Izeafest – Day 2
We learned on Day 1 that we had to get there bright and early to make sure that we got a plugin for our laptops. Without that, day one didn't have a lot of blogging or twittering going on. Well, at least not from me. Day 2 (aff) started with a keynote speech from Merlin Mann. I have to say that it was one of the best keynote speeches I have ever heard. His speech was about “don't be a dick”. Everything he said was true. He even asked the audience to disagree with what he said, but no one did, because he was right.
The next panel was Social Network and included Michael Brito, Sean Bonner, Etan Horowitz, and Lena West. This was another panel that really wasted my time. First, we had Lena West stating that she was too busy to actually do it herself. My first question was then why are you on this panel? Then she managed to offend half the room (google: Lena West and mommybloggers to find out why. Trust me, there was no
airbrush do over. The more she tried to explain herself, the worse it got). They pretty much said to use Twitter and Facebook. Umm, yeah, knew that already. Now, tell me how to use them to help me, because I really don't get Facebook at all. There are also dozens of social networking sites out there — and nobody even mentioned them.
Next, there was Loren Feldman. I love Loren Feldman. He speaks his mind, and he makes awesome videos! It was almost breathtaking to hear what equipment he uses. We learned that you don't have to spend thousands of dollars to do good videos on your blog.
Next, we had the plug-in panel with Loren Baker, Jonathan Dingman, and Erik Hersman. This was definitely cool, because I learned I am using a lot of the wordpress plugins that I should be!
Last, there was the Blog Design Makeover Panel with Scott Allen,Matt Blancarte, and Christopher Schmitt. My only complaint with this is that they were very rushed. Also, the designs were nice, but way out of the price range of us normal bloggers.
In a nutshell, that was the conference. I have one more post about the IzeaHunt that we did, and that will pretty much summarize the conference. Would I go again? I'll be honest — I don't know. It is a lot of money. Did I learn things? Yes. However, does any of it help me to monetize? Not really. I really thing they need to have breakout sessions, and you can pick and choose what sessions to go to. That way, you can reach the middle ground bloggers and the beginning bloggers. What I found lacking was that none of the big name big money bloggers really told us how to get from middle group to up on top. Telling me what you are doing now really doesn't help me all that much.
4 thoughts on “Izeafest – Day 2”
Leave a Reply
Lisa… i'd have to agree with you that the cost of having one of us on the blog makeover panel redesign your blog would be cost prohibitive. we were definitely rushed and i was hoping to impart a little help on the usability front that would allow many people to makeover their blogs as well. one thing i didn't get a chance to mention is that you can purchase a fairly cheap, well designed, wordpress template from templatemonster.com. my personal focus has always been usability, so along those lines i don't feel that someone needs to be a master of photoshop to have a great blog/site. some of my favorite websites are not build by what many of us would categorize as a designer. best wishes. //scott
Thanks for mentioning the panel. I know I felt a bit rushed–as there was more I wanted to touch on with the design, but that's the way things go. I believe the three of us did what we could with the time we had 🙂 and would love to be go back for next year.
As for the benefits of going to the conference (or almost any conference for that matter), it's not about the direct pay-off. It's the indirect–meeting people, thinking about new ideas or new approaches and hopefully forming relationships. You can't really do that by being online.
Also, you raise an interesting point concerning the price of the blog design. What kind of price point do you think would be suitable to most bloggers?
@ Scott I wish you would have had time to mention that, because a lot of bloggers were talking about what a great job you did, but we just couldn't afford you. I personally think this should be a breakaway session all on its own and then you could have more time.
@Christopher I think you guys did great on the designs even though the presentation was rushed. You should have definitely had more time.
Unfortunately for this mommy blogger to make it feasible for me to be able to go to conference, I need the direct pay-off. Otherwise, I can justify leaving my hubby and kids for 3 days and spending the money that I do.
As far as price, I think it depends. Personally, I can't afford much which is why all of my blogs have a free template on them. I personally don't think I could afford more than $50 a template (I also have 5 blogs). However I think in $100 – $200 range would be better for the average blogger.