Elisa Camahort Page,
Co-Founder, BlogHer
This story reads like your favorite pre-teen beach book, complete with plenty of drama and a merry band of best buddies akin to Nancy Drew and her crime-solving cohorts, or that singular Sisterhood and their travelling pants. Our particular saga stars Elisa Camahort Page, the IT it girl, Lisa Stone, the journalist extraordinaire, and Jory Des Jardins, the publishing pro. Before they met, each one was separately blogging, wondering, “Where are the women in Fortune 500 board rooms? On Op Ed pages? At tech conferences? In political and business forums? I can’t be the only one stewing; bring on the female bloggers!” It was these passionate emotions that inspired Elisa, Lisa, and Jory, almost immediately after meeting for the first time, to organize a conference to empower women bloggers. The fast friends drummed up sponsors, slapped costs on their credit cards, and power-blogged the event which sold out in 120 days.
A smashing success, the conference motivated its savvy organizers to form an LLC, pool their diverse backgrounds in media, marketing and business strategy, and launch a Web community covering all things female, from post-baby workouts to politics. They started BlogHer without any funding in January 2006, relying rather on strong volunteers, community efforts, networking, their own A-1blogging skills, a targeted approach, and again, their credit cards. A risk, yes, but Elisa, Lisa, and Jory never looked back. They bonded, brain-stormed, trusted each other, and listened to their users, offering up a platform for opinion and a place to connect. Exposure, education, community, and economic empowerment; that’s what BlogHer is all about.
BlogHer is now the number one spot for, and guide to, blogs by women, reaching more than ten million people each month through annual conferences, a Web hub, and a publishing network of over 2,700 blog affiliates.
We talked to Elisa, and what we learned from her is this: You have a kitchen cabinet of people in your life. If you want to start a business but don’t know how, start asking questions, and keep asking until you get the answer. It’s out there, and chances are someone close to you has it.
A is for Apple, B is for BlogHer
Part of our success as a team is that we didn’t know each other before diving into this adventure. Lisa and I decided at our very first meeting to organize a women blogger’s conference and I invited Jory to join us after having met her once. Our friendship was forged as we were building the business – no other baggage, no biases, no expectations. We have a shared commitment to our company. It’s much easier to get along when it’s not about us.
Assess, Discuss, Adjust
In the beginning we all worked on every part of the business and conferred on every single decision. But as we grew we had to carve up the pie and trust that after working as a unit, we had a good sense of what the team decisions should be on a day to day basis. And it actually helped that we came from diverse backgrounds but brought complementary skills to the table because our intense, shared commitment to do what it takes to succeed was all the more obvious. If one of us were less impassioned or less dedicated, this just wouldn’t work.
Differences, Yes; Disrespect, No
In a partnership, you don’t want your opinion taken for granted which is why you can’t take disagreements personally. If you’ve got an idea that the others don’t like, make a case for it! If I were afraid to let my partners critique my ideas, we’d all be in trouble. Don’t confuse disagreement with disrespect; it’s not the same thing.
Taking Risks
We definitely took a risk starting BlogHer. We were flying by the seat of our pants for eighteen months before we got funding. But that forced us to be creative. Sponsorships, ad networks, banner ads, social media, partnerships, we tried it all. So I can speak from experience when I say to other entrepreneurs – take a risk! Take a risk in whatever way you can live with. Ask yourself: What, truly, is the worst that can happen? Once you define what failure would look like, you’ll see it’s not so scary. Not trying is what’s scary!
Our Mission
We are a company that is fully dedicated to leading by listening. We turn to our community for feedback. But it’s a big community, and the challenge is not just coming to a consensus between the three of us, but to listen to thousands of women and do our best to provide what they want. There are so many paths we could take, so many projects we could tackle. It’s great to solicit suggestions and add new ideas to the mix, but we have to be disciplined enough to grow strategically. We don’t want to get too big too fast then have to subtract. We only want to add. Careful, conservative, creative is our motto.
A Matter of Trust
We trusted and relied on each other from the beginning because we all just wanted to see women’s opinions taken seriously. (We still bristle at the term “lady bloggers,” as if we’re gossiping.) But when you trust your partners, you’ll be able to share everything, even if it’s bad news. It’s easy to talk about what’s going well. If you can address unfulfilled expectations just as seamlessly, you’re going to be successful.
This Featured Lady was profiled by Susie Lacey, Associate Editor, Ladies Who Launch
