Those Double Standards

Ugh!

While I'm rarely present in my personal social media (although you can follow me here and here for my bloggy exploits), I still glance and skim articles periodically to keep my finger on the pulse of current events as well as check in on friends.

Social media is taking a turn toward real, unscripted posts now. The curated perfection people amd companies strived for before is slowly making way for real snapshots of real people being their real selves.

As a blogger, I work with different companies sometimes to do a review or demo. There are three things I am very upfront about:

1. I do not pay for followers.

2. I do not stage photos/fudge reviews. I don't nor do I want to spend hours setting up for pics and I am more likely to send a product back than lie about it.

3. I'm NOT gonna compromise myself or my views just to fit in as an influencer.

So...

All this comes about as a result of a photo recently shared. My little flower girl was enjoying a product and actually got a feature on that company's Instagram. I was pleased and even shared the link!

It was then brought to my attention that she was not featured in the same vein as other babies. While she was on tbe IG and got a good buzz generated, her little brown self was notably absent from the FB, despite that company actively posting many other babies since.

I wasn't all that aggravated at first. She got a feature with minimal work on my end--I snapped a pic and posted it. I used their hashtag to see if they'd use it and they did! Can't argue with that.

The pic is a real pic of a real baby on a real shopping trip. I didn't rope off an area of Target nor did I stage lighting and filter my kid til she looked different. None of that. I didn't coordinate her outfit and pose on an aisle with a complementary theme to said outfit.

...but because people kept reaching out to me about her noticeable absence on the FB page, I decided to have a lookie-loo.

The pointer-outers were correct! Because my baby's photo was not staged and retouched to the gods, it was not put on FB. I was a little annoyed by now because practically every other baby they featured got the double whammy.

Note: I did acrually ask them about it...no response. *shrugs*

I still can't be too mad. After all, they don't have an obligation to me. I bought the item and didn't really plan to review it. I literally needed it to make tasks easier, and it does.

It is still more than a little hypocritical that companies who swear they like real moms and want real influencers turn around and only interact with the opposite though. Specifically when those companies are owned BY MOMS. Like sheesh--you are working the "regular mom finding a solution" handle to hock your goods AND you happily accept regular dollars...be upfront with your tactics so we can decide if we want to play the social media game with you.

But I still wont be buying followers, staging unnaturally perfect photo ops, or going full pretendo for reviews.

You're still stuck with legit me! *chuckles*