How Not to Make Friends After A Conference

As mentioned in my previous posts, I had the privilege of attending the 2010 CFC and HOW Design Conferences in Denver in June of this year. Like any conference, you share stories with your colleagues. Eventually someone breaks out the business cards and you trade. And while I love a well-designed business card, I have a pile of them by the time the conference is over and other than enter a few of my top picks (more on this in a minute), I add them to my growing dust collectors collection of cards in my office.

So how do you keep in contact with your fellow attendees that you do want to connect with? Well, I first narrow down my cards based on 1) the notes I took on the back of the card or 2) how well I remember the person. I make those people a top priority to connect with and put the rest on the back burner.

For those few folks I do choose to connect with, I typically connect via an awkward e-mail or two, Facebook, or Twitter. So needless to say my follow up isn't the best. However, I learned of another way that people are connecting post-conference, and while it might be a good idea overall, the implementation needed work.

Apparently, by handing my card out to a few folks at this year's conference, I was also added to their e-newsletter without really knowing or thinking about it. Now for me, I do expect the large companies in the resource center to use and abuse my business card in exchange for cool schwag. However, for some reason, I never anticipated my fellow attendees signing me up for their newsletter just because I gave them my card. To me, this is spam because I never granted my permission to be on their e-mail list.

Needless to say I was a bit surprised when I started receiving new newsletters in my inbox that I didn't sign up for . Were these newsletters asking me to try viagra or some other product? No, they were nicely written pieces that deserve more attention. But I didn't ask for them. So I promptly unsubscribed from each and sent an e-mail to the person so they knew why I was unsubscribing. (I'm not always the most tactful person either, so I did my best to restrain myself, but I still need to work on it...) In every case, the person understood and made sure my name was removed.

But this all could have been avoided. All I want is to be asked to be signed up. So when you trade business, the exchange could go something like this: "Hi, it was nice to meet you. I would love to keep in touch with my e-newsletter, is it okay if I sign you up when I get back home?"

See how easy it was? I've been asked (and will most likely agree) to receive your newsletter because I've given you my card so I might think you're a good person that I can learn from and share cool design stuff with.

My other thought is to follow Mig Reyes' example and only hand out my card to folks who promise to send me something cool. That way I'm giving them permission up front to send me stuff.

Either way, please don't be offended if I don't ask for your card or give you one of mine. I've just grown to the point where I need to find quality connections, not quantity.

CFC & HOW 2010: Part 2

I had the privilege of attending the 2010 Creative Freelancer Conference and a few sessions of the 2010 HOW Design Conference. In a stroke of brilliance, F&W Media decided to hold the CFC, HOW, and inHOWse conferences all at the same location and at the same time. As a result, my CFC package included access to the HOW resource center (samples and schwag! :), the HOW Opening Keynote and one "Wildcard" HOW Session. Here's part 2 of my experience…

Alas, the topics of Day Two were a bit dry: It's Your Money (Galia Gichon), Legal Basics (Jean Perwin), and The Art & Science of Pricing (Shel Perkins). Galia and Jean presented their rather dry info in a good and as interesting as possible way as they could. It was a necessary evil, but useful and informative. Shel's session, however was not for me. Way too dry to keep me interested. It looked like good info, however the slides were nearly illegible at the back of the room and instead of offering us a link to his extremely long presentation, he just mentioned that all the info was in his book. Major fail there dude, this conference is about sharing! A link his presentation would have been greatly appreciated here, especially since Shel talked way too fast and had too much info to capture in the session's allotted time.

The session on Internet Marking by Aliza Sherman was informative and great for those who are tiptoeing into social media and internet marketing. Not nearly as dry as the financial and legal presentations, Aliza really lit up her session with color and wit.

I skipped out on the remaining sessions to hang with my fellow HOWies (members of the HOW Design Forum) on the 40th floor of the Hyatt's Peak Lounge, which has a fantastic panoramic view of the Rockies and downtown Denver. And while I was skeptical of Von's order of the Crisps with Artichoke dip, it was really good. I think I became addicted to it in the first bite! The company and the view were fantastic and I wouldn't have traded that for any session.

After our pre-HOW meetup, we all trekked over to the Denver Convention Center for the HOW Opening Keynote by Andy Stefanovich. I'd seen Andy speak at a previous HOW conference (Vegas, I believe) and as I expected, he was fantastic. He talks a mile a minute, but this enthusiasm and passion are quite evident and it is is hard to not get caught up in it. Andy's session was a great way to kick of the 2010 HOW Conference (and the mayor's proclamation declaring it Design Week in Denver didn't hurt either... ;)

After that rousing session, it was time to hit the famous Resource Center. One of the best aspects of the HOW Design Conference is all the vendors that are located in the Resource Center. Plenty of schwag and samples to be had by all! But that doesn't stop 2,500 of your closest design friends from clamoring to get all the cool stuff on the first night. Nothing beats earning that Veer T or French Paper sample kit by standing in line and waiting with your fellow designers chatting about the day.

Day Three for me (Day 2 of HOW) was a short day for me since I just had the 2 Wildcard HOW sessions. (I was fortunate enough to score 3 Wildcards for HOW because of friends who either purchased both CFC and HOW Conferences or had a plane to catch...it pays to know people! :) I started out with Gail Anderson's session on You Are What You Keep. It took Gail awhile to get up to speed and I figured that she was like me and didn't do well with the whole getting up early thing... Gail had great info and I particularly liked how she showed specific examples of how items she collected were used or inspired future projects.

Next up was Von's session, 5 Alarm Concepts. Von always has a great presentation and his latest one was no different. Von spoke of collecting "matches" to fill up your virtual matchbox so you could ignite your brain to creative 5 Alarm Concepts. Funny and informative, this was my favorite of the two sessions I attended.

2010 was a great year for the CFC/HOW Conferences and I was pleased that I was able to reconnect with old friends and make new ones along the way. Alas, I was bummed that I missed out on the closing Party as well as the awesome Kevin Carroll giving the closing keynote, but I was able to squeeze in another day of Denver siteseeing along the way before heading home Tuesday evening. All in all, I think I did a good job of collecting a variety of matches from different sources to fuel my next creative endeavor.

CFC & HOW 2010: Part 1

I had the privilege of attending the 2010 Creative Freelancer Conference and a few sessions of the 2010 HOW Design Conference. In a stroke of brilliance, F&W Media decided to hold the CFC, HOW, and inHOWse conferences all at the same location and at the same time. As a result, my CFC package included access to the HOW resource center (samples and schwag! :), the HOW Opening Keynote and one "Wildcard" HOW Session.

I'm a CFC and HOW Conference veteran and while my main purpose was to attend both conferences, I brought along my friend who likes to travel, so I planned on working in a bit of a vacation too.

Despite what our pilots told us at the beginning of the flight, our ride into Denver was anything but smooth. Especially the last half hour, it felt as if we were on a roller coaster and not a plane. And alas, I did succumbed to altitude sickness that same night. Going into the first day of CFC, I was a bit unsteady and uncertain.

However, once I arrived and saw Bryn Mooth (HOW Editor and all-around awesome person) and chatted with her a bit, I started feeling much better. That carried me until I entered the room filled with CFCers and the energy of several hundred independent creatives lit my design fire up.

Ilise stared the day off right with the session You Are A Business.She talked about how we decide if and when we are a business. It was very empowering. Pitch Perfect by Dyana was good, however, it was the same basic presentation from 2008, so although it was not new to me, it was good to hear again and to do the exercises to help clarify how I define my business when asked the dreaded "What do you do?"

Luke's session Who's The Boss was by far the best presentation of the day for me. He explained how to set clear boundaries between work and personal for you and your client as well as strategies to keep your business and clients all working together smoothly.

Rather than attend the panel on freelance success and the networking reception, I decided to fill up my soul or as Von said in his HOW session ("add a match to my matchbox", more on that later). My friend's friends were going to visit their dog who had just given birth to the cutest little labrador puppies I've ever seen. Nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, I really got to see the beauty of Denver and surrounding areas.

Day Two of the CFC was shaping up to be a long day for me since I also had the HOW opening keynote and resource center on my agenda. I was starting to really feel better today! The design mojo and creative energy was definitely palpable as I walked through the Hyatt to the sessions.

Look for part 2 coming Monday!