Mom as a cross-cultural discussion driver

Saturday my wife pointed me to an article in the NY Times about "eco-moms" organizing in California and she noted there were a couple of eco-blogs in there. Environmentalism is just one of the issues around which moms organize, and the environment will be an increasingly important issue in November and beyond.

The Times is on to something, but it's not that moms are suddenly going green. The angle here is the "unlikely" advocate. This is the type of thing I search for every day at work.

For me, Jennifer Lance at Eco Child's Play (an affiliate of enviro-juggernaut and Best Blog EVAH Green Options) and Izzy Irish at Moms Speak Up have been driving the discussion on environmental issues for some time now. It's not that they're on the cutting edge of clean technology like EcoGeek or leading the environmental policy discussions like Maria Energia or Ecopolitology. It's that Jennifer and Izzy help make eco-issues more "mainstream."

The truly important lesson here is that from an online perspective, "mom" serves as a bridge between communities and cultures. Moms care about everything. They talk about everything. They buy nearly everything. They vote on everything. And they're not shy about sharing opinions. However, moms also use their blogs to discuss their unique interests beyond their kids and what's on Oprah. They network with the best of them, and many have relationships far beyond the mom-o-sphere.

This is the thing most online marketers miss - they try to fit online moms into a ready-made demographic designed to assess acceptance of a cleaning product. Try to pitch an online mom to write about an exciting new furniture polish, and you get what you deserve. Engage a mom on the issues she writes about, and you've opened a door to multiple communities.

Saturday I noticed that Liza Sabater from techPresident is linking to Jenn Satterwhite at Mommy Needs Coffee - a gamer and mom in Dallas with a large audience who happens to really like Michelle Obama. Satterwhite isn't really overtly political, but she's very influential and opens a door for smart and strategic political operatives to reach new communities, forge new relationships and alliances, and build coalitions.