Bloggy Boot Camp: What I learned, Part 2

 

I’m back with the rest of what I learned from Bloggy Boot Camp Dallas! You can read Part 1 here. I’ll say it again, if you get a chance to go to a BBC event, I highly recommend it! I’m not going to giveaway all the details… that’s why you pay to go! LOL But I will share some of the highlights of what impacted me the most :)

I covered the morning sessions in my first post and after lunch, you had a choice, The Business of Blogging session or the Writers Workshop. Kelley and I had already agreed to split up, she went to the Business of blogging and I went to the Writers Workshop. And golly! am I glad that I did!

The Writer’s Workshop featured the fabulous Francesca (from the SITS Girls) and Kathy (from Mama Kats Losin It)

^{Sorry for the icky iphone picture! I really should have taken my Nikon!}

• ^{There is a difference between blogging and writing (its in the content!).}
• ^{There is an art to writing but success come from including the fundamentals.}
• ^{EVERYTHING is searchable and your first 100 words contribute the most to SEO}
• ^{Writers block? – walk away – check out inspiration links ( Just write: extrordinary-ordinary.net / Pouryourheartout.com / Five Minute Friday: lisajobaker.com) – distract yourself with something “fun” but have paper and pen near by to jot down new ideas.}
• ^{The six word memoir exercise (http://www.smithmag.net/sixwords/) Would this work as your tag line?}

^{The six word memoir was one of the hardest things for me to come up with (and mine ended up being 7 words) but it has inspired me so much! There are big changes coming to this little blog of mine and I can’t wait to share in a week or two!}

 

^{Holly Homer (sheisdallas.com & businesstoblogger.com) was up next! And boy, oh boy, did she have some incredible ideas to share about Local Content and some smart tips for SEO!}

• ^{Change the URL of your “About Me” Page – include an SEO searchable phrase and then use those exact words in EVERY guest post/giveaway opportunity and link it back to your “About Me” page! {Can we say brilliant!}}
• ^{Set up a blog category under the name of your town for your local content/around town type posts.}
• ^{Obscure posts will get more hits.}
• ^{Make yourself available to the local press! You might be surprised to find that they will use you!}
• ^{Attend local events whenever possible.}
• ^{You ARE already a local blogger, but may not realize it! Identify your local sphere of influence! – check out your analytics, search for geo-centered boards on pinterest, Twitaholic .}

 

^{Growing Your Traffic with Tiffany Romero and Francesca Banducci of the SITS Girls (Two flipping-fantastic women if you ask me!) was intense! They blasted us with a TON of info in a short amount of time ( we were running a little behind schedule lol), but it was a fab session and added about 38,748 more things to my To Do list!}

• ^{As soon as a new social media is introduced, register your name! Even if you don’t use it right away! Otherwise it may be gone!}
• ^{Editorial Calendar! Plan out the next 12 months! It doesn’t have to be for all 365 days or uber specific, but get the gist of it on paper.}
• ^{Twitter – sign up both your personal name and your blog/business name –FILL IN THE BIO!}
• ^{Keep a healthy Tweet ratio – 8 convo tweets vs. two promotional tweets.}
• ^{Facebook – Get visual! Create your own images and use them! – Add a freebie to your FB page.}

 

^{Have you heard of Flourish in Progress? Elizabeth was one of the funniest speakers of the day! And a total Gem! I got to talk to her a bit at the Mirassou Wine Tasting After Party and she is so genuine!  She spoke at BBC about Authenticity.}

• ^{What is your Story? Its YOURS! No one can tell you how to use your voice!}
• ^{If you’re honest and don’t try to hide details, you will be surprise by the number of people who “get it”!}
• ^{When you get discouraged (about a lack of comments/interaction) remember that people have lives!}
• ^{Not everyone will like what you do, and not everything is about you!}
• ^{If you put out honest content and work it, you can make a space for yourself in the blogosphere!}

 

^{Honestly, at 5 pm I was sad! I was sad because the day was over and the learning was done :( I could have listened to these remarkable women talk for another week! Of course heading upstairs to the Mirassou Wine Tasting party helped a little bit ;)}

I was so glad to meet up with some of “My Texas Girls” from the FB group I started in the spring! (Photo Creds to Cynthia from Oh So Pinteresting)

Overall it was an absolutely INCREDIBLE experience and I can’t wait to go to another BBC (hopefully) next year! And maybe even a weekend conference? We’ll have to see :)