Friday, March 22, 2013

Mother of Invention: Mom Creates Online Baby Book for Busy Parents - MyOwnLittleStory.com


 Mother of Three Makes “Baby Book Guilt” a Thing of The Past 
By Creating An Easy-To-Use Online Baby Book With 
Email Reminders Specific to Each Baby

Move over mass-produced photo books, a mom is taking charge and changing how parents record and share their baby’s story. 

In 2006, Kristin Coons, a mom of three boys and a former financial industry executive, traded her stable career and income to become an entrepreneur.   After giving birth to her third child, she was looking for an online baby book to record the special moments in her boys lives.  When she couldn't find a book that fit her needs, she decided to create one.   In 2011, she founded MyOwnLittleStory.com: a unique online baby book with e-mail reminders specific to the baby’s current age and milestone, which can be printed at the one-year or two-year mark. Busy moms across the nation are loving the idea –joining the site at a rate of 50-100 new users a week.

Starting a company while raising three boys was not an easy task.  But, using the courage and tenacity that she so often writes about on her blog: The Inspired Mom,  Kristin decided to take a leap of faith and follow her dreams.  Without any previous experience in web-based business or knowledge of the book industry, Kristin started from scratch researching everything she needed to know about creating and publishing books online.  Even though it took almost five years to bring her vision to life, she launched www.MyOwnLittleStory.com in 2011. Her first challenge was letting parents know that her site existed, however once she earned a few enthusiastic endorsements, MyOwnLittleStory.com began growing quickly with the user base increasing from 2,000 users in year one to almost 10,000 users in year two. The site currently gets over 5,000 visits a month- which includes returning users and new users.  

Kristin specifically remembers reading a statistic that most people can only remember about 12 stories from their childhood: "I was shocked!  My family bonds over retelling stories."  To think that her kids would only remember a few stories from their childhood and that she might also forget the details of their special moments motivated and inspired her to take action.   

With MyOwnLittleStory.com, it doesn't matter if parents are at home, using a smart phone or at the office, by just answering a few questions a month, parents can jot down thoughts by responding to an e-mail reminder about their baby’s highlights and have their baby book done by their child’s first birthday. MyOwnLittleStory.com is easy to use and has more flexibility than a traditional baby book: each question is optional, any unanswered questions will be omitted from published pages and users can skip pages/milestones as well.  

“As my boys grow into men, I want them to know the stories and the special moments that my husband and I have treasured so much:  how I loved the times that they curled up in my lap, how we all enjoyed our silly dance parties or how we built sand castles at the beach,” says Kristin Coons. “My boys will know always know their stories, because I created MyOwnLittleStory.com for them.”

To learn more about MyOwnLittleStory.com, read about it here.