WordPress WordCamp Milwaukee 2014

Members of our team attended the WordPress WordCamp in Milwaukee this last weekend. This was the third year for this regional technology users group event and we’ve attended all three years. Kudos to the organizers, volunteers and sponsors. This event each year has gotten bigger and better. You’ll note from the pic above that while there is serious learning going on the organizers, all standing together at the front of the room during kick-off, to their credit don’t take themselves too seriously. We’re in Wisconsin ergo the cow theme for the weekend. Thankfully we got all the cow puns out of the way quickly and mooo-ved on to the knowledge exchange in short order.  😉

What’s WordCamp? Why should I care?

Sure. You own or manage a business or organization. You’re trying to reach your target audience online, engage with them in a meaningful and ongoing way and hopefully encourage them towards a desired action.
You have business needs.

Well its in your own best interests to know that we at Resonate are actively engaged in the never ending pursuit of keeping current with the rapid pace of evolution in the web technologies we use to meet our client needs. There’s no coasting here. It doesn’t work.

The term WordPress may not mean anything to you, perhaps it shouldn’t.  You have running your business or organization to stay on top of. Allow us to be the experts here in helping guide you to meet your online aspirations. If in fact you are aware of WordPress and already know it’s the way you should be going or simply are curious to know more or why… we’d be happy to talk with you. Suffice to say that you’ve come to the right place.

But What’s in it for you?

I wanted to talk a bit about our attendance at this regional technology users group gathering this last weekend for a couple reasons. Firstly we had a great time and learned a lot. We love this stuff. We were able to reconnect with a range of subject matter experts who have become friends, colleagues and collaborators over all these years and had many great conversations. I continue to be enthused about the work that we do. I’m a lucky guy.

What’s in it for our clients is the assurance that we’re working hard for you to stay current with this rapidly advancing world of web based communications and marketing. We’re not new to this. We’ve been working in this space for close to twenty years now. We have some deep experience and relationships to draw upon in helping our clients.

Some things that spark our interest

There is no such thing as having arrived. There is always more to learn. I must say though that it was affirming to find that all things considered we’re doing well and better than most. That’s likely due to the fact that we’ve been doing this for some time now and have been fortunate enough to have worked with some fantastic clients who have had interesting, complex and challenging projects. While we welcome and can do the simple “brochure” websites we gravitate towards the interesting challenges. We’re not afraid to tackle the hard projects.

So the subjects we focus on and our conversations often revolve around current and potential client needs. Some times we’ll attend sessions on where we’re already deep to see what’s new, sometimes we’ll attend something completely different as these often strikes new ideas.

We attend a lot of WordCamps and have for years. For us the key determinant for these professional development events is the quality of the conversations. The sessions are great of course but firstly, for us it’s the attendees and the conversations.

As for the sessions, a few favorites:

Lisa Sabin-Wilson | Check & Double Check – Internal QA is Vital
Lisa’s presentations are always first rate. Given that we attend a lot of WordCamps we’ve heard Lisa’s presentations any number of times so the fact that she was addressing a new topic was really intriguing and a must-attend for us. Of course it was great, very informative and action-able. A huge thank you to Lisa. You help us to help our clients.

Dre Armeda | WordPress Security – Kill The Noise
Dre… what can you say. Energy, enthusiasm, to the point and informative. If you’ve not heard of Dre he’s the co-founder of Sucuri, arguably the leader in website security services. Security, it’s an issue for so many and likewise something we focus on and help new clients with who’ve found themselves in trouble. Thank you Dre for helping us help our clients.

Greg Rickaby | SASS Basics
This was a real treat for us. You see, we’ve been big fans of Greg for years now but never had the opportunity to meet or listen to him speak. I suspect Ana may have given the wrong impression as creeper given her enthusiasm for having finally met someone who’s professional / technology insights we’ve enjoyed for years. Here again, his presentation was content rich and an eye opener. Thank you for that.

We’ll keep attending

The WordPress WordCamps like Milwaukee’s don’t disappoint. We’ll keep attending, keep learning and keep talking with both new and old compatriots. It’s good for us. It’s good for our clients.