getting started with cafemom
This is part of Wendy’s To Do Wish List Group Research Project
CafeMom
What is CafeMom?
CafeMom is an online community created especially for moms. Since its launch in November 2006, thousands of moms have come together online to swap stories and advice on a huge range of topics, share photos, and connect with friends. CafeMom users each get their own homepage which they can customize to show off their personality. Plus, they can start public or private groups with other moms about common interests. Moms of all ages and beliefs are now meeting, conversing, and having fun at CafeMom.
What’s so special about CafeMom?
I am still investigating this question, but it is a very active community, and their community groups span almost every topic you can think about, a few of the popular ones being “Stay At Home Moms” with 8147 members, “Toddler Moms” with 4855 members, and “Raising Girls” with 6028 members, which sadly, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to join.
Further reading:
On Mashable
On Business Week
On Social Degree
Creating your profile on CafeMom
It took me about an hour to set up my profile, but I did enter some information about my kids and also I customized my profile homepage, so I guess all things considered, an hour is not bad.
In customizing, they do offer a lot of different ‘themes’ to choose from, you just need to select a theme that you like, hit save, and you’re good, but none really suited me, so I used the ‘Advance Profile Customization’ feature to create my own look, and include a little bit of branding (details below).
Once I was done obsessing over the background, I added some information about my kids and a photo of each, I joined some community groups, I wrote a journal entry, and I added a friend! I think that it’s probably important to spend the time adding as much relevant information that you can to your profile page, as it is your ‘first impression’, so to speak. Members may not take the time to visit your personal blog, most will be visiting your profile page and using it to determine if you are someone they would like to interact with!
Socializing on CafeMom
The easiest way to socialize is to join community groups; there are a lot of active, high traffic groups discussing a wide range of topics. The groups are set up like forums, so they are easy to use and navigate, and I would suggest just responding to a few posts on the subjects that interest you. Of course, it’s to soon for me to tell how easy it is to find friends, but I did respond to a couple posts so far.
You may also invite your own friends and create a group of your own. It is very easy to do; find a small green button labeled “Share CafeMom”, and then just email your friends to have them join up!
Don’t forget to add me as your friend!
I am going to keep an eye on what happens here because I am pretty intrigued by the popularity of this site; right now there are 1509 moms logged on! To get on the “Top Contributors” list, it seems like you would need to do about 5 or 6 journal entries per day!!