Actually, I already went… but it’s still a great badge!
A few days ago I went to my first social media/online business conference. SOBCon (Successful Online Business Convention) is the brainchild of Liz Strauss and Terry St. Marie (aka Terry Starbucker). The subject matter of SOBCon doesn’t align completely with the topics we talk about at Thoughtwrestling but the experience of participating in a well-run event like SOBCon does have a lot to do with stimulating your mind.
SOBCon’s subject matter is important, but the way that your brain really gets stimulated is by meeting new people and hearing what they have to say. SOBCon attracts 150 attendees to each Chicago convention. As far as social media/technology/business conferences go, it’s small. That’s a very good thing because the small size creates a more intimate experience.
It’s simple, really: if you want to stimulate your thinking and get out of a rut, go somewhere different, meet different people and do different things. SOBCon is a great place to do that. The conference organizers work hard to create a positive, nurturing environment and that’s reinforced by the large number of returning attendees. This is something that I haven’t seen in some of the other conferences that I’ve attended.
Some miscellaneous thoughts on how I made my experience worthwhile:
- The stranger on the train might be heading to the same place as you, so it pays to introduce yourself. Thanks Becky!
- Make something personal and share it. I made 20 business cards by hand and treated them like collector’s items, even though a six year old could have made them. People seemed to like them, though. I saw some really awesome professional and slick business cards and it would have been nice to have some. At the same time, my hope is that seeing something handmade (I even wrote on them in pen) will spark a memory and a positive association with my and my work.
- It’s good for you to be around people you don’t know: just think of how much you might learn. If you’re like me and you’re on the shy and introverted side, it feels uncomfortable to be around people I’ve never met in person before. This is a good thing: doing something that’s uncomfortable is a sign that your brain is being challenged and it will need to helpful new connections.
- It’s good for you to know people you don’t know before you meet them in person: it’s getting easier to learn about the people you might meet. Event registration software (e.g. Eventbrite) lets you see who’s going to attend and you can find out stuff about them, which makes it easier to start conversations (see 3. above).
- Manage your energy according to your needs – depending on your personality type, you might need to build in some downtime to recuperate. I snuck in some downtime to allow me to handle evening events better. On the other hand, I suffered an energy slump during the middle of the second day and I wasted some time sitting when I could have been meeting other people.
- Look for the awesome in the people around you. It will inspire you. I was inspired many times during SOBCon and, more often than not, it wasn’t the presenters or the organizers (who were all great), but my fellow attendees who impressed me. Listen, look, and listen. Understand. It’s all very important.
- If you’ve only learned what’s on the conference program, you’ve missed a lot. This is a mistake that I’ve made at other conferences. It’s the conversations before, between and afterward where many of the riches lie. SOBCon was an incredibly good experience for me in this respect.
- Karaoke is fun if you can tolerate it. You don’t have to have the microphone to sing. It’s fun and encouraging to see people having fun and being decent to each other.
- Speakers and presenters are often better after they speak – you never you know what else you might learn. If you can pick out something they did well or add something that they might not have covered, they’ll almost always appreciate that.
- Follow up afterward so the connections don’t die. I only got to speak to about a third of the attendees but I’m planning to reach out to just about all of them in some way. I hope we’ll all stay connected. I think I made a few new friends for life, which is worth many times more than the cost of the conference.
And finally… don’t be afraid to hug someone, especially if they hug first. It’s not just about the information; it’s about the connections.
Don’t be afraid to leave your home base and experience something new. It will stimulate your mind and nourish your emotional side. With some preparation, care and a little bit of courage to put yourself out there to be seen and heard, a good conference can be a pivotal life experience. It has been for me.
Final note: in addition to getting some time to speak with Terry and Liz, I also want to shout out to some other wonderful people that I spent some quality time with during SOBCon:
Chris Garrett
Michael Martine
Nacie Carson
Kristi Daeda
CV Harquail
Allen and Jessie Mireles
John Haydon
Steve Sherlock
Andy Hayes
Chris Guillebeau
Chris Brogan
Laura Petrolino
Geoff Livingston
Angela Maiers
Derek Halpern
Elisabeth Marshall
Zena Weist
Jonathan Fields
Alli Worthington
Margo Millure
Paula Lee Bright
Mary-Lynn Foster
and many other deserving people that I have failed to mention…
I was also fortunate to get a few moments to talk to authors Michael Port and Steve Farber about their great presentations.
Related posts:
- The next frontier is the unconscious mind
- Crowdsourcing Creativity
- Does thinking outside of the box make you break the rules?
- Summer reading picks – Mark