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Jen Singer was a mom blogger before the phrase was even coined!

In 2003, she launched her web site, MommaSaid.net, in her basement during naptime.

Now, seven years later, she’s got a three-book series emblazoned with her web site’s logo and a TV crew from the Today Show in her kitchen.

What is MommaSaid.net? 

It’s Jen’s little corner of the Internet where moms can go to get a good laugh about motherhood, find information to help them become good mothers, and get needed validation that they really are good moms. 

Jen says, “What mom doesn’t want to hear from somebody who cares that trying to be a good mom is important even in a world that so often forgets why good even matters.  I am that voice of reassurance.  And I love to make moms laugh, especially on those really long days when the kids are hanging from your belt loops, the laundry is piled high and the cat appears to have brought inside a furry little friend.”

While some mom bloggers dream of becoming authors, Jen Singer is an author, five times over.

The third book in her Stop Second-Guessing Yourself (HCI) parenting series is due out in May. She recently won a coveted 2010 gold Mom’s Choice Award for her parenting series, an added honor to her web site’s Forbes Best of the Web distinction. Her previous books, “You’re a Good Mom (and Your Kids Aren’t So Bad Either)” (Sourcebooks) and “14 Hours Til Bedtime” have earned high praise from American Baby, Parenting magazine, and more.

 “I’m an overnight success…that took seven years,” chuckles Singer. “People don’t realize the amount of work – blogging, writing and building brands – that it took to get here. And yes, I’ve thought of quitting more than once.”

The success of Jen’s website caught the attention of publishers and product managers years ago.  In 2007, Jen was offered the opportunity to write a MommaSaid-branded book series by HCI, the publishers of the famed Chicken Soup for The Soul enterprise. Her books have recently won a coveted gold Mom’s Choice Award for 2010.

In the corporate community, Jen is frequently tapped to be a spokesperson for Fortune 500 corporations, including Hershey’s, Pfizer, Coinstar, SC Johnson and Kimberly-Clark, where she has served as a Pull-Ups Potty Training Partner for five years.

I’ve helped translate a variety of corporate messages into the language of moms. I reach moms through print, on the radio and on TV.  Online opportunities have evolved to include hosting Twitter parties, making Skype guest appearances, and serving as the keynote at company events on Facebook fan pages. And it’s a whole lot of fun.”

Be a MommaSaid fan on Facebook. 

Longtime client and friend, Jen wrote the foreword to PR THERAPY by Robin Blakely!

The Inside Voice by Therese Crowley

THE PROBLEM:  Recently I had the opportunity to travel to a new place where there were a bunch of people who had the surprising notion that I was ‘famous’ and that I ‘had made it’. It was all very flattering and wonderful in a funny new way.  I mean, they thought I was SOMEBODY.  Somebody BIG.  But I found that it took me off guard and I got a little scared. I quietly made sure they hadn’t mistaken me for someone else.  Even when I saw my own book in their hands, I still wondered if they had me mixed up with somebody else.  I’ve been so busy writing, it never occurred to me that anyone would think I had “made it.” 

Will I ever feel comfortable in this situation?  If I buy-in to this assessment, will I get a big head?  What can I even say if this ever happens again? 

THERESE CROWLEY:  Welcome to your success. They like you! They really, really like you!  You have a public now, which requires a certain new attitude.  This, too, is a part of the job. 

Right now, you are akin to the swimming swan, or more comically, the quacked-up duck – gliding across the pond seemingly effortlessly, but paddling like hell underneath!

They have no idea how hard you’ve worked. But something within you, some kind of fire, and lava, and love, drove you to create, and now your creation is complete.  No need to be scared about the acclaim.  That’s a weird kind of pride in reverse, which we’re all subject to. It’s a false echo on the navigational radar, a lie of the negative ego that says, ‘I have no right to be brilliant.’ But, it’s still a lie….you do have a right to be brilliant.  

Accepting love and acclaim requires the graciousness of letting people give to you, without complication. The ultimate complication would be to resent your biggest fans.  Can you just let them fawn over you in ignorance, while you smile like the sphinx? 

Imagine yourself as Lindsey Vonn, winning her first alpine Gold Medal at Vancouver. You know, God knows, your best friends and parents and partner know how hard you’ve worked and how much you’ve given up–no one else has to know. No one but your peers, in private. (And one day, perhaps, your biographer!)

You may feel tired, and frustrated, and fried.  But grace under pressure shines and shines. Try one of these responses…

Keep it simple:  Thank you!  I’m so glad you liked it!  Or, I worked really hard, but it was a labor of love!

Or, be inspirational about your hard work:  I learned in my younger days, persistence is the key to writing!

Or, be humble:The parts of it I like the best–it’s as if it was written thru me, not by me–I’m honored I got to write it, and I’m glad you liked it too!

Save your frustrations and fears for your pillow talk. 
Don’t be upset by the public who loves you.  It’s okay to simply be thankful.  And, then,  just enjoy the shining. Because pretty soon, you’ll have to get back to work…

But, wait a second.  Don’t forget the rest of the story.  PR THERAPY has some critical messages that writers need to integrate into their writing consciousness this year:  Writers also write to make a living, promote a cause, or sell a product.  Your work entertains, informs, and is provocative. Whether you write novels or nonfiction, blogs or poetry, you express what others think, touch hearts, and help expand minds. 

That is your work.  So, why do writers find it so difficult to promote themselves?  How can writers reach a balance between artistic integrity and business acumen?  Who can writers turn to for encouragement, answers, and insight when the sheer act of writing is actually done alone in front of a computer? 

You can start here!   

 

Rebecca Forster

PR THERAPY welcomes Rebecca Forster and her new column Write Now.  She will help members of the writing community forge ahead in a wildly changing landscape during an exciting era of publishing transformation.  

Agents, editors, published and unpublished writers, bloggers, bookstore professionals and Rebecca Forster - a working author whose passion for both craft and promotion has not waned in over 20 years (and 22 published books) -  will offer insights about the changing life of today’s writer. 

So, keep an open mind. Figure out what strategies fit your personal style, what words lift your spirits, what thoughts inspire you. 

 Above all, relax….and enjoy the debut of Rebecca Forster’s column here on PRTherapy.com!

ARE YOU A WRITER?

“What do you do?”

“I’m a writer.”

“Are you published?”

There it is; the rock and the hard place.

All too often, people assume you are only a writer if you are published.  By a publisher they recognize, of course.  In book form, with pages and a cover.  Distributed in their local bookstores. Heck, even my own mother didn’t acknowledge I was a writer until she could physically buy a copy of my first book (never fear, I paid her back).

Even published writers can lose in this game of professional chutes and ladders. I’ve published over twenty books and, yet, when people find out my backlist is now only available for E-readers like Kindle, my previous success is somehow suspect. Instead of ‘show me the money’ the only way to prove you’re for real is  to ‘show them a book’.

So the question becomes, when do any of us become a legitimate writer? I believe it depends on the writer’s own vision of success and level of confidence. I have met people who have kept journals for years but have no desire to publish.  I have met some who have written for publication, never achieved their goals but continue to revise and refine their work. There are others who aspire to selling a screenplay or novel yet find success in magazine work, newsletter writing and advertising.

All of these are genuine writers. They share the critical professional virtues: dedication to  the craft, love of the written word and the determination to make their voices heard. Pretenders are those who do not work at writing. These are the people who sit with you at a dinner party and say:

“I have a wonderful story to tell.”

To which I respond:

“How exciting.  How far along is your work?”

And they assure me:

“Oh, I don’t want to write it. I thought I could tell you and you’d write it.”

And I laugh and refill my wine glass. I have my own stories. I work hard to write them, revise them, submit them. Sometimes they are published and sometimes they aren’t but I work every day. Like you, I am a real writer.