When mad moms blog, stores listen

By The Associated Press

When Melissa Garcia was frustrated by Old Navy's scanty coupon offerings, she didn't just complain to the store. She vented on a message board tied to her blog ConsumerQueen.com, which is read by at least 30,000 people each month and now, increasingly, by corporate America.

Within weeks, chatter in the so-called mommy blogosphere led Gap's Old Navy stores to begin issuing coupons several times a week, instead of just once a week.

Moms have always had marketplace muscle, but a new frugality driven by rising joblessness, housing woes and other economic problems has them exercising it like never before with the help of the Internet.

In this recession, their talk online encompasses everything from complaints to advice on coupon-clipping, low-budget meals and family finance. But it's not just other moms who are following every post: Retailers and consumer product makers are listening, too -- and responding.

"We see (moms who blog) as a vital force for our brand strategy," said Gap spokeswoman Louise Callagy. "They are the voice of our customers, and we are working harder to develop and maintain their trust and respond to their feedback."

After repeatedly getting blasted on blogs for not offering layaway purchase plans at its namesake department stores, Sears brought the plans back over the holidays after a two-decade hiatus.

Everyone benefits

Both the companies and the bloggers themselves are benefiting. Consumer product companies like home-appliance maker Frigidaire and Unilever, maker of Suave shampoo, are hoping to enhance their brands by giving free samples of their merchandise to key women bloggers to test and chat about on their sites, though many bloggers say it's essential to disclose such freebies to maintain credibility with readers.

• Talk back: Where do you go online for money-saving ideas?

Nevertheless, bloggers who focus on penny-pinching are helping broaden spending behavior, like doubling up on online coupons, because of their large collective audience.

The books, magazines, bulletins, newsletters and neighbors mothers relied on for similar advice in the past didn't bring so many people so much information, or nearly as fast. Now money-saving strategies can spread like lightning.

Audience of money-savers growing

More than 12% of all posts on mom-oriented blogs during March and April included mentions of the economy and saving money, up from 8% a year earlier, according to Nielsen Online, which has studied 10,000 parenting blogs.

Meanwhile, traffic to blogs written by mothers and devoted to saving money has exploded. CouponMom.com -- cited by Nielsen Online as one of the five most influential of that breed -- attracted 972,0000 unique visitors in March, five times more than a year earlier, according to the latest data from Internet research company comScore Media Metrix. Nielsen ranks mother-oriented blogs by how much chatter they garner, their number of followers on Twitter and the number of times consumers link to them from other blogs, among other criteria.

"Moms are turning to their new set of online friends and families to make all kinds of purchasing decisions," said Kelley Murray Skoloda, a partner at Ketchum's Global Brand Marketing practice and the author of "Too Busy to Shop." "Women are trusting of women bloggers. They do them a real service without commercial interest."

Continued: Wal-Mart joins the party

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