Event Camp Twin Cities

This post was written by Erica St. Angel, VP Marketing, Sonic Foundry (@EricaStAngel, @mediasite).

Watch the Video from the Session

Earlier this month I had the privilege to present at Event Camp Twin Cities 2010 in Minneapolis, MN. Event organizer Samuel J. Smith kept telling me over and over, “This is an experiment. We’re going to try a bunch of different things and see what works and what doesn’t.”

Based on the feedback and meaty list of tactics that follow, I’m going to go out on a limb and say I think this session, “How Do You Keep the Conversation Going after Your Event,” was one of the things that worked.

And it worked on two fronts: 1) we ended up with a great list of tactics and 2) we got everyone involved in this hybrid event – people onsite, online and in PODS – to brainstorm together all at the same time.

@eventcamptc: “Go forth and ideate.” – St. Angel

I kicked it off with a confession – yeah, I admit it, I struggle with leveraging our conference content after the event: the webcasts, tweets, networking, videos. And I know I’m not the only one. Why is it so hard to plan the post-event strategy while we are planning the event?

So I put the question to the floor, divided the attendees up into eight groups (including the two PODS in Dallas, Texas, and Basel, Switzerland, and the online audience as their own group). Lucky for me, it was a challenge everyone chose to accept.

@RuudWJanssen: Basel Pod going into conclave about 3-5 ways to attract sponsorships we accept #ectc10 #ectc

And the result?

Not just 37 ways, but 111 at last count.

With more added daily. We used Google Moderator to submit and vote on ideas for each group. And that is one area where we all had a teachable moment.

What didn’t work?

Google doesn’t always let you submit multiple ideas in rapid succession into that same group. It often defaulted back to group 1, so Basel was the recipient of the most ideas (those lucky Swiss).

@mikegranek: Make sure you’re submitting your idea to the right group. It’s a drop down menu right above the submit area. #ectc10

But that didn’t stop our unflappable online host Emilie Barta: she just had her group tweet their ideas.

@TahiraCreates: #ectc10 I agree with Mike I can’t make this work… sigh. @emilebarta what connections did they make this year that make a return wanted

I’ve since posted those idea tweets over into the Google Moderator groups. And if this post, the on-demand webcast or the transcript, yield more inspiration for you, then go add your idea to the mix right now. Or at least cast your vote for your favorites.

What kind of feedback did we get?

The buzz in the room was crazy positive. And it was important to me to have each group, including the PODS and remote attendees via Emilie, report back what they’d accomplished during the 15 minute collaboration.

I decided to type up each group’s top 3-5 ideas onto a slide as they were reported so that everyone in the room and online could count down the progress. The result? Tons of people coming up to me and saying, “Wow, I can’t believe we just did that.”

And similar feelings expressed in 140 characters or less:

@ASegar: Firehose of ideas at Erica St. Angel’s session on how do we keep the conversation going after the event #ectc10

@MelCMP: Thx #ectc10 and St. Angel’s online group collaboration for allowing us remote attendees to participate in real-time brainstorming!

@skylineexhibits: Erica St. Angel’s group collaboration for content has produced a flood of great info. #ectc10

@slaytercreative: @EricaStAngel thanks for sharing, taking chances, and presenting. very provoking. #ECTC10

@JimPelley: @EricaStAngel post content leverage ideas A+ #ectc10

@theexpogroup: Great topic at #ectc10: How do you avoid post-event adrenalin-crash to keep pushing out content and engage your community? #tradeshows

Me: [blush] Aw shucks. But seriously, it wouldn’t have worked with you.

So will it change anything?

I believe it will. I asked attendees to tweet or write in their conference journals just one item that they would pledge to implement once they got back to their day jobs. Seemed like that in and of itself might have been a stealable idea:

@KathiEdwards: Brilliant to have people tweet intent over next year to do something from what was learned in session. #ectc10

And I encouraged us as group to hold each other to that commitment. To that end, I’ve started a Twitter list of those fine people willing to go on record. Join us! Just tweet “#ectc10 I will: [insert tactic here]” and I’ll add you to the list. Here’s a roundup of those brave souls and the idea that resonated:

@NickBalestra: #ectc10 i will improve sparking tactics and evaluate innovative event like this to attend or sponsor as a tech start-up company

@Callainthesnow: #ectc10 I will circulate these ideas to our event peeps.

@JimPelley: #ectc10 I will develop game / local pod concept

@RuudWJanssen: #ectc10 I will create interest lists for sponsors at future events. gr8 format, well done @mediasite Erica St Angel

@Natchuk: #ectc10 I will implement 5 new strategies I learned from today’s event camp in our next major event. Testify!

And, even with the glitch, many people made notes on-site and via Twitter to check out Google Moderator for future events.

@eventsforgood: I’m gonna need to spend more time with it. RT @tracibrowne: once I figured it out I did really like google moderator #ectc10

@GregRuby: Google Moderator looks interesting, will have to investigate it more after returning from #ECTC10

The big list of dynamite ideas

So, with much thanks to our attendees on-site, online, and abroad, here’s those 37 Ways to Leverage Your Content Post-Event.