Day Two - Just Another #dpcon13 Post

You can read about Day One here.
Did I mention how good the food was? No? Well it was superb!
Day Two started bright and early once again with a panel discussion featuring some of the finest ladies in blogging, Kerri Sackville,  Sophie Bone, Karen Andrews & Penny Webb. The topic? The Myth of Having It All.

It was an excellent discussion, probably one of the highlights of the conference for me. In fact I loved it so much that I intend to dedicate a post to it and add a few of my own thoughts in to the mix as it's a topic I've thought about a lot before.
This here little girl is the most chilled little blogger baby ever! Has it all! She belongs to the beautiful Danya Banya

The breakout sessions I attended were, once again, fabulous.

First up was Building Your Facebook and Twitter Community with Zoey Martin from Goog Googs and Shake Media. Zoey is a bit of a social media genius and I definitely got a lot of practical stuff out of this session that I plan to put to good use not only for the blog but for work as well.

The main points I took away from the session were -
~ Be clear about your community's goals and define them. Are they personal, commercial or community?
~ Create a strategy thinking about: creation vs curation; target niches; pick two networks to focus on.
~ Creation is new content that YOU the owner have created, whereas Curation is sharing links and info from others.
~ Curation is more about keeping the community engaged and not so much about growing your community.
~ Most people can really only keep up on two social media networks so do 2 well, but keep your finger in the pie of two others
~ Be aware of what time and day your posting to FB. 8pm is generally a good time for parents, as is 1-3pm, before school pick-ups. The best times will depend on your community type and demographic
~ If you schedule Twitter updates then make sure its at the appropriate time & when you are able to respond to replies
~ Having a Google+ badge on your blog will increase your search traffic a will posting to G+
~ Remember that there is NO privacy on social media. If you would not say it to someone's face DO NOT POST IT, even in private or direct messages.

Obviously I took quite a few notes in that session. 7 pages to be exact. I'll be typing up my notes from all the sessions I got to at some stage for a couple of people who couldn't make the session or the conference at all. If you would like me to email all my notes to you too then just shoot me an email to kylie(@)kyliepurtell(.)com or leave your email address in the comments.

The next session was Blog Promotion 101, all about working with PR companies and building a better media kit. Key points from this session were -

~ PR friendly is an invitation to readers, brands and media and its all about relationships.
~ Be clear about what you want, be honest about what your readers like/want
~ Negotiate
~Always leave a door open, don't flat out say no
~ Make sure everyone is clear about what's expected and stay true to yourself and your readers
~ Be respectful. Sometimes they may want something changed, be open to that, but if they are being unfair be polite when you let them know
~ Media Kits: should have everything they need to know; background on you as a person and your blog; 1 page fact sheet with stats & links; Info on media coverage; Comments/testimonial from readers of your blog; Comments from brands you've worked with previously; Include your photo and full contact details
~Sponsorship: Find ones who work for you and your readers; Show why they should work with you; Research the brand
~ Get noticed: Seek people out and talk to them, start relationships and let them know why you would be good to them; Think long term; Promote yourself on social media; Build a relationship before you start pitching.

Johanna Dowdell (Strawberry Communications) has uploaded the slides she used for this presentation on Slide Share, which you can find here.

After lunch I attended two more sessions, User-friendly Blog Design, presented by Kate Fairlie from Picklebums and Dealing with Negative Comments, Trolls & Haters. This was a panel discussion featuring Woogsworld, Where's My Glow, Retromummy and Reservoir Dad.

I won't go in to the blog design one as it really was the type of session you needed to be in to see the examples that Kate used, but if you'd like my notes I don't mind sending them to you.

I think the Negative comments session was one of the most hotly anticipated of the conference, probably due in no small part to a little website called GOMI. If you haven't heard of GOMI then you must be living under a blogging rock! There has been some vicious stuff said on there about one blogger in particular, Retromummy and I won't lie, I was very interested to hear what she had to say about it all. She was amazingly calm when discussing it and seemed to mostly take it in her stride, something I'm not sure I could do.

Mrs.Woog as always was a breath of fresh air and bought some great perspective to the discussion. She is definitely my kind of lady in the sense that she said she is just too lazy to be bothered engaging with trolls and haters. It's not worth her time so she just doesn't bother and mostly ignores it. Glow was also very matter-of-fact in saying that she has no time for that shit and tries not to get in to it either.

I think the most interesting part though was when she said that she knew who some of the anonymous posters on GOMI were and she knew some of them were in the room at that very time. I reckon just about everyone in the room gasped and then tried to look around casually to gauge the reaction of everyone else! Mrs. Woog called them a little bit ass-holey. It was brilliant.

After an awesome final session in which some amazing bloggers got up and shared the stories behind their lives and blogs, it was time to get changed and head for the Gala Dinner. It was during the final session that Dave sent me a picture of Punky and I will say that I almost got up and left to go home at that moment. The only thing that stopped me was the thought of the peak-hour traffic I would have had to endure had I left then and there. I'm glad I stuck it out though.
The awesome Melbourne Mum and I
Thankfully after a glass of coke and some lively conversation with the awesome Kim from Melbourne Mum, my second-wind kicked in and I had an awesome time at the dinner, I ended up staying till the end at 11pm, when I had told myself I was going to leave early. I just couldn't resist the lure of the Nutbush and the chance to show my awesome air-guitar skills to the blogging world (yes, I totally rock the air-guitar. Don't believe me? Just ask Melbourne Mum!).
Super Organiser and Digital Parents Founder, the one and only Brenda Gaddi, rocking it out at the Gala Dinner
All in all it was the most fabulous two days and I seriously can't wait for next years conference. I am already starting to save money and thinking of ways I can get myself there, assuming of course it won't be in Sydney this time. I'm tempted to turn it in to a family holiday to wherever it may be!
Blogger babes getting down - Jodi from Mummyhood 101, Salz from Salz Dummy Spit and Catherine from Cup of Tea and a Blog

I apologise for the length of this post but I just have to finish by giving a bit of a shout-out to some of the lovely ladies that I had the pleasure of meeting and who were kind enough to have a chat with me for more that 5 minutes and endure my ramblings. They are, in no particular order -
Rhi from A Parenting Life, Yvette from Little Bento Blog, Jodi from Mummyhood 101, Catherine from Cup of Tea and a Blog, Grace from With Some Grace (Jodi, Catherine & Grace, I wish we got more time to catch up properly, will have to amend that very soon!) Claudia from Little Cottage, Big Life, Kim from Melbourne Mum, Angela from School of Mum, Kim from Working Women Australia, Salz from Salz Dummy Spit and of course, the wonderful Vanessa from Babbling Bandit, who is just the most awesome lady and someone I am so glad I got to spend a decent amount of time with.

Thank you ladies (and my apologies to anyone I've missed, there were so many people!) for being as wonderful in offline life as you are in online life and for being nice enough not to walk away from my nonsensical ramblings!

Sharing this post with Grace for Flog Yo Blog Friday, the best Friday Blog-Hop in town!

Comments

Kylie Purtell said…
Kylie, I am SO glad I read this post. Firstly, great wrap!! You have covered day 2 so well and all the breakout sessions I missed, could I please put my hand up for the notes? So glad you got to stay till the end :) Didn't get a chance to talk to you much but we will have to definitely catch up properly next time xxx
Kylie Purtell said…
It is great to hear about the other sessions which I didn't attend (it was so hard to choose). I was too tired to make the Gala but next year I'll be there for sure.
Kylie Purtell said…
Great summary of Day 2 Kylez! Would love to have a read through your notes when you're done sorting them out. Email: sakuraharuka at live dot com

Actually I think I do live in a blogging cave.. have no idea what GOMI is about heh but it's great with Glow, Mrs Woogs and Retromummy reaffirming that it's just not worth the time or effort to deal with trolls.. and I guess to some point hypocrites who treat you well in front of you, but just want to bring you down.

Ai @ Sakura Haruka
Kylie Purtell said…
I knew there was no need for me to write notes during the conference! You've got it all down right here. It was so great hanging out with you. Looking forward to a playdate at the plane park soon.


Re GOMI, I must say curiosity is almost killing me. I'd love to know who could possibly write that stuff! And to think they were in the room with us all.


I can't believe we didn't get a photo together. I was so crap with taking photos over the two days. Oh well, there's always next year!
Kylie Purtell said…
Thanks for sharing Kylie! Would have loved to have been there... maybe next year. Although, might go to pro-blogger later this year as it is in the Gold Coast.
Kylie Purtell said…
I enjoyed reading this hun, and I never knew there were GOMI' moles - I thought surely they wouldn't be hiding in plain sight! I really would love to come next year, I just presumed it would be in Syders! xx
Kylie Purtell said…
Fabulous post Kylie - love Mrs Woogs comment xx
After reading so many positive wrap ups about dpcon13 I think I'll have to get myself to dpcon14!
xx
Kylie Purtell said…
Another great wrap up post, Kylie! I wish I listened in on Zoey's presentation. I've heard the advice of doing 2 social media networks well at Problogger but hadn't heard about keeping your finger on the pie on 2 others. Good idea. We definitely have to have a proper catch up soon!

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