On Wednesday, March 4th we hosted our fourth(!) Advisory Board call. Some of our top members and bloggers joined the Smiley team to chat about a number of topics ranging from our five-year anniversary infographic to what Smiley can do to grow its already awesome member base. Need a refresher of our first three calls? You can find the recaps here.
1. Five Years Later
As you may know, Smiley celebrated its fifth birthday recently! To mark the milestone, we crunched the numbers and put together an infographic that sums up all you’ve helped us accomplish over the years. We asked our Advisory Board what surprised them most about the numbers we came up with and across the board everyone was blown away by just how many members we have and how many kits we’ve shipped. It’s a lot!
Many were also happy to see that our “Most Wanted Product Categories For Mission” section fell right in line with what our Advisory Board would like to see.
The geography of our members has been a bit of a mystery to our community and all were surprised to learn that Brooklyn was in our top cities with the most members—everyone except one Advisory Board member who triumphantly shouted “Brooklyn in the house!”
What surprised you most about the infographic? Let us know in the comments!
2. How Would You Describe Us?
Since we’re always curious how other people describe Smiley360, we asked our Advisory Board to tell us what they tell people when asked, “Where did you get that free stuff?” Our board did a great job of getting to the core of what Smiley is all about. “I feel like I have influence over products I might not otherwise try.” One member of the board stressed the importance of the community at Smiley and how you feel like you are a part of something big and meaningful.
How would you describe us to your friends? Let us know in the comments!
3. Where Do You Turn For News And Product Information?
Television, print magazine, blogs—we wanted to know where you get most of your information.
We learned quickly that our board members stay away from the news—too much negativity out there! Our board members are great sharers and active online, so it came as no surprise to use that many of you get much of your information from Facebook, whether it be following brands or publications. Specifically a few of the board members mentioned that they tend to follow niche local publications that focus on areas they are interested in—fitness, beauty, dieting and more.
We want to hear from you all too! Tell us about the TV shows, newspapers, magazines websites and blogs you read and watch. And think about this; if you had never heard of Smiley, where would you be most likely to see or read about us? Let us know in the comments!
4. Spreading The Word Of Smiley
Smiley has been lucky enough to be featured on The Today Show and in USA Today but we wanted to know, what else can we do to spread the word about our great community (you guys!)? Not surprisingly many of our board members suggested getting involved with different charities as a way to get our name out there while also doing good for other communities. Specifically, child-focused charities were popular among the board members.
Do you have any other suggestions for how Smiley can help grow our awesome community? We’d love to hear about them in the comments.
5. What’s Your Ideal Mission?
As the call wrapped up we asked our board members what their ideal Smiley Mission would be. A few notable categories were mentioned—anything relating to children/babies, fitness-related Missions, natural or organic products, keeping things seasonal (a gardening Mission for spring, for example) and of course FOOD.
Let us know what your ideal Mission is in the comments!
Until next time.
Do you have anything to add to the topics we discussed? Do you agree with everything our board members said? We love hearing from you all so leave any thoughts you may have in the comments!
Guess if we were not invited we know were not considered one of your Top Bloggers or members . Hope they go the extra mile for you.
CynthiaBeaumont Hi Cynthia! The Advisory Board isn’t made up of all our top members. We had just six members on this call with us – if there were many more the conversation would have gotten out of control! I hope you understand that it’s not some exclusive club. The reason we share these blog posts is so that everyone can see what we talked about and have their own say on the topics discussed. You’re always welcome to give us your feedback on how we run things at Smiley360 – you know how to reach us! ^DOC
I would like to see more pet related missions. Toys, natural treats….that kind of think. I have a Boxer has has allergies, including some toys. So I am always on the look out for things that I can safely give him.
I have really enjoyed all my missions so far, I am looking forward to many more. I have a few persona l blogs, one of which is dedicated to reviews and sharing information about the samples that I try. I would like to see more missions that have the opportunity for me to share my blog posts. I write a review on my blog even if it is not a requirement of the mission.
I would like to see healthy products that have more natural ingriendents, beauty products, clothes, active wear – some things like that.
I am also very big on books, crafts, DIY…so maybe even some things like that would be neat to try.
CourtneyT Thanks for the suggestions, Courtney! You might not have to wait too much longer for some of those Missions 🙂
That’s great that you love to blog about your Missions! You can always use the Blog Review Sharing Tool to submit your link and earn points.
If you’d like, you can share your blogs with us at blogger@smiley360.com – we’d love to take a look. ^NP
Smiley360 Thank you for replying to my post! I sent a link to my blog to that address. 🙂
https://ageekygirlsramblings.wordpress.com/
Yes most Def love