Flying through the Holidays – January Conferences

I’m wrapping up what has been a pretty good week all in all. All week, I’ve been working to provide free upgrades for my clients sites from last year. I haven’t hit them all yet, but I’ve hit most of them. Upgrading their WordPress installations and any plugins that are out of date. I’m doing this free, and not expecting anything for it. I mention it for other WP designers out there.

Consider, you could charge for this service, you could charge a maintenance type of contract even. You could also charge your clients an arm and a leg if their site gets hacked because they were running an out of date version of WordPress or using a plugin that has a security vulnerability in it.

All those situations however, hing upon the concept of your customers experiencing a problem and you fixing it. Ergo, they have to experience some level of pain, and then make the association of you with that pain, even if you are the cure.

I’m not big on codependence, creating it, fostering it etc. I am big on helping people, and helping them avoid pain and problems. So I’m helping my clients avoid this issue going forward.

Plus, honestly, it is a little self serving. Yes, I could make some decent money charging to clean up a hacked account, but that type of work is really a pain in the ass, not very fun, and every one involved (client, designer, hosting company and more) all go through the process reluctantly.

Who needs that type of hassle? That goes double during the holidays!

So happy holidays to everyone, and I hope you update your WordPress intallations and plugins too! The tighter your installation and security the safer the web is for everyone.

Travel and Conferences

I’ve been working on getting ready for January travel and conferences after the holidays. In this area, I’m really looking forward to my third Affiliate Summit. I’m covering the show again this winter, and something about this show gets me jazzed everytime it comes around.

It is not an easy nut to crack. Even though I’ve been covering, writing, even working in the affiliate world myself for several years now, there are a large number of disciplines to understand deeply. This is not a get rich over night scheme. It involves a large number of professionals that work on the web and have been honing their craft and skills and tools since the earliest days of the internet. When Yahoo! was still trying to figure out how to build a revenue component into their business plan, the affiliate marketing industry was already profitable.

This time around, I’m again going to be focusing on any tips I can pick up in understanding analytics and PPC management. I’m also going to be VERY focused on trying to find affiliate networks that provide products or services through their network that play well in the realm of content that has entertainment value. Anything from Blogs to podcasts to video casts to movies and tv shows online. I see a big future here for a number of reasons, and I’m looking for ways to make this work.

I will also keep my eye out for anyone that builds in better integration with WordPress or other CMS systems.

This will be my third show and I think as a blog marketer, WordPress CMS web designers, I could offer back some useful insights to this community as well. To this end, I’m hoping to discuss this more with Shawn Collins and Missy Ward. I haven’t gotten a good bead on how or where I might be able to give back to this industry that has taught me quite a bit already, but I think there is an opportunity there.

I’m also trying to figure out how to juggle in CES, Atlanta WordCamp, Boston WordCamp and Indiana Barcamp this next month.

Atlanta Wordcamp organizers sent me a request to send in a speaking proposal for that conference. They specifically asked for something, a topic, that hadn’t been used elsewhere before. So I took an extra few days to put something together, got it in by the deadline, then didn’t hear anything from them. I started seeing other speakers added to the list, covering some of the same exact topics I’ve heard them cover more than once elsewhere. (not saying there is anything wrong with that, but I kind of figured when Atlanta WordCamp asked for something unique they meant it. )

Guess that wasn’t really the case. lol

It looks like its going to be a good WordCamp if for no other reason than Scott from WordPress Pods is going to be presenting. I really hoped that he could have spoke at the Birmingham WordCamp but it didn’t happen. So I was glad to see him get on the docket for Atlanta.

Anyway, Atlanta WordCamp happens right at the same time that CES is taking place in Las Vegas. So I was looking at flying to Vegas, then taking the Red Eye back after the tweet up at the LV Hilton to make it to Atlanta WordCamp in time to speak.

That’s not necessary now as they lost my proposal in the pile, filled up the schedule with other great speakers, and decided they didn’t need me after all. That’s all fine and dandy. I was waiting on feedback on whether they needed me or not and got no response all week long.

So I finally was able to track down a Google voice number for one of the organizers (think there are a couple), and called. Nice guy, that I met in Birmingham (didn’t remember me lol even though he requested I send in a proposal in the first place ). So he told me that they didn’t have a spot for my topic (which is true, there are about 3-4 people presenting the same topic already, sans the tool that will enable people to actually walk out of the room with the ability to use the skill taught.

That’s all well and good, but when I went online to finally get my travel plans locked in stone, the airline rates have gone up by $400!

So essentially, submitting my speaking proposal, and then not backing out, and waiting for someone to follow up with me and confirm whether or not they really needed/wanted me to speak after they asked, just cost me $400.

Merry Christmas from WordCamp Atlanta!

Now, anyone that knows me, knows that I’m not rich or anything. I’ve got a home in Atlanta with an updside down mortgage. I’ve got other challenges stemming from my run in with the Chinese mafia when I used to be a corporate accountant for Motorola. I don’t really have $400 to spare, especially when I’m trying to do right by someone or some group.

I realize its the holidays. I realize December is a tough month. I realize that 99% of people that work in Social Media wouldn’t know how to return a phone call or follow up with someone in a meaningful (nonfollowfriday shout out) way unless you were threatening to decapitate Steve Jobs and put his head on a pike in the middle of the Microsoft Corporate Headquarter campus.

I know all that and my expectations are very very low. I’ve been working in this industry for 4 years now. Its par for the course.

But well, it is still annoying, especially when it takes money out of my bank account.

Sorry Bank of America, guess it took money out of your bank account too.

Fortunately, the week has been pretty good from a financial perspective.  I had done a fair job of bringing in new business this month, and before this happened, it looked like I would be going into the holidays with all pluses on my tick sheet.  So now I have a $400 set back, plus, not sure if I can make either the WordCamp in Atlanta nor CES! ($400 extra might blow my budget for that trip)  I could go to Atlanta WordCamp if I don’t go to CES, but now I’m a little annoyed, and there’s really no room for politics or bad attitudes at WordCamps. 

Its funny, over the years I’ve heard quite a few of the speakers that frequent WordCamps in the southeast, bitch moan and complain about the inherent politics that screws them out of grandeur.  Other than empathizing with friends, I never really paid it much attention.  I do my best to stay out of politics.  If someone wants my help, I’m there.  If they don’t, that’s cool too.  I’m pretty easy going.  So getting sucked in on this one, with the invite first, the stall second, and the blow off last even managed to get under my thick skin.

At least they weren’t threatening to kill me and my kids like the Chinese mafia in Buckhead were!  Some things in Atlanta are getting better I guess.

…..

deep breath, btw , this IS a blog, in the diary sense of blogs.  I write here to express myself and for therapy reasons these days.  Nice cleansing feeling of getting this crap off my chest.  After I hit publish, I won’t care about this any more.

OK, so its finally snowing here.  The kids were let out on a snow day 5 hours ago, when there was not any snow or rain in the sky.  (silly)

I’m going to get cleaned up then head over to a holiday party at some of our friends house.  My wife and kids are already there.  I’ve just been finishing a few things up before heading out.  Trying to put in something of a full day.