Marketing Super Heroes and Sausage

There has been some debate in various blogging circles about the approach marketers and advertisers take in working with bloggers. Many bloggers, some more than others, write/complain/mock on a regular basis about how they can't stand when and how marketers will write them asking them to pitch certain products. As much as I understand the frustration of spam and spam like pitches I for one actually welcome the opportunity. Blogging is not my job. I consider it a hobby. A hobby with benefits (hey now). See the ads from BlogHer on the right. I make a little bit of money from those ads.

I get emails from marketers all the time asking me review a product or write about some service or what have you that doesn't really fit the scope and feel of this blog. I don't get mad or annoyed. I thank the sender of the pitch with quick email telling them I am not interested but if another opportunity comes along to works well with the content of my blog then please keep me in mind. I have probably only said "yes" to maybe 10% of the marketing pitches I have received. That is not a lot. I say no because, well, I don't think throwing all kinds of product endorsements and what not is fair to the people that read here on a regular basis.

However every now and then an email pitch comes along that is just too good to pass up. It is emailed to me almost as if the person who works for the marketing company reads my blog and knows me personally. This week I got two that were too good to pass up.

I have written in the past about how I dig sausage Here Here Here Here. Hell, my very first post on P&B, my test post if you will, was about Kielbasa. I have often said if I was ever stranded on an Island the one food I would bring would be sausage.

When I received an email form Hillshire Farms asking me to "try" their Beef Smoked Sausage to review, how could I say no? Here is the funny thing, I put the quotes around the word try because we get Hillshire Farm products all the time. I do not need to review it. Hillshire is one of the best out there when it comes to Brats and links. They sent me a free packages of their smoked sausage and one of their Kielbasa, a cook book with some pretty impressive looking recipes and an apron that says "Go meat." The best part was that it was delivered on Lauren's birthday, so, that's right, she got sausage for her birthday present (hey now). We tried this recipe and even though I do not like spinach I do like sausage and cheese. The meal was very good and the leftovers made a great lunch. Also I love that Hillshire Farm's website is Go Meat.

Hillshire Farms wants to offer one of P&B readers a chance to win a free Sausage a month for a year. The winner will receive 12 coupons, each for one free product. A years worth of sausage. To enter leave me a comment telling me what one food you would want to have if you were stranded on an island (Dharma Initiative foods are not an answer). I will pick one winner at random.

But wait, there is more (I sound like Ron Popeil).

The other day I received an email from a woman with Hachette Book Group offering me a chance to give away some Iron Man Books (Junior Novel and easy reader books) for kids. Seriously, these marketing people must stalk me or something. They must know that my son Wyatt dresses up as Iron Man every day. They have to know that I am a recovering comic book addict , that our house is filled with super heroes and that I compare blogging to comic books.


Anyway the seven books (listed here) are all based around the new Iron Man 2 Movie coming out this May. I was introduced to Iron Man in either the late 70s or early 80's in the comic book the Avengers. I still remember my first issue of the Avengers. If you would like a chance to win the Iron Man Super Hero Super Giveaway book collection (I have three I can give away so that is three winners) please leave me comment trying to guess what was the issue number of my first Avengers comic (comic books have issue numbers starting with #1 and each month is a new issue). The three guesses that are closest to the actual issue number will win the 7 Iron Man books. Once a number is guessed it cannot be used again so be aware of the guesses in the comments.






You can leave a comment for a chance to try and win both the sausage and the Iron Man books but you need to tell me your Island Food and the issue number. Winners must live in the Continental US (or Canada for the Books Only). Winner must make it easy for me to contact you (like have a valid blogger account or email address or just, you know, make it easy). Also The publisher cannot send the books to a p.o. box. I will stop taking entries on Sunday 3-21-10 at 11PM.--