Month: September 2008

Blog World Expo ’08 – What A Blast!

Just like last year, Blog World Expo has come and gone way too quickly. This was my second appearance to the second annual Blog World Expo, held in Las Vegas Nevada. Overall, the BWE08 weekend far surpassed last year!

Last year was our first conference ever and first time we exhibited, as well. This year, UBD designed and implemented the official Blog World Expo Blog, so we were upgraded to a 10×20 booth (twice as big as last year). KA POW!

On Friday afternoon, only four days after returning from Orlando (IZEA Fest), we packed up our monitors and UBD supplies, and we drove the 4.5-hour trek from Phoenix to Las Vegas.

Friday

We arrived in Vegas around 9:00PM, right when the Tech Set party was kicking off. We first met up with our Blog World Expo buddies from last year, Ms. Danielle and Greg Morgan.

New friends Gary from iPhoneinCanada.ca and Derek Semmler also joined us and we went to the Tech Set party at the Mirage where we met up with our Market Leverage home girls, Dina and Debby, and ShoeMoney.

At this point, the bar was closing at the Tech Set party, so we went another bar in the Mirage where we saw IZEA CEO Ted Murphy and also Pete Cashmore from Mashable. After a few drinks with everyone, we basically called it a night. 😉

Greg Morgan, Matt Blancarte, Nate Whitehill, Gary Ng, Dina Roccobono

Josh Mullineaux, Ted Murphy, Nate Whitehill

Jeremy Schoemaker, Nate Whitehill, Danielle Nagami

Debby Phillips, Ian Fernando, Nate Whitehill, Dina Roccobonno ‘

Nate Whitehill, Jeremy Schoemaker, David Brim, Pete Cashmore

Saturday

Saturday was the first day of the conference, so we spent the majority of the day at the conference hall talking to a wide range of different businesses and individuals. As you can see, I look a little more tired than the night before. 😉

ShoeMoney and Ted Murphy stopped by to let us distribute some of their t-shirts, stickers and buttons. Did we mention we love IZEA?

Ted Murphy, Josh Mullineaux, Matt Blancarte, Nate Whitehill, Jeremy Schoemaker

Later that night, the fun started when we went to the Market Leverage-hosted Super Panel dinner with Internet stars such as Zac Johnson, Ian Fernando, John Chow, Jeremy Schoemaker, Brian Clarke and Jim Kukral. We had dinner at an awesome steakhouse. Big thanks to Market Leverage!

Sunday

Sunday was the final day of the expo, but luckily, I was much better rested than the previous night. We exhibited all day, and afterwards, we had dinner with John Chow, ShoeMoney, the Market Leverage girls at the Red8 Chinese restaraunt in the Wynn.

Unfortunately, my camera died earlier that day so I wasn’t able to snap any more pictures.

Overall, it was an incredibly productive weekend and some of the best networking I have done since, well, the week before. 😉

Sometimes people ask me if I have any tips or tricks for people looking to get started online and how they can become more well known in their online field. My answer is always:

The best way to network online…is to do it IN PERSON!!!

Remember that next time you are thinking about going to an industry conference/tradeshow.

More photos here »

IZEA Fest!

IZEA Fest has been off to an incredible start. It has been great to meet and catch up with many of our past clients including John Chow, Shoemoney, Neil Patel, Israel Lagares, Michael Brito, Zac Johnson and Andrew Bennett.

It has also been great to meet some familiar faces such as IZEA CEO Ted Murphy, Tamar Weinberg, Ian Fernando, Brian Clark, and John Reese.

So far, Matt, Josh and I have been kicking it in the “La Playa Lounge” where we have a table and booth setup.

Here are some pics:

Exciting September Plans

As many of you know, my work with UBD has dominated my time over the past year. We have been very fortunate to have met and worked with some of the top bloggers and companies online, including John Chow, Shoemoney, and Yahoo!

Our networking experiences have been one of the most important factors that have helped grow our business. Last November, we attended Blog World Expo in Las Vegas. That was a huge branding benefit for our business and it also where we met Yahoo! and IZEA.

IZEA Fest

On Thursday, my biz partners and I are flying to Orlando, Florida to speak and exhibit at IZEA Fest. My business partner and senior UBD designer, Matt, will be speaking on the “Blog Design Makeover” panel with two other top web designers.

We will also be exhibiting with a booth at IZEA Fest. This will be our first east coast conference, and hopefully no category-4 hurricanes will get in our way!

John Chow dot Com Design Version 3

I am also happy to report that UBD will be releasing the next iteration of John Chow’s popular blog later tonight. We have been working on this with John for the past several months and we are very excited to debut several new features and functionality which we have built into this theme.

Affiliate Marketing Product

Over the past few weeks, I have been working with Paul from UberAffiliate on a new affiliate marketing product. I can’t say much more, but we should be releasing this in the next two weeks! I can promise you this – everyone will be talking about it!

Blog World Expo

Five days after IZEA Fest, we will be driving up to Las Vegas (4-hour drive from Scottsdale) to attend the second-annual Blog World Expo. This will be our second time exhibiting at Blog World Expo, and this year, our booth is twice as big – 10×20! What will we do with all of that space? Good question. On a side note, we are proud to have worked with the Blog World Expo team this year on the Blog World Expo blog.

Citrus Theme

Back in the Olden Days, when I used to work at the Apple Store, I met friend and fellow Apple enthusiast, John Ellenich.

Almost two years since I started working at and quit Apple, John and I decided it would be smart to design and release a premium theme together in conjunction with Unique Blog Designs. We are proud to release Citrus Theme in six beautiful colors.

You can learn more about Citrus Theme here… Let us know what you think!