By: Eden Hensley Photos by: Justin Hackworth for Alt Summit
When you attend an Alt conference, be prepared to be overwhelmed. Speakers pack sessions full of practical tips for stepping up your game, so much information that you cannot take it all in. Whether online or in person, there are three things you can do to ensure you leave getting the most out of your investment: identifying a goal or two, reviewing your notes daily, and recognizing when you are full.
Because Alt for Everyone is an online conference, there are a few things you can do depending on whether your primary goals are learning, sharing your expertise, and/or networking.
Learning
We have an amazing cadre of speakers lined up for you. They are real life practitioners who know their stuff, and in each session you have the opportunity to pick their brains. Two tips for increasing your takeaways:
- Get to know your instructors before their session starts. Over the past couple of weeks we have introduced our keynote speaker, Day 1 (Thursday, September 25) speakers, Day 2 (Friday, September 26) speakers, and Day 3 (Saturday, September 27) speakers. Understanding your instructors allows you to better target your questions to leverage their expertise.
- Write down one or two things you would like to do better or are having trouble with related to each session you are attending. Expand these areas into questions that you have in front of you during the conference. Your list of questions gives you a checklist of what you still need answers to and is at hand when sessions open for questions.
Sharing
Passing along takeaways from the conference can help you internalize what you have heard. The other benefit of freely sharing your takeaways? If your dream customer or blog reader is in the Alt Community, sharing key points from the conference live can get their attention (tomorrow we will have tips on what to share and how to avoid fatiguing your audience). Three tips for increasing your reach:
- Tag your speaker when paraphrasing them. This is easier if you get to know your speakers before the session starts, especially if you are already following them (as you type their name most social media apps will autopopulate people you follow).
- Use the #AltSummit hashtag. Use the #AltforEveryone hashtag. These are the two most popular hashtags for our online conference. If you only have room for one hashtag on Twitter, opt for #AltSummit, your Tweet will be added to the feed that displays on our home page.
- If appropriate to your blog, draft a recap post. We share recaps on our blog as well as pin them to our Pinterest boards.
Networking
In each session, you have the opportunity to interact with fellow attendees. Three tips for maximizing live connections:
- Utilize the Alt for Everyone Fall 2014 Facebook group. All attendees and speakers are invited to join. The people who decide to participate are likely to be interested in connecting with you. Check them out before the conference starts (under the Files tab, there are documents for Blog URLs, Pinterest and Instagram Profiles, Facebook pages, YouTube channels and more). Identify with whom you want to engage.
- Create a virtual business card. In each session, there will be a Blog Roll where you can share your social media links. Type out your information once and simply cut and paste at the beginning of each session. Links to think about including: your blog/site URL, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+, YouTube or Vimeo, Bloglovin. Want to showcase your personality? Try a unique landing page on your blog/site.
- Pitch your dream collaboration at either the cocktail hour (Friday, September 26 at 3:30PM PT) or the coffee break (Saturday, September 27 at 8:00AM PT). Wanting to expand your audience, where would you like to guest post? Mention it. Have an idea about a project that is bigger than one or two bloggers? Put out feelers. Be ready to ask for what you want and to share what you know with others.
How are you getting ready for Alt for Everyone? Share your tips for maximizing your investment in an online conference.
If you have not yet gotten your tickets for Alt for Everyone, there are still a few left. Grab yours soon to ensure you get your first choice of sessions.
