Catalog Community: Blogs Help Motherwear and Carson Find their Voice

Blogs are helping catalogers Carson Wrapped Hershey’s Chocolates and Motherwear communicate with their audiences and boost sales.

Motherwear sells clothes and accessories for breastfeeding moms, while Carson markets Hershey bars with customized wrappers for wedding favors, baby announcements and other events.

Both companies began blogging last year. Despite knowledge of the topic thanks to being a father and grandfather himself, Motherwear International Inc. president Tom Kothman knew that as a man, he probably wasn’t the right voice for the blog.

He retained a lactation consultant to write the blog (http://breastfeeding.blog.motherwear.com), which has gotten 65,000 page views so far. The blog soon became the third ranking referral source for new business on the motherwear.com site, thanks to people finding the blog via keyword searches and then linking to the store.

Since its inception, 25% of all new visitors to the Motherwear site have come in through the blog, says Kothman. And even better, the customers who were referred to the Motherwear site from the blog place orders 15% higher than customers referred from other sources.

“A blog gives you credibility and supports the brand,” he says.

Carson is using its “Wrapping About” blog to both support the brand, and generate traffic from search engines.

“It gives us a place to talk about the products in a different way from the Web site and the catalog, says Scott Frederick, president, sales and business operations for Carson.

The blog (http://carsonbars.typepad.com) also gives Carson a way to get employees involved; all are encouraged to write entries.

Recent posts have covered a taste testing session where employees tried new Hershey products, an update on new shipping policies, and photos from a recent employee baseball outing.

Frederick and Kothman spoke earlier this week at ACCM in Boston.