00:01:14.760Today we're going to have a really candid conversation about how the Momfluencer industrial complex has grown,
00:01:19.180why moms are continuously still underestimated in the marketplace, and why influencer moms,
00:01:26.960who seemingly have a very flexible job and lifestyle, can be really susceptible to burnout.
00:01:33.200Just like all of us, we are all teetering on the brink. I started out my conversation with
00:01:38.740Chelsea by asking her why moms are actually so powerful when it comes to marketing.1.00
00:01:49.180There is a stat and like a running joke that moms make like 80 percent of the household decisions.1.00
00:01:56.520And I always say that in my house, it's like ninety nine point eight percent, maybe.1.00
00:02:00.880So, you know, women are really in charge of like most things that we purchase in the house.1.00
00:02:04.920So, you know, we don't just do kid things, but yeah, we work with mom creators and brands.1.00
00:02:09.200So we help them run campaigns together.
00:02:11.040Yeah, I mean, I would say that in my house, it is probably about 99% of me having the final decision, right? And then maybe 80% of me initiating that entire decision. But it's true that moms have so much purchasing power. And yet I think that moms have been discounted as the people with that purchasing power for a really long time.
00:02:57.600And over the years, it really has grown past that.0.71
00:03:00.380And there's many, many moms that have a very healthy business.
00:03:04.780But there still is definitely, you know, the power of mom is huge.
00:03:08.320And then some brands really try to exploit it, which, you know, I feel like it doesn't, I don't know how in-depth you want to go in the creator economy, but lots of brands get away with, you know, giving Gen Z's free product forever, right?
00:03:19.440But it's a bit of a different thing if you have three kids at home and you're a stay-at-home mom and want to make some income.
00:03:23.980You're not generally looking for product-only campaigns.
00:03:27.580Yeah, I mean, I always want to dig into the influencer industrial complex.
00:03:31.160I feel like my audience is really hungry to hear about the intricacies of how this works, especially since it's grown so much in the past six years.
00:03:40.040How did you start doing this and then specifically decide to focus on moms?
00:03:45.360Yeah, when I used to own restaurants and then I got pregnant with my second child, moved overseas to Costa Rica or I guess abroad.
00:03:52.760And I was trying to help very small, mostly mom owned companies.
00:03:58.320right they might have like a um you know like a playpen company or whatever it was I was trying
00:04:03.020to help them get into stores and all those companies all those brands really needed to
00:04:06.940use influencers and when I tried to help them find some someone to help them it was really expensive
00:04:11.960or it wasn't all moms and so you filtered through lots of creators that were absolutely not the
00:04:16.920target um so I started it just with the idea of it being moms from the get-go um and it was really
00:04:22.700like a stroke of lightning I have actually no idea why I thought that I could do this I didn't even
00:04:26.420have an Instagram account at the time I I knew nothing about marketing other than just what you
00:04:31.520know as a small business owner um but I have obviously I've learned a lot and I feel like
00:04:36.180I've kind of learned as the industry has evolved quite a bit I mean now it's a you know it's very
00:04:40.520very common to be a mom creator I feel like especially in the U.S. even if you're just I
00:04:45.480mean everyone's a creator in some capacity whether you're getting paid for it or not is the difference
00:04:48.960but yeah I really have learned a tremendous amount yet I still feel like an imposter so I still feel
00:04:55.280like, who am I to answer these questions? Which I guess is just part of being a woman.
00:05:00.240Apparently, it's part of being a woman. And if they could figure out a way to fix it,1.00
00:05:04.260they would sell that drug as fast as they sell GLPs.
00:05:08.060It is. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think men have the same the same thing.
00:05:12.740Well, I don't think men are discounted as much. I mean, I think it's really interesting to me
00:05:17.060because even though dads and men generally do not make the majority of purchasing decisions,
00:05:22.960I mean, even a man who is not married, who is not a father, I feel like their girlfriends are still really influencing what they buy and when.
00:05:34.140And yet they've never been discounted by advertisers.
00:05:44.780We obviously love sharing recommendations in many ways.
00:05:47.860I mean, obviously moms of the, you know, I grew up in the 80s.
00:05:50.840those moms were having tupperware parties and mary kay was a thing and avon right so that that
00:05:55.560really was you know back then that was their equivalent of today's mom creator but i'm not1.00
00:06:01.340sure why women just in general their their just natural instinct is to be the sourcer of things
00:06:07.680right of resources of like learning of products it's it really is interesting how our brains are
00:06:13.480just very different in that way our brains are so different and i will never allow anyone to tell me
00:06:18.300otherwise. I really won't. And it's interesting that you said, you know, moms have been sharing,
00:06:25.200reviewing, and building these kinds of trust-based audiences and businesses for so long, but it was
00:06:32.340also usually unpaid and unsupported. And now the influencer economy is a multi-billion dollar
00:06:40.120economy. Do you think that moms are getting paid what they deserve now? And if not, how can we1.00
00:06:47.280finally get them to the point where they are? Yeah, it's a good question. I think lots of moms
00:06:53.880are. I think lots of moms aren't, but I actually think the influencer model is just broken. It's
00:06:59.480not necessarily related to just moms. I mean, it happens to be moms a lot because, you know,
00:07:05.760once you get past being in your 20s, you actually want to start getting paid. And getting paid for0.95
00:07:10.300this kind of freelance work always comes with risks of, am I getting paid enough? How do I
00:07:14.480price myself i mean it's the wild west out there in terms of pricing and rates and all those things
00:07:19.280right because how do you know if you're joe from indiana and you're starting an account how do you
00:07:23.420know what you're supposed to charge it's not like there's a benchmark for a salaried career that you
00:07:27.120can say okay as you know i made this at a job so i should make this as a creator um but i think that
00:07:34.140i think that the whole industry has to change a little bit in order for everyone to get paid
00:07:37.360more fairly and i think it has to move more towards a content creation
00:07:41.000model and less towards the typical influencer that we see because you know getting paid
00:07:48.960getting paid a flat fee for how many people you reach is fine but with everything being outside
00:07:55.080of their control how do you control how your content performs right there's just there's so
00:07:59.900much outside of the creator's um creator's scope of power and i think when you focus more on content
00:08:05.400creation and selling those assets it just becomes a much more manageable and predictable career
00:08:09.760It absolutely does. And so, I mean, I do think that transparency and how people are paid in every field, honestly, is very important. Publishing is the wild, wild west. Someone can get a $25,000 book advance or no book advance, and someone else could get a $1.7 million book advance, and you have no idea the rhyme or reason behind why that happens.
00:08:32.760And it's because, you know, I also think that women don't have this kind of whisper network of an old boys club where we tell each other how much money we're making.
00:08:43.000Yeah. Yeah, it's very different in that way, for sure.
00:08:46.680And that's something that I always, you know, I mean, we get women applying to campaigns and their rate is a tenth of what it should be.0.89
00:08:52.600And in the beginning, when I was more hands on with this, I would literally email the woman and be like, just so you know, you should be charging this.
00:08:58.620You know, you're getting taken advantage of. Stop, stop, you know, valuing yourself so low.
00:09:02.180And I think that actually is equally prevalent as people overcharging. So it just really is completely unknown. And actually, even though I've been operating as an agency for six years, software was always my end goal. And I'm like, you know, just actually finished that up. And so we'll have a way that mom creators can actually be told like this is what the industry should pay you based on what everyone else is getting paid.
00:09:25.640And so that I think will help on both sides. You know, you don't want to overprice and price yourself out of jobs. You don't want to be working for way less than you should be.
00:09:34.640And so how many mom influencers are you working with at this point?
00:09:38.560We have not. Roughly 9,000 in our network. So people can either apply or we reach out to them. And then every month, I don't actually know the number, probably 400 to 500 we work with on a regular basis.
00:09:48.920And, you know, it switches. Some creators only work with us one time. Some are, I mean, our favorites work with us over and over. But it kind of depends.
00:09:55.640Yeah, yeah. I mean, the whole thing is also constantly in flux. I also know, I truly believe that social media is media generally. I mean, it is where the majority of our attention lies.
00:10:10.100How has it changed talking to marketers and advertisers in terms of getting them on board with paying influencers fairly and also then, you know, treating them fairly as well?
00:10:23.800Because I talk to a lot of influencers who find it very difficult to work with the brands because they don't understand how influencers function.
00:10:33.940You know, I think the brands are split.
00:10:36.260there's so many brands that think they can just give someone a product in an affiliate code and
00:10:40.620that mom's going to post 10 times and it doesn't that doesn't make a lot of sense to me uh then
00:10:46.100there's other brands especially i think the bigger the brand the more they see the value in paying
00:10:49.980and they're used to the rates right so i think it depends on where a brand is and they're working
00:10:54.380with influencers um there's lots of you know very confused brands that try to dip their toes into
00:11:00.700influencer marketing and are blown away that they actually have to pay them they're like what what
00:11:04.380you mean they're not going to take our $30 thermometer for free and post, you know, six
00:11:08.960times. So some people have a reality check. And yeah, the brands that, you know, I think that's
00:11:15.780one thing that I have been a stickler about the whole time is that we have lots of brands that
00:11:20.580have unrealistic expectations when it comes to timing for a mom, right? It's like we have lots
00:11:25.840of moms that give birth or have a sick child in the hospital or even just at home and they might
00:11:30.500not meet deadline for a certain project and we are always um you know in the influencer's corner
00:11:36.100letting a brand know like we will check back in with them in a few weeks but like for now they're
00:11:39.560not going to be doing anything and i think a lot of brands forget that these are mom creators like
00:11:44.180they are running their household and they have children to take care of your you know skincare
00:11:48.400reel is not their priority and nor should it be right exactly and i think that's why moms are in0.97
00:11:55.380a very particular niche. From what I've learned, so many mom influencers have entered this space
00:12:03.660because the traditional workforce is unkind at the very best and toxic at the normal end of the1.00
00:12:11.300spectrum for women and mothers, especially when it comes to the flexibility and understanding
00:12:16.860that mothers are also caregivers, that they have about 19 full-time jobs. And so protecting
00:12:23.820mother's time and space feels like a really important place to be in.
00:12:29.500I definitely think that it should be the norm. You know, like I'm an example. I have my own
00:12:34.480company. I should, I feel this, I don't want to gender it, but I feel this male pressure to work0.88
00:12:40.22060 hour weeks and put everything I can into my company because I could make so much money if I0.64
00:12:44.420do that. But in reality, I work from 10 to three on a good day. And I've still grown my company
00:12:51.080quite a lot i earned enough money as a single mom to pay for many things i didn't have as a kid like
00:12:56.240i'm doing okay and i can't imagine having a normal job where it's nine to five i can't even understand1.00
00:13:02.560that's the way that women can live it's just so stressful but i think the irony of all this is1.00
00:13:08.440that women that don't want that are brave enough to start a creator account and i love thinking
00:13:12.620about them starting with zero followers right a brand new baby fresh account and growing it to0.99
00:13:17.380being like a real business where they're getting paid thousands of dollars uh you know for one real
00:13:22.320but then the same pressure applies it's round-the-clock pressure to respond to comments
00:13:26.160and to you know analyze why that performed well in this dig in and sort of you know become a
00:13:31.400negotiator you know the world being an influencer requires so many different skill sets and i i
00:13:36.380think there's a lot of help that can come with a more transparent um you know industry that it
00:13:42.140really is community like we're we're a community of women when it comes to recommending what0.80
00:13:45.580microneedling system to use. But when it comes to how to actually, you know, make business hood0.99
00:13:51.440easier for us, there's still so much secrecy and competition. And that part's a little bit bizarre
00:13:56.000to me. Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. That blows me away all the time, too. Let's take a really quick
00:14:02.020break. And when we get back, I want to dig in a little bit to the myth of flexible work
00:14:06.100and the kinds of things that influencer marketing actually demands from others.1.00
00:14:15.580so like we said influencing is often framed as like the ultimate inflexible jobs for moms because0.93
00:14:26.340you can set your own schedule and i also think a lot of people don't realize how much work goes
00:14:32.480into content creation content creation is the one thing that breaks me i could write books all day
00:14:37.640long all day long but if i have to make the reels to promote those books i will curl up in a ball
00:14:45.240and die and I do I do on a regular basis because I do all my own social media so let's talk a little
00:14:50.640bit about how much labor actually goes into monetizing your brand yeah it is a I and I mean
00:15:00.540I speak with only you know arm's length knowledge because I'm like you I don't have social media
00:15:05.820personally I don't post anything the idea I have someone do our social media I honestly I can't
00:15:11.040handle it which is really funny like promoting anything related to my business I'm like oh that
00:15:14.820feels like i can't do that that's so interesting why do you think that is for you i just like i'm
00:15:20.820not a creative person in that way i'm not a visually creative person i don't that's just not
00:15:25.560i'd much rather massage a spreadsheet of numbers um i'm just yeah it's just not my thing i mean i
00:15:33.040don't draw i don't make videos i don't really like taking pictures so you know i think it's
00:15:37.740important to know the things that you're awful at and to never do them yes yes i mean this is why
00:15:44.180i don't make tiktoks because my tiktoks are just embarrassing they truly are it's easier though
00:15:51.580tiktok you can just hold a microphone and walk down the street and that's a tiktok
00:15:55.600i know but but no but but then it is demoralizing that people that no one ever watches it true no
00:16:02.880i know i so i think the biggest thing like i'll get into what creators have to build you know
00:16:08.160have to do to build it but i think the absolute most challenging thing for anyone creative you
00:16:12.120and I are showing the example of this is the psychological pressure influencers face by the
00:16:19.600self-imposed. You know, over the years, I've gotten close with a few influencers and, you know,
00:16:24.780I get messages late at night, like with them showing me their analytics. And do you have any
00:16:29.520idea why this didn't do well? One of my best friends is an influencer. And psychologically,
00:16:33.940it's so, so hard to have your work publicly evaluated every single day. Like that is a
00:16:40.780nightmare for me. Imagine every email was scrutinized by a team of Karens, you know, that's1.00
00:16:46.000just not doesn't seem like a fun experience. But I mean, aside from I think the downsides of being1.00
00:16:52.480a creator are the round the clock having to respond to comments, right? Like you feel this urge
00:16:57.060and this sense of urgency to always be present on your account so that you keep your community
00:17:02.300engaged. The psychological toll of things flopping when they shouldn't and, you know, being amazing
00:17:08.120when you threw it together like that is just a mindfuck and i don't know if i can swear in here
00:17:11.580as in itself then there's the pressure of having to just manage it all imagine you have you know
00:17:17.58020 or 30 collabs which many creators do at one time that's 20 or 30 mini projects with all
00:17:23.440specific briefs telling you please make sure you talk about how this algae is good at promoting
00:17:27.880you know the cells of your skin on your feet and this one like the number of details is i would
00:17:33.720find overwhelming um you know and then staying relevant finding the real the real trends what
00:17:39.300music is good it's just i don't envy them in any way even when i pay out creators and i realize
00:17:45.240they made far more than we did that month we know sometimes we work with giant creators and i'm like
00:17:49.860wow you did really well i still wouldn't trade that for anything yeah i do feel the pressure
00:17:56.020because i've watched the book industry change from oh my gosh you could just write a book and then
00:18:02.240it will be promoted in all of the book promotion places to now you have to be an influencer in
00:18:08.140order to sell your book. And so I've grown my account to 35,000. I have a sub stack. I have
00:18:13.020a podcast. I have all of the platforms. And yet it is the constant scrutiny and judgment
00:18:18.640that just destroys me. I mean, it breaks my soul on a regular basis. It is so hard. And I don't
00:18:26.140think a lot of people realize that psychological toll that putting yourself out there to these
00:18:31.920commenters it's even harder than people judging my book it really is and that is an interesting
00:18:40.500point for everything now I have friends that are you know still living you know there's in their
00:18:45.12020s still and even for their jobs which are unrelated to social media they feel like they
00:18:49.780need to have social media accounts that are successful as you know part of their resume
00:18:54.060I it's you know the pressure to be you know seen on social media and for that to be this canvas of
00:19:00.580your life you know or or your intellectual capabilities is just wild um and yeah you speak
00:19:07.880to I think what every creator feels and then imagine on top of that it's your only income
00:19:13.220and you're a stay-at-home mom and you know I can't imagine the scenarios that go on in families
00:19:18.780across the U.S. and North America I mean really everywhere but North America is the hub for mom
00:19:23.960creator-led families I think you know you see it you see creators as they grow they retire their
00:19:28.680husbands and then the husband is the helper right which I find so amazing well exactly and I say
00:19:34.220this to so many people and they're constantly surprised because so much of mom content is often
00:19:41.020very domestic in nature it's you know taking care of a house taking care of kids and yet so many of
00:19:48.260these women become the breadwinners right yeah and actually I listened to one of your podcasts0.98
00:19:54.180or I've listened to a few, but one that stuck out to me is you had a woman on who was a trad wife
00:19:59.500and really embraced that until, you know, until her husband wasn't nice to her and she wanted to
00:20:04.320get a job. I forget her name. Actually, she didn't give her name. That's why I don't know it.
00:20:07.820Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing that there's so many accounts about this because that that topic has
00:20:12.440exploded in recent years. Right. And a lot of it, a lot of it is very logical and makes sense. And
00:20:17.300a lot of it is not so logical. But whatever way you fall in that, anyone that has those accounts
00:20:22.100by default are not doing that because they they're they're the primary breadwinner.
00:20:27.840Well, exactly. Exactly. And even if they're not the primary breadwinner,
00:20:31.700they're still making a living. They're still working. And what kills me is the discounting
00:20:37.240of the labor involved in creating all of this content. And then also the discounting of the
00:20:43.540labor of general caregiving. Right. So they're like, but this is so easy. If you do this,
00:20:46.980it's just so easy. It's all just so idyllic. And you're going to be as happy as I am
00:20:50.260if you just buy this thing if you just buy this whisk uh and yet and yet you know behind it is a1.00
00:20:58.100woman who's putting in so much work and so much labor that's the that's the biggest thing that
00:21:04.620that often bothers me about influencing it's the erasure of women's labor and work yeah and you
00:21:10.940don't really see it right because if you if you follow someone you have no idea what it's like
00:21:15.540to make content or you just make videos that only your friends see so you don't really care about the
00:21:19.360you know post-production it it you have no idea how much time it takes i mean i only know as i
00:21:25.100said i don't make content but if we request revisions on content and the creator has to
00:21:29.220start again you can feel the despair in the email back you know just like oh my god i have to do
00:21:34.780this again not to mention if you have to have your kids in the content which is a whole other thing
00:21:38.880you know like getting them to cooperate we've had brands where the idea of the campaign is a
00:21:43.760surprise we're going to surprise our kids with this bouncy castle and the content there was
00:21:48.260something wrong with it they wanted her kids to be in it again and do a re-surprise and we as the
00:21:53.720logical team even though we're on the brand side they pay us we're like unfortunately she's not
00:21:58.200going to be able to do that we're not going to ask her kids to like act surprised right it's just
00:22:03.760that's you know that goes back to your question of why moms feel this difficult to act with brands
00:22:08.000like do you have children do you know like do you want it to feel like the most fake thing you've
00:22:12.140ever seen well exactly and i think that a lot of the people directing a lot of this on the brand
00:22:17.080side not all of them but often they are people without children or dads who have children but
00:22:22.160they're not running the day-to-day of the household and so they're like well of course you know i'm
00:22:27.400hiring this person to do this i'm therefore also de facto hiring her kids to do this so why can't
00:22:32.860they just perform yeah yeah and there's lots of brands too that this has become a thing and
00:22:37.720you know may the last year or so and i'm sure you've seen it lots of moms don't want to feature
00:22:41.620their kids right and so whether they just only show the back of them or they just actually make0.82
00:22:46.000content without them even in it or they blur their faces or put a emoji over. I mean, this is a
00:22:51.300polarizing topic of conversation, but many brands don't will send a brand a shortlist and they will
00:22:56.460decline the people that don't show their kids. Right. So it's like so you want them to also show
00:23:00.980their kids, but you're trying to get them to do this for a very low amount of money. You know,
00:23:05.180it is exploitive in a lot of ways. It's if you hired a, you know, a studio and photographer and
00:23:11.220models, you would you know, that would be a big pain in the butt and you would have to pay a lot
00:23:15.600more than you would if you're paying creators. And that's always kind of what I tell brands when
00:23:19.440they are dipping their toes into this. Like think of this as a photo shoot that's going to be
00:23:22.680cheaper and you don't have to deal with the crying kids. And that's usually what I tell
00:23:28.640people consuming this content to think about it as as wealth. Because I do think a lot of
00:23:34.540influencer content makes moms feel guilt and shame because we're looking at these picture
00:23:38.700perfect images and these kids that are happy all the time and they're looking at it like1.00
00:23:43.560my goddamn house is a mess. My laundry is on my bed. I had to wrestle my child to the ground like0.99
00:23:49.040an alligator this morning to get them to wear pants. And what am I doing wrong? And the answer
00:23:55.920is absolutely nothing. This is the reality for 99.9% of parents out there. It's just we're not
00:24:02.680seeing everyone else's mess because mess isn't a magazine shoot. Yeah. And that's kind of a
00:24:08.100disservice, really. You know, I think there's, you know, there's the Emily Vondes of the world who
00:24:12.260are so relatable and make you feel just totally seen and normal right and she's doing god's work
00:24:18.560then there's the moms which you know really want to have a magazine feed which is their creative
00:24:22.780outlet they're free to do whatever they want but you know i think that it's almost doing a bit of
00:24:28.200a disservice to to women i you know i don't think i would feel good about doing that i wouldn't want
00:24:32.960someone to leave my page feeling like oh how did she get her kids in a perfect photo shoot
00:24:36.500you know have the carousel post the end being like this is the reality you know because we
00:24:41.300we all already feel like we're doing the wrong, the wrong thing.
00:24:45.280We really do. Again, yet another thing that if we could fix this in pill form for women,1.00
00:24:49.720we would make millions and millions of dollars because I mean, I wake up every day and go to0.96
00:24:55.260sleep every day thinking that I'm not doing enough, that I'm not doing enough as both a mother
00:25:00.360and as a productive human in the world. And I recognize that that is bullshit because obviously,0.96
00:25:06.620you know, you talk to a therapist about this or even one of your friends that can you write down1.00
00:25:10.760all of the damn things you do in a day for both your kids and for your work and then just read0.97
00:25:15.920it out loud to yourself and you're a crazy person right and yet we all feel this way yeah i know the0.99
00:25:23.900number of days i leave work and i'm like i did nothing and then i tell my partner he's like how
00:25:27.860many calls did you have today i was like i don't know eight maybe okay well that's not nothing i'm
00:25:32.240like i know but i didn't like feel like i got anything done you know we're just so hard on
00:25:36.580ourselves. We're such an interesting, you know, I don't know. But I mean, back in the day, lots of
00:25:41.280moms stay at home. I guess they felt accomplished in some way. Maybe. I don't know. What's the
00:25:45.280secret here? Is it is working causing us to have too many, you know, mixed expectations is trying
00:25:50.520to balance both really that hard. I mean, I find it impossible, but maybe that's just me.
00:25:55.640I find it really hard, but I find it really hard because of expectations, I think. I think
00:26:02.660And not even other people's expectations on me, but the expectations that I've absorbed about what makes someone, like, quote, good at something or, you know, what is optimization and what is productivity generally?
00:26:17.260I think that's what makes it hard.0.99
00:26:18.840And, you know, going back to, yeah, a lot of women used to stay at home.
00:26:24.380But then we get all of these stories from those women about how they were just popping pills all the time and they were miserable.