Word of Mouth, GTD, and WordPress Theming: A Trio of BatchTalks at NewBCamp ‘09
- Posted February 11th, 2009
- Filed under: Community, Events/Presentation, Social Media, Technology
The second annual NewBCamp unconference was held this past Sunday here in Providence. Last year, I gave a talk on Web Standards while Pam performed admirably in her role as Vice President of Cheerfulness.
This year, three (THREE!) members of the BatchCrew gave presentations. They were:
“Wonderful World of Word of Mouth Marketing” by Michelle Riggen-Ransom
Michelle’s talk explored how to create low-cost buzz around a product or business. She spoke about identifying ways to connect with customers, how to get them talking about your business, and providing tools to help your customers to share the love. She also gave real-world examples of word of mouth campaigns both good and bad.
You can download Michelle’s notes (PDF) from the presentation.
“The Tao of GTD” by Matt Gillooly
Matt’s presentation, “The Tao of GTD,” combined productivity tips for knowledge workers with martial arts philosophies from the Tao of Jeet Kune Do. “I think you’d be hard pressed to find anyone more accomplished than Bruce Lee,” said Matt, “so it seemed only natural that some of the teachings from his book would apply well in other creative fields.”
The talk touched on several strategies for acknowledging your own weaknesses, removing obstacles from your workflow, and keeping yourself motivated. Matt also talked about a few tools he uses to manage his information and gave a quick overview of Merlin Mann’s Inbox Zero approach to email. But ultimately it’s not about the tools. “It’s really easy to waste time fiddling with tools, if you forget that the whole point is getting to your real work more efficiently.”
Or as Bruce would say, “It is like a finger pointing toward the moon. Don’t concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory.”
“Turning Your Design into a WordPress Theme” by Adam Darowski
In this presentation, I deconstructed a WordPress theme I recently built (the Tabigail theme) and explained what each file does. Then, I took an all-new XHTML/CSS one-page design and combined it with the Tabigail theme code to make an all new original theme. I only had 15 minutes for the actual “building” part, so I didn’t finish the WHOLE theme, but I did get the home page and archives up and running. The theme will be launched in the form of a redesign of my personal site soon.
We love NewBCamp for a number of reasons. It’s local. It’s small, It’s intimate. But there is also an incredible amount and variety of information exchanged.
