On Saturday, I woke up at the ridiculous hour of 4:45 AM and drove the 2.5 hour trek to St. Paul for the Minnesota Bloggers Conference. Let me tell you, it was totally worth it! I learned so much and had a great time meeting other bloggers. Here are a few of the things that did and learned at MNBlogCon.
- Visited St. Catherine’s – what a cute little campus!
- Participated in my first live tweeting of an event (@puppiespretties if you want to join me on Twitter). And it was fun! I have a love/hate relationship with Twitter so it was great to try something new with it.
- Got a headshot taken by Glimpses of Soul Photography – I can’t wait to see it!
- I won a prize! But I had to give it back since I’m not in Minneapolis/St. Paul (the prize was tickets to the Social Media Breakfast there)
- Learned SO MUCH – here are a few tidbits that really stuck with me
- Create with a purpose
- Hope is not a strategy
- Think of yourself as an artist
- Stop being a lurker! Comment on posts that you enjoyed reading. (This has been one of my goals the last couple months)
- Your blog is an island – don’t compare yourself to others (this one is tough for me)
- Your audience is always moving – are you helping them do that and do you know where they are before they get to you?
- Monetization isn’t about spamming, its about serving needs
- Do giveaways that match your blog, otherwise all those views are trash and are not really worth anything
- Magic happens when you tie online and offline
- Make sure you have Open Graph set up for Facebook – otherwise you might end up with a random picture of a taco
See what I mean? So much! I can’t wait to put it to use. I’m also looking forward to checking out the blogs of the wonderful people I met.
And you know what made the day even better? I got to stop at Trader Joe’s on my way home and stock up on their delicious candy and mac and cheese! Oh, and I got Arby’s! There are some cons of living in a rural area, that is for sure – like having to drive 1 hour (to Rochester) just for Trader Joe’s and Arby’s.
Alas – I didn’t take a photo of my pretty awesome outfit (#StyleBloggerFail) but just know it was a good one!
MNBlogCon will be an event that I put on my calendar every year. Do you have any events that you would recommend?