I attended my first PodCamp this past weekend, and had a great time. Actually to say it was a great experience is a severe understatement, the experience was very good for me. Unfortunately due to some personal considerations I was not able to be there for the full two days, but I did attend half days each day. The best part of the experience was of course meeting social media enthusiasts from all over (Flickr Pics). The community is so vibrant and the personalities so rich it was a refreshing. It was also very good to see how vibrant the local Phoenix community is when it comes to social technology usages and participation.
Naturally, the two day event was jammed packed with loads of information sessions. It was very difficult trying to figure out which session to attend, since so many were appealing. Given the awesome choices, I attended the following sessions:
- “The Audacity of Podcasting: Tips for producing and editing your audio podcast with free software” by Dan Feierabend
- “So you want to make money with your podcast? Now what?” by, Nicole and Marc Spagnuolo
- “Podtaint: Fame in the New Media World” by, Jack Mangan
- “Stranger, Meet Strangers” by, Brian Shaler
One presentation I wish I had the time to attend was by Pamela Slim, “How to strike a balance between sharing information freely and making a living using New Media.” I was really looking forward to hear her speak but things didn’t quite work out that way on my schedule.
On Sunday morning, I had my own presentation on “Integrating Social Media to Traditional Marketing”. In this presentation I discussed how social media needs to be integrated into your overall marketing plan and can not be viewed in isolation anymore. Many companies are struggling to achieve this integration but those that have are seeing a lot of success. The discussion among those who attended was really amazing and to be honest with you I learned from those in the audience in that one hour time frame. The participation was lively enough that some folks continued the conversation afterward in a different room. For those interested here is my PowerPoint presentation:
PodCampAz organizers and volunteers deserve a great round of applause for their hard work in putting this together. Their hard work was evident in the success of the conference.