I’m sitting in my hotel room in Orlando. The #BlogHer17 Conference ended last night and I can now officially say (having been to both) that blogger conferences are really different from writer conferences.
First of all, the standard for fashion is way higher at a blogging conference. At a writing conference, a girl can throw on a simple dress and a pair of sandals and look pretty fabulous compared to everyone else in the room (just saying).
Not here. Oh, no. Ladies were walking around in gowns. I’m not kidding. Like, sparkly, clingy, single strap dresses. With four inch heels. And it wasn’t just the fashion bloggers either. I kept meeting people and saying “you must be a fashion blogger” and they would say, no, I’m a mommy blogger, or, I’m a food blogger. But I don’t regret my grey pants and hiking boots for a second. I was comfortable. That’s what matters to me.
Then there were the sponsors. The last writing conference I went to was AWP, which, if you’ve been you know, has an enormous expo of publishers and writing programs. Thousands of book nerds all coming together to talk about favorite books, upcoming books, sneaky little gems of books that must be read, literary journals, short stories. I went back to the expo over and over to talk story, story, and more story. And the swag ranged from copies of journals, to actual books, to pens, to flash drives to silly stickers. I got a mug that said “write like a motherfucker” on the side. I love it.
After two and half days at this conference I am leaving with more feminine products than I even knew existed. I mean, I know it’s a women-centric conference, but it felt like half the sponsors at the expo were pitching something for my vagina. Even sponsors that weren’t pushing vagina care seemed to skip over the “blogger” part and focus on the “her” part. BestBuy, for instance. They sell all kinds of cool gadgets. I know, I’ve been to their stores. But what did they bring to BlogHer? Refrigerators. Yes they did.
On the plus side, the content of the actual sessions was really good. The main take-away for me is that I need to start considering video content. I knew it was coming. I read a fair amount about blogging and social media and everyone keeps saying how video is the future, but I’m a writer, damn it. So I’ve been dragging my feet on that. But, dear readers, I’ve officially caught the bug. I’m not giving up written content (ever), but as I pack my bags to head home, I am already percolating ideas for how to incorporate more video into my blogging. So stay tuned for that.
All in all, it was worth the trip to Orlando, but writing conferences are much more my style. Where is AWP this year, anyway?
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