But all good things must come to an end and it’s time for me to take a (potentially temporary) break from speaking. While I have thoroughly enjoyed speaking at conferences and events, there are definitely downsides too.

I need to spend time with my kids

The biggest reason I’m taking a break from speaking is the time away from my family. About a month ago, my son said something about me never being home, and that really stung. As Interactive Director at Kelsey Advertising & Design and owner at 2BigFeet.com, I have to travel several times a year for business, so adding a speaking engagement every month meant I was gone once or twice a month for several days – usually on weekends. Taking a break from speaking will mean more time with my kids.

I need to focus on my business

Working full-time as Interactive Director doesn’t leave much time for being the leader of a growing company. I do a lot of high-level work during lunches, in the evenings, and on the weekends. When I’m off at a conference speaking, it’s hard to get any time to work, because there’s always something going on. I am either rehearsing my presentation, at a networking function, or meeting colleagues for lunch or dinner.

Speaking so often over the past few years has taken a toll on my business. Our growth, which was averaging 85% a year, has slowed substantially to around 30%. That’s still great growth, especially in this economy, but I know we can do better. I have projects (like a mobile-optimized website) that have been stalled for months, simply because I don’t have time to work on them.

Conference organizers don’t fairly compensate speakers

Public speaking does have several benefits to professionals. It does help to establish yourself as an industry expert, can be a marketing and lead-generation tool for your business, and can promote a book or other products or services you have to offer. But these are really secondary to the time and effort that goes into planning and executing a good presentation.

A successful presentation can take 40 hours to brainstorm, plan, write, design, and rehearse. Add to that the travel time and expenses, not to mention time away from work and family, and speaking can be incredibly expensive.

Most conference organizers and event planners are really great people, but many of them try to take advantage of speakers (even if they don’t realize they are doing it). I often get asked to speak at a conference out of state, for no compensation at all, and I am expected to cover airfare, hotel, and other travel expenses. And some will even ask you to pay to go to their event on top of that!

But because there are so many young professionals out there interested in professional speaking, events rarely have a problem finding someone to speak. It might not be the best speaker, but they’re free and pay their own way.

Because of the two reasons mentioned above, I simply cannot pay someone else to go and speak at an event.

When I will still speak at your event

I am taking the next couple of months to focus on my family and personal projects, but I am still willing to speak at a small number of conferences or events in 2012, providing you are able to meet the following conditions:

Expenses

All expenses must be covered, including the following.

• Airfare
• Hotel (at least two nights for one presentation day)
• Meals
• Parking
• Mileage to/from airport

Compensation

If you cannot pay me to come and speak, I understand. But unfortunately, I will most likely decline the opportunity. My standard fee for a one-hour presentation (that takes approximately 40 hours of preparation time) is $1,000. Longer workshops or keynote presentations start at $2,500.

This is still a very low fee considering both the preparation time and the fact that I will be losing two days of productive work to travel and speak at your event. If your budget allows, I would love to talk to you about speaking for your event.

• Mobile Marketer Daily
• Mobile Marketing Association
• SMS Marketing Provider

The Social Media Masters series is hosted by Social Media Club and Sensei Marketing.

Other presenters include Patrick O’Keefe on building community, Candace Kemp McCaffery on measurement, Sam Fiorella on building corporate social infrastructure, and many more. Check out the entire lineup of speakers that will be presenting at one or more of the five events in the United States and Canada.

Register before tomorrow, 8/19, and you can save 30% off the regular price using the discount code SMMBE30. Come see me in Atlanta or New York and learn about mobile marketing!

Next weekend I’ll be giving a presentation at IndieConf about effective networking for independent contractors and solopreneurs. Everyone says word of mouth is the best way to get new clients, but who can just sit around and wait for word of mouth to start bringing in the business?

I’m going to be talking about how to use effective networking strategies to land new clients and more work from current clients. I’ll be discussing several different strategies – both online and off.

Why should you listen to me about networking for independent contractors? After spending two years as head of web development and sales for a small company, I started my own (solo) consulting firm that I later sold to Kelsey Advertising & Design in 2006. I have owned or worked in small web consulting firms for the past ten years.

There’s still time to register for IndieConf. Register online and enter discount code “25off” for 25% off regular price. I hope I see you there!

I’ll have a full schedule this year, with a book signing, speaking on two panels, and several interviews and other functions scheduled. If you’re going to BlogWorld, check out my schedule below.

Official Functions

Online Marketing Inside Out Book Signing

Friday, October 15, 11:00 AM
I’ve already had two book signings, but I’m really excited about the one at BlogWorld this year. It will be the first time I meet my coauthor Shayne Tilley in person. We wrote Online Marketing Inside Out by collaborating using Skype and instant messaging, as he’s from Australia. This will be our first official book signing as far as I’m concerned… since you have to have both authors present for it to be official, right?

Panel: Ethics and Social Media Marketing

Saturday, October 16, 12:15 PM
I’m honored to be speaking with good friends Patrick O’Keefe and Jeremy Wright, as well as Jason Baer in a discussion about ethics in social media marketing. We’ll be talking about examples of unethical marketing in the social media space, and discuss how to do it right.

Panel: 5 Strategies Bloggers Should Learn from Online Marketers

Saturday, October 16, 3:30 PM
My panel with Online Marketing Inside Out coauthor Shayne Tilley, author of UnMarketing Scott Stratten, and Scott Fox, author of e-Riches 2.0, will discuss how to determine your most important conversion goals, and how to optimize your blog to maximize conversions.

Parties & Social Events

I’ll also be attending several parties and events, both official and unofficial. If you can’t make it to my book signing or one of the panels I’m on, stop by one of these events and say hi.

UnMarketing Tweetup

Although its an unofficial event, I’m excited about attending Scott Stratten’s pre-BlogWorld tweetup. Scott is speaking on a panel with me and has a new book, UnMarketing. The tweetup is getting a lot of attention and should be a blast. I’ll be heading there straight from the airport on Wednesday evening.

Social Media Explorer Mall Bar Tweetup

Jason Falls’ annual Mall Bar Tweetup is a pretty low-key event, but last year’s was filled with great conversations and interesting people. I’ve got another, private, event around the same time but will definitely make time to stop by Jason’s tweetup for at least a little while.

Mashable MashBash Opening Party

I’ll most likely be at the official BlogWorld opening party, sponsored by Mashable. MashBash sounds like a lot of fun, but will also be insanely packed.

BlogWorld Late-Night All-In Poker Party

I love poker. The only thing better than playing Texas Hold’em is playing with a bunch of other geeks at BlogWorld. Join us for the “official” BlogWorld poker game. Just a warning, friend or not I’ll take your money!

Third Tribe Meetup

Are you a member of Third Tribe Marketing? We’re having a meetup every morning of BlogWorld. I’m going to try to join in every morning. Considering the official parties can often run late, I may not make it every day but I’m going to try. If you’re a member of Third Tribe, check out the thread about the meetup. Not a member yet? Well, you should join!

Find Me, Say Hello

Even if you’re not going to be at one of the sessions or events above, shoot me an @ message on Twitter or email me. I’d love to meet up with you for a cup of coffee or beer.

The True Cost of Free

Nothing is free… everything comes with a cost. There are monetary costs, productivity costs, opportunity costs, and risks (which can turn into costs later).

Before you choose a free (or paid) solution, look at all the real costs associated with it.

If you download a free open-source word processing software, it may take marginally longer to build a document than in the popular commercial software equivalent. That time different and frustration from a slightly less-usable interface can add up over time. At some point, it may be worth it for you to just spend the money on a commercial application.

Another cost to consider is your privacy. When you use free web services, such as Google Anallytics, you are giving another company access to sensitive information, and trusting them to keep that information safe. Giving up privacy is not necessarily a material cost, but it is a cost nonetheless. But there are real costs if that information is compromised or lost.

Tools

Below are the tools we discussed in my presentation. I will add screenshots from the presentation when I get a bit more time.

Productivity and Collaboration

• AVG Antivirus
• Google Apps
• Evernote
• Skype
• LogMeIn
• OpenOffice
• DropBox
• InvoiceBubble
• Google Reader

Marketing Tools

• Google Analytics
• Google Keyword Tool
• Google Trends
• Google Website Optimizer
• Google Places
• Google Alerts
• Google Reader
• MailChimp
• Hubspot Website Grader

Web Design & Development

Gimp
Pixelmator (mac)
VectorDesigner (mac)
Filezilla
TextWrangler
Eclipse
WordPress
Drupal
Adobe Browser Labs

E-Commerce & Web Hosting

I didn’t talk about e-commerce software or web hosting specifically, but I just want to stress that this is an area where you do not want to go the cheap route. I get asked a lot about free or open source e-commerce packages. Yes, there are several platforms available, one being Magento Commerce, but none of them are really free.

E-commerce software is very complex, and holds very sensetive information such as customer details, thier payment information, and your financial information. One security flaw that allows someone to access sensetive information can open you up to severe liabilities.

And both the software and the hosting are critical in being able to make money and reach customers. If a software update renders your website unusable, or your webshite hosting goes down frequently, you could lose thousands, or hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales.

It’s my personal opinion that these are two areas where spending money is definitely appropriate. We have managed dedicated servers with ServInt and Rackspace, and use several different e-commerce packages including Interspire and ShopSite.

Slides

The lineup of speakers and presentations is impressive to say the least. My good friends Patrick O’Keefe and Wayne Sutton are giving a talk titled “Personal Branding & How to Break Into Social Media” which I can’t wait to hear. There will also be a videoconference with Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist and of course, the keynote with Brent Payne, SEO Director for the Chicago Tribune. There’s a little bit of everything, from business and marketing to social media and development. Check out the schedule to see the full lineup.

Registration closes Wednesday, September 29 so if you’re interested in attending don’t wait! Check out the ConvergeSouth 2010 website or go straight to the registration page.

Several speakers are also hosting dinners on Friday night. There is no fee to attend a hosted dinner, but you do have to buy your own meal. I’ll be hosting a dinner with Jeff Cohen and Trey Pennington at The Summit Station. It’s a great opportunity to network with the speakers and other attendees and enjoy a great meal. If you’re coming to ConvergeSouth, you should definitely register for one of the hosted dinners.

Upcoming Speaking Schedule

After a couple months off, I’m getting back into a regular speaking schedule. I’m excited to be speaking several times this fall all over the country:

• Tips Bloggers Can Learn from Online Marketers
  September 18-19 – WordCamp Birmingham (Birmingham, AL)
• Free and Open Source Tools for Business
  October 1-2 – ConvergeSouth (Greensboro, NC)
• 5 Strategies Bloggers Can Learn from Online Marketers
  Panel with Scott Stratten, Scott Fox, Shayne Tilley and myself
  October 14-16 – BlogWorld & New Media Expo (Las Vegas, NV)
• Ethics and Social Media Marketing
  Panel with Patrick O’Keefe, Jeremy Wright, Jay Baer and myself
  October 14-16 – BlogWorld & New Media Expo (Las Vegas, NV)
• Effective Networking for Freelancers & Independent Contractors
  November 13 – IndieConf (Raleigh, NC)

I am interested in new speaking opportunities as well. If you need a speaker for your conference or event, get in touch. You can see my entire speaking schedule on the Online Marketing Speaker page.

Email Marketing Live

I’m working with SitePoint on an online learning course teaching the fundamentals of successful email marketing. It will start with the absolute basics, and cover everything from determining what emails should be about to building a subscriber list to designing effective newsletters and testing them to increase conversions.

The course will start this fall and will include lots of one-on-one time with me in a private chat area where I’ll be available to answer questions, review campaigns, etc. I’ll post more information as it becomes available.

Upcoming Books

I was asked to coauthor a book, but with my current schedule and the proposed deadline by the publisher, I had to decline. I did agree to be the technical editor and as an advisor of sorts on the content. I’m very excited about working on the project, though, even if in a lesser capacity. The book is about the business of web design and should be out early next year.

I’m also working on a third book, which I can’t be too specific about just yet. I’m working with a colleague on a book proposal that we’ll soon pitch to a few publishers. I’m pretty excited about the subject matter and that there aren’t any marketing books published in the last 5 years that really cover it.

Blogging

I’ve been blogging much more lately on the Online Marketing Inside Out blog, and here. I’m trying to get into a regular schedule of posting (typically Monday, Wednesday and Friday but this week was a long holiday weekend). It’s going to be a little difficult to keep up the pace with everything else I have going on, so I may have some guest posts, contests, and other fun topics.

Tribune Newsletter

I’m still writing alternating issues of the SitePoint Tribune email newsletter, that reaches over 200,000 web professionals every week. My next issue comes out this Thursday. Subscribe now to be sure to get it.

But it’s more than just a motivational self-help speech. Over the years, I’ve had some amazing opportunities… and it had nothing to do with “luck.” I’ve also, like everyone, had some misfortunes from time to time. But although we don’t have complete control over what happens to us in life, we do control how we handle those situations.

My session is all about how to watch out for opportunities, and when there aren’t any, how to make them. It’s practical advice on how to move from waiting for good things to happen to taking your life by the horns.

Please consider voting for my talk at the SxSW 2011 Panel Picker.

If you think it’s a good idea and want to vote for me, here’s how. It will take at most 5 minutes of your time:

• Create an account
• Check your email and click the validation link
• Sign in to the SxSW Panel Picker
• Go to my speaking event page
• Click – Your vote: Thumbs Up Image

AAF District 7 Conference (April 23)

This weekend I’ll be leading two workshops at the AAF (American Advertising Federation) District 7 Spring Conference. In the first workshop, I’m going to talk about 5 online marketing tactics everyone should be utilizing, with practical tips on getting started with each. In the second workshop, I’m going to be discussing social media trends and looking at alternative ways to use social media for brand awareness and public/customer relations.

WIN Luncheon (May 6)

Women Intelligently Networking (WIN!) is a business growth strategy society headquartered in Atlanta, ran by my good friend Taryn Pisaneschi. I’m going to be presenting Email Marketing 101 where I’ll be covering the 5 keys to email marketing success, the secrets to getting emails to convert, and how to build your list without being a spammer.

I’m really excited about this luncheon… if you’re a businesswoman in Atlanta and are interested in coming to the presentation or joining WIN, check out the links above.

WordCamp Raleigh (May 22-23)

I’ll be speaking about online marketing at WordCamp Raleigh in May. My talk, 5 Tactics Bloggers Should Learn from Online Marketers, will cover some simple and practical things bloggers can do (with WordPress) to make more ad revenue, increase email or RSS subscriptions, or sell more products through their blogs.

Converge SE (June 25-26)

Converge SE is “a conference for web professionals who wish to defy classification.” I’m still working on my presentation for Converge, but with rockstars like Neil Patel and Jason Beaird involved in the conference, you know it’s going to be good! I feel privileged to be involved.

The conference is huge, the parties are over the top, the venue is amazing (who doesn’t love Austin?) and the people are what it’s all about.

This was the first year I was speaking at SxSWi, I had a book reading for Online Marketing Inside Out on Saturday, March 13 at 11 AM (well, a little later because the previous speaker ran into my time slot). So I was incredibly excited about going this year, but decided to take a slightly different approach.

Instead of trying to go to a lot of panels and sessions, and trying to hit all the big parties, I would just take it as it came. The last two years at SxSW seemed to fly by so quickly and it seemed like I never had time to just sit down and enjoy the company of friends or really connect with people. This year I was determined to really make the most of it.

So what follows is a daily recap of my SxSW experience (with many thanks to Foursquare for the helpful history tool!). Be forewarned… it’s long and incredibly detailed. If you’d rather skip all the minute details and just read my takeaways, you can jump to the conclusion.

Thursday

We have a client in Austin, and it was actually a trip to meet with them that led me to my first SxSW in 2008. It just so happened that our client meeting and the conference were extremely close, so we got tickets to the conference. For the past two years we’ve repeated that coincidence by scheduling our meeting around the conference.

We flew into Austin pretty early, and Donna (our client) picked us up from the airport. We went to their offices for a short time and then went to Rudy’s BBQ for lunch. We stuffed ourselves, then headed back to the office to get some work done.

Went out to The Salt Lick for dinner, one of my favorite places in Austin to eat. It’s located in a dry county, but you can take a cooler filled with beer. It’s got a great atmosphere and even better Texas BBQ.

After dinner I hitched a ride to the hotel and checked in. It was 9:45 PM when I got to my room and dropped my bags, so I decided to run over to the convention center to try to get a badge. I ran past Jim Caruso in the Hilton lobby, and he walked with me to the convention center. I barely got my badge before they closed at 10, then Jim and I went to the lounge in the Hilton and had a drink. Chrispian Burks met us there and we hung out for a few before calling it a night.

Friday

I went back over to our client’s office for a while and wrapped things there, then had Mighty Fine Burgers for lunch (owned by the same folks as Rudy’s). We finished up around 4 PM and I headed to the hotel and convention center. I went up to the day stage for Darren Rowse’s book reading of the second edition of his ProBlogger book co-authored by Chris Garrett. I met up with Julie Taylor, Josh Coffee, Patrick O’Keefe, Chrispian Burks, Deb Ng, and Chris.

Someone pulled the fire alarm right in the middle of Darren’s book reading and the entire convention center was evacuated. It was a little funny how slowly people were evacuating. If there was a real fire, I think half the world’s bloggers would have been lost. When we got the all-clear, we went back to the book reading and Darren finished. After the reading, Darren and Chris had a book signing at the SxSW Bookstore. I bought another copy of Problogger Book and got them to sign it.

I went back to the room briefly and then went downstairs to meet up with Jeremy Wright and head to dinner with some friends. He was in the Hilton lounge with a few friends. I grabbed a drink and he introduced me to Loren Feldman of 1938 Media. Loren seems like a pretty cool guy, the kind of guy that’d be fun to just hang out and have a few drinks with. We threw down our drink pretty fast because we were running late and then headed to Roy’s where we met Darren Rowse, Deb, Chris, Patrick, Chrispian, and some others. The food was great, but it was a little dark.

After dinner, we went to Emo’s and I saw Jim Caruso, Courtenay Bird, Scott Lockhart and a few others. The scene at Emo’s was a little… err… different. We didn’t stay there all that long.

We headed to the Driskill Hotel (that’s where all the cool kids said the party was at) and it was packed. I saw lots of cewebrities there like Gary Vaynerchuk, Robert Scoble, Brian Solis, etc. Whoohooo! (note the sarcasm). I stayed at the bar upstairs for a while but then heard a few friends were downstairs at the 1886 Cafe and Bakery. I headed down and the atmosphere was much better. We could actually hear each other talk. We stayed there for a bit then I headed back to the hotel to get some sleep because I had a book reading Saturday.

Saturday

I woke up early to prepare for my book reading, and as I was going over my notes and slides I decided to completely change my talk. Instead of going through several chapters in the book giving tips and tricks, I decided to tell a few stories about our experience at 2BigFeet.com over the years. I frantically retooled my slides to be much simpler and prepared some notes for the talk at 11am.

I got to the Day Stage around 10 minutes before 11, and the presenter before me was still going strong. Book reading presentations are supposed to be 20 minutes, but the time slot is 30 minutes. This gives the AV team time to get the next presenter setup and gives the people in the audience time to get up and leave or new arrivals time to find a seat. The guy before me ran really long, cutting well into my time. At 11am, I looked at the AV folks and they said he was wrapping up. 5 minutes later, still talking. Playing videos. Talking more. 10 minutes… STILL talking. Then as he was playing a video he told us he’d take ONE question after it was over. As soon as the video stopped, he said “I’ve got time for a couple questions” and proceeded to take two, and give extremely long-winded answers.

If people came at 11am for my book reading, I can only imagine what they were thinking. Did it get cancelled? Was it already over?

He finally got off the stage, and we setup the AV and I started. I was a little worked up about going on late and the previous presenter’s lack of respect, so I stumbled a bit over the first few slides. I think it went well as soon as I got into the three stories, and my talk was even covered on HubSpot’s Internet Marketing Blog.

Immediately after the book reading, I walked over to the SxSW Bookstore (a few tables across from the Day Stage) for a book signing. I sold lots of books and met some really cool people… and some really great friends like Patrick, Josh, Julie, Chrispian, Deb and Taryn Pisaneschi were there to support me.

Then we went to Patrick O’Keefe and Twanna Hines’ core conversation, “Shameless Self Promotion Without Looking Like an @#$%^&!“. It was originally submitted as a panel with Patric, Twanna, Darren Rowse and me, but was converted to a core conversation so Darren and I just attended and participated from the audience.

We were pretty hungry after Patrick’s panel, and one of my friends James Paden and Deb Ng had never had Texas BBQ, so I took a group of friends to Rudy’s BBQ (worst bbq in texas) for some brisket and beef ribs. It was me, Josh Coffee, Julie Taylor, Deb Ng, James Paden and Chrispian Burks. We had a blast, and have photos to prove it! We had to take a couple cabs out there, but it was worth it. Next year I’m taking them to The Salt Lick though!

It took a while to get there and back, so not much was accomplished that afternoon. We had RSVP’d for the Old Timers meetup so Patrick, Jared Smtih and I headed over there. We met some great folks like Alyce Lindquist from the Silicon Valley Social Media Club and Brian O’Shaughnessy from Skype.

We left there with intentions of finding a place to eat, but had trouble getting a cab back to the convention center area. When we finally got there we saw Lucretia Pruitt and Allison Worthington in the Hilton lobby. We were all hungry, so we just decided to get something to eat in the Hilton Lounge (food by Finn & Porter). The group ended up being me, Lucretia, Allison, Patrick, Josh, Julie and Chrispian. I had a great time talking to Allison about her BlissDom conference.

From there, we tried to go to the TechKaraoke party but the line wrapped all the way around the building. One of my goals this year was to not stand in any lines… you can waste so much time waiting to get in and there are so many parties going on. Why wait to get into that one cool party? We eventually ended up at the Bellmont bar and had a great time. They had live music and the weather was great, so we stayed outside on the roof most of the time. We closed it down, then went to Jimmy Johns for a late night snack.

Got back to the hotel really late, and suddenly remembered I was going to have to be up early because Patrick and I had RSVP’d for something Sunday morning. I set my alarm and tried to get a few hours of sleep.

Sunday

I had to wake up early for Social Media Breakfast… but of course slept late. I woke up at 9, and was supposed to meet Patrick in the lobby at 9:30 to grab a cab. I jumped in the shower and threw on some clothes as fast as I could. We left the hotel by cab at 9:45, got there, got some grub and sat down at a table with Deb Ng, Chris Garrett and later Dave Barger. The presentations were very interesting and I met a few people afterward. I even scored a free Skype headset they were giving away. We snagged a ride with Patrick’s friend Nathan Wright back to the hotel.

The breakfast lasted until noon, and we were pretty hungry by the time we got back to the hotel. I went to Champions for lunch with Patrick, Chrispian, Julie, Josh and Jared. After lunch I dropped by the blogger lounge and said hello to a few people. Outside the blogger lounge Patrick introduced me to Rafael Marquez of MarketingLatinos.com and he interviewed me for his blog. Then I headed to the Interactive Agency Workflow session. The session started out great, going from requirements gathering and wireframing but seemed to linger about wireframes way too long. Most of the people got up and left about halfway through.

We skipped out a few minutes early and went over to the Twitter Dating panel at the Courtyard Mariott supporting Jeremy Wright (one of the speakers). The panel was hilarious… there was lots of participation and interesting online dating stories (probably helped by the free beer).

After the panel I went back to the Hilton and met up with Joe Hamm and the usual Patrick, Julie, Josh and Chrispian and headed to dinner at Cantina Laredo. We had some awesome gourmet mexican food and then headed to Lanai for the Big Omaha party. Nathan Wright was a sponsor and we spoke to him for a moment when we got there. It wasn’t very busy at all, nice group of people until Gary Vaynerchuk announced his “secret” wine party was there (about midnight). It packed out with hundreds more people and they cranked up the music. I got a pretty bad headache and decided to call it a night… went back to the hotel and got some sleep.

Monday

I think my body was trying to tell me I needed some rest, because I woke up around 7 and felt much better. I got ready and headed to the Blogger Lounge to catch up on some email and work before the sessions. Jeremy came in and sat next to me and we caught up on our SxSW adventures to that point — I think he had much more eventful time than I had at that point! I also talked to Rohit Bhargava and Patrick about professional speaking.

For lunch, Julie wanted to find some gluen-free pizza. She’s gluten-intolerant so she’d been just eating a little of this and that wherever we went. She did some research and found a couple of pizza places in Austin, but none of them close enough to walk to. We took a cab to one of the restaurants she found but it had closed down. We were sitting in two cabs with meters running so we decided to just go to Conan’s Pizza. We original and thought they had gluten-free pizza, but it turns out they didn’t. We decided to eat there anyway, and it turned out to be a very interesting place.

After lunch, we took a few cabs back to the convention center. As Patrick and I were walking through the convention center floor, we ran into Thom Singer and had a great conversation about professional speaking. Thom is a professional speaker and spoke over 50 times last year. He is a wealth of information about speaking and presenting, so I picked his brain for a while and asked a ton of questions.

Patrick and I walked back over to the Hilton and saw Jacqui Chew, who I had met earlier (but when and where is escaping me right now). We decided to head over to the Frost Tower for Gary Vaynerchuk and Brian Solis’ joint wine tasting and book signing. I saw a lot of people there including Courtenay, Taryn, and Jim. Taryn introduced me to Stephanie Lichtenstein and Lindsay Burck.

We were getting hungry, so we decided to find a place to eat. We had a decent sized party, and went to one restaurant that wasn’t going to be able to seat us for 30-45 minutes. They recommended Sullivan’s Steak House which was right down the street, and we got a table there almost immediately. Me, Patrick, Jacqui, Jim, Julie, Josh and Chris all had dinner, and it was great. The service and food were excellent, and they got us in and out relatively quickly. After dinner, Patrick went to watch the premier of MacGruber. We all went to the TechSet party but several of us weren’t on “the list” so we couldn’t get in. Josh, Julie and Chrispian decided to call it a night.

Jim, Jacqui, and I decided to go to the Rackspace Revolutions party, since Jim and I are both customers. When we got there, Jim spotted the chairman and he and Jackie ran off to find him and take a picture with him. I hung around the bar area, and ran into several people like Robert Scoble, who is now working with RackSpace. I also bumped into James Paden, Taryn, Stephanie and several others.

Later that evening, I noticed a crowd gathering around a table. They have hired someone to hand-roll cigars. After waiting in line for about 30 minutes I finally got a hand rolled cigar. After enjoying my cigar, I met up with Taryn and Lindsay. We stayed at the party until closing, when I walked them back to Lindsay’s car. Her car was dead so we asked someone else who just left the party if they could jump start her car. They just got in the car and left. I called AAA and they sent someone out to give us a hand. After waiting about an hour, a tow truck showed up and helped us get her car started. They gave me a ride back to the Hilton and I called it a night.

Tuesday

I went to a few sessions about mobile development and had lunch again at Champions with Patrick, Chris, Josh and Jared Smith. After lunch we went to the Press Lounge to wait for Abby Johnson of WebProNews who had scheduled an interview with Patrick.

After their interview, she asked if I’d like to interview again (of course I would!) so I talked about my book reading a bit. Afterward, I went to one final session on mobile advertising and then went back to the hotel to work a bit. Later that evening I joined Jim, Stephanie Frost, Chris Turner and Jackui for dinner at Eddie V’s. I had Ahi Tuna (rare, of course) and it was amazing.

I decided to go back to my room and work, forgoing the closing party since I had an early flight.

Wednesday

I originally thought my flight back to Atlanta was at 5am, but fortunately that was when I needed to be at the airport. My flight was at 6:55 and I was joined on the flight by lots of Atlantans heading home from SxSW. I sat with Joe Hamm and Stephanie Frost waiting to board.

The Big Picture Takeaways

SxSW was epic as usual. This blog post is a testament to that. This was my third South-by and was by far the most productive. My first year I tried to attend ALL the sessions and ALL the parties. As a result, I was always running around like crazy and can barely remember who I met or what I did. Last year I took it a little easier, but still tried to go to all the parties and meet as many people as possible.

This year I just decided to go with the flow. We made dinner plans at the last minute, hung out in the halls, went to meetups, and generally just bummed around the conference. If you just looked at my schedule, you might think I completely wasted my conference pass… maybe I did. But I got more from this year at SxSW than the two previous years combined.

I spent time with great friends (including some new ones like Deb and Chris), met some truly awesome people, and made some connections that I am sure will be extremely valuable. I stuck by my original goal and didn’t wait in lines to get into a party (with the exception of a short line to have my ID checked).

The overall takeaway for me is to experience SxSW like you’d experience a great little city you’ve never been to. If you’ve never been, you don’t know all the cool places to go see, you just go exploring, meeting people as you go. Not only is it much more fun, but I think you get a lot more out of it that way.

People that Made SxSW Rawk

I met literally hundreds of people at SxSW. I had great conversations, learned a lot, and really had a great time. But there were some people who really stood out and helped made SxSW 2010 really special. In no particular order…

• Patrick O’Keefe
• Chrispian Burks
• Josh Coffee
• Julie Taylor
• Jeremy Wright
• Jim Caruso
• Stephanie Frost
• Darren Rowse
• Chris Garrett
• Jacqui Chew
• Taryn Pisaneschi
• Thom Singer

• The Changing Face of Marketing
• Using your Website to Generate Income
• Using Social Media to Promote Your Website
• Getting Others to Sell Your Products for You
• Spreading your Message through Online Advertising

The seminar is hosted by Kapital Medya and MediaCat Communications Institute. Last year, David Meerman Scott, author of “The New Rules of Marketing & PR” and “World Wide Rave” was one of the seminar presenters.

I’m excited about the seminar and look forward to seeing some of Istanbul while I’m there!

3 Ways to Dramatically Increase Your Conversion Rate

If you’re an e-commerce retailer or online marketer, don’t miss it. It’s free to come, network and learn. The food’s pretty good too.

I have wanted to speak at SxSW for several years, having been to the conference both in 2008 and 2009, so I’m very excited about the opportunity to both speak at one of the largest conferences in our industry and to get such an amazing chance to promote our book.

I just hope my coauthor Shayne Tilley can make it to Austin all the way from Australia. Not only would it be an excellent opportunity for us to promote the book together, but it would also be the first time I met him in person!

This is my first trip to Myrtle Beach, and I’m excited to see coastal South Carolina again. I lived in South Carolina for a good part of my childhood, and think it is a truly beautiful place.

You can read more information about the Coastal Carolinas AAF on their website. If you happen to be in the area, you can register for the luncheon here.

I’m especially excited about this year because I have a book signing Friday at 11 AM, a time slot I’m sharing with Patrick O’Keefe, good friend and author of “Managing Online Forums.”

I’m looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting new ones. If you’re headed to BWE as well drop me a line in the comments below or hit me up on Twitter.

The title of this episode is “Attracting Your Target Audience” and will be streamed live on the VoiceAmerica Business Channel at 1 PM EST, 10 AM PST. It will also be replayed again at 10 PM PST, 1 AM EST and will be recorded and available for download as an MP3. You can also subscribe to the recordings via iTunes.

I’m excited to be on the show. If you’re not busy Thursday at 10 AM EST, stop by and listen.

Below are the slides of the presentation hosted on SlideShare:

I also recorded the audio of the presentation and exported it as a movie synced with the slides. Below is the complete presentation (slides and audio) hosted on Vimeo:

Using Social Media for Brand Awareness and Marketing from Brandon Eley on Vimeo.

Online voting amounts for 30% of the decision making process, with the advisory board having 40% and staff picks having 30%. Since online voting counts for so much of the decision, I’m asking everyone to take a look at these panel and session submissions and please vote “thumbs-up!”

Note: Even though my name isn’t on the Panel Picker website for each of these, I am a speaker on each of the panels below.

Marketing By Design: Practical Advice For Better Conversions

Great design is about getting visitors to take a desired action, whether that’s placing an order or clicking on an ad. Learn how to use proven marketing principles to increase conversions and ROI. I’ll discuss how to improve usability, navigation, calls to action, home page layout, error pages, & headlines.

How to Pitch Social Media to Your Clients

Odds are your clients have already asked about Social Media. They’ve heard about Blogging, Twitter, and Facebook and want to know how they can effectively use social media in their marketing strategies. We’ll discuss what questions to ask, how to charge, and how to pitch social media to your clients.

Other Panelists: Jason Falls, Principal at Social Media Explorer; Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs and Co-Author of “Trust Agents.”

Marketing and Online Communities: Oil and Water?

Online communities represent captive audiences, having conversations that you want your company to be a part of. But, communities are built upon trust and respect that is earned and are rightfully protective of their space. So, how do you connect with them? That’s what we’ll discuss.

Other Panelists: Patrick O’Keefe, Owner of iFroggy Network and Author of “Managing Online Forums”; Darren Rowse, Founder and Editor of ProBlogger, Digital Photography School and TwiTip and Co-Author of “ProBlogger: the Book”Shayne Tilley, Marketing Manager at SitePoint and Co-Author of “Online Marketing Inside Out.”

Shameless Self Promotion Without Looking Like an @#$%^&!

Too often, individuals and businesses take advantage of someone else’s turf and excuse it as “shameless self promotion.” It’s not acceptable and it can lead to you being labeled a spammer or worse. In this panel, we’ll tell you how to promote yourself without turning others off.

Other Panelists: Patrick O’Keefe, Owner of iFroggy Network and Author of “Managing Online Forums“; Twanna A. Hines, Founder of Funky Brown Chick Corporation, freelance writer and blogger and Owner, FunkyBrownChick.comDarren Rowse, Founder and Editor of ProBlogger, Digital Photography School and TwiTip and Co-Author of “ProBlogger: the Book”.

When Does the Conversation End and the Selling Begin?

Social media is now critical in the modern marketing mix. However the emergence of a social media corporate etiquette is creating real barriers between a conversation and direct sale. So how do you effectively transfer your conversations to a sale without risking your online reputation? That’s what will be answered.

Other Panelists: Patrick O’Keefe, Owner of iFroggy Network and Author of “Managing Online Forums”; Darren Rowse, Founder and Editor of ProBlogger, Digital Photography School and TwiTip and Co-Author of “ProBlogger: the Book”Shayne Tilley, Marketing Manager at SitePoint and Co-Author of “Online Marketing Inside Out.”

Below is a video presentation with audio:

Capitalizing on the Mobile Web from Brandon Eley on Vimeo.

• Remove Distractions
• Optimize Your Navigation
• Effectively Place Calls to Action
• Omit Needless Words
• Focus Your Audience

I’ll also cover 5 more points that will help you get most out of your Website.

Not selling something, eh? Sure you are. Even if your site is just a personal portfolio or ‘business card’ site, you’re selling yourself or your ideas. I’ll give you some simple advice about how to do a better job of it.

If you make stuff for the Web, the info you get from this event will help you do it better.

Get more info and RSVP here

Update: Below is the SlideShare presentation for download

The presentation is open to the public, but there is limited seating and only about 15 spots left. It’s free to attend, or $10 if you would like to eat lunch. RSVP at the IPSA website. It will be hosted at Innovation Depot by CommonThread.

Yesterday I was in Mobile, AL speaking at the monthly Mobile Bay AAF chapter meeting about Social Media. Specifically, I was talking about using Social Media, namely Facebook and Twitter, for businesses.

I was expecting a crowd of about 35-40 people, typical of most monthly Ad Fed meetings. We had a great turnout, and approximately 80 people showed up! It was so packed, there wasn’t enough seating or food for everyone. I’ve since found out that it was the largest crowd for a monthly speaker in two years! (I’m honored)

Thank you to Laura Burton and Sarah Jones for being excellent hosts. I really enjoyed dinner and conversation at Felix’s Fish Camp. It was great meeting you both, and all the members and guests of the Mobile Bay AAF.

Below are the slides from my presentation.