Conference Thoughts

Robert Scoble's written a very important blog post about conferences in general and BloggerCon and Foo Camp in particular, which took place respectively last weekend and this weekend. Make sure to read it.

I've been in the conference business for quite a while, first with TTI Vanguard, where the model was annual member subscriptions, five conferences a year, a committed Board of Advisors, and NO sponsorships. This is unique model fosters an amazing community and an openness as members are not there for a one-shot deal, but are ongoing members. Without vendor sponsorship, you are never served up a speaker pretending to be unbiased, but is really just a pitchman.

I also worked for these folks, here at Harvard Business School Publishing's Conference Group. They did have sponsors, but mostly managed not to have flat-footed sales pitches from those sponsors, and they always knew how to pack the room with top talent, both in the speaker slots AND in the audience.

I would add only one thing. In the best conferences, you go away thinking "Wow, I really learned something," or even better, "Wow, it was great to meet that person I've been hearing about and reading about but never got to talk to up close." I think those experiences make or break a conference.

Any good conference is a mix of traveling think-tank and celebrity event. There need to be stars in the room that people are excited about seeing. You need some rock star type talent. Also, you need to make that person be accessible. One of the things Scoble is writing about is how people really were accessible after hours and "out of the room" at both conferences, instead of the old model where Mr. Keynote flies in, gets handled by handlers up to the podium, does his thing and gets whisked away to where only oh-so-special keynote guys hang out on the remote Planet Fabulous. We've all had enough of that.