloggity world.
We cherish every one of you who has been with us along the way! We are excited to meet any newbie bloggers and those who were not fortunate enough to have heard about our amazing group of women before. Please invite all your bloggy friends to hop on board! Everyone needs to sign up (or re-sign up for all our existing member gals). It is free!
Hop over here and fill out our form and voilà, welcome to the gathering place to make friends with other Arkansas women bloggers, share stories and experiences and be inspired! Oh yes, there is more, The Pioneer Woman generously donated one copy of her cookbook and one copy of Black Heels to Tractor Wheels, yes, both signed by her (Ree), for a giveaway. Go join the NEW ARWB and you will be entered.
Our MISSION: To be an Arkansas-based blogger community dedicated to growing women by gathering them into a common space with common objectives and by connecting and empowering them for the greater good.
In summary: Gather. Grow. Connect.
Our VISION: -Gather: provide a gathering place, a sense of community and sisterhood and connections that yield results. -Grow: offer education, tools, resources and connections delivered in a balanced manner to allow every woman to grow her blog and her voice. -Connect: supply opportunities, professional connections, platforms and networking to help our bloggers build their personal brands.
Remember gals, go sign up now! Don’t delay, you need Ree’s cookbook to plan your holiday meals.
. Or, any of our #ARWB member blogs if you are otherwise inclined.
