We are happy to announce the content for the 2015 Wine Bloggers Conference has been mostly finalized and is now online on our Agenda.
Determining content for the WBC is a long process that involves substantial input from our alumni. We recently conducted two surveys of our alumni. The first asked about whether we should implement one or more of five structural changes to the content format as follows:
- Tracks: Run all breakout sessions in beginner/advanced tracks: 48% in favor, 22% against (remainder neutral)
- Intro to Blogging: Alternatively, have an “intro to wine blogging” session and make the remaining content more advanced: 65% in favor, 6% against
- Panel of Top Wine Bloggers: Invite a panel of top wine bloggers to tell their story and then participate in a series of breakout sessions explaining their success: 59% in favor, 8% against
- Blog to X: Have a series of breakout sessions in which bloggers reveal how they went from wine blogging to getting a winery job, consulting in social media, writing a book, etc: 42% in favor, 15% against
- Live Blog Reviews: Have a two-hour session in which experienced bloggers review the blogs of less experienced bloggers: 36% in favor, 16% against
We took all this feedback into account, added in our own experience as to what works and what is possible, and have made the following changes for 2015:
- Intro to Blogging: Clearly the idea of having an intro to blogging session and making the main content more advanced appealed more than having tracks. We have added the Intro to the agenda and will make sure breakout sessions are more advanced.
- Panel of Wine Blog Award Winners: We are announcing today changes in the Wine Blog Awards that will hopefully allow more winners to attend the conference. We will invite winners to sit on a panel on Saturday afternoon where they can share their secrets to success with all conference attendees and participate in workshops on Sunday in which we delve into specific topics more deeply.
- Blog to X: This idea received some favor but many people suggested it deserved only one hour, so we have added it to the agenda as a one-hour breakout session.
Subsequently, we put out a Call for Content and then did a second survey of alumni to determine which specific topics we should include in other parts of the agenda.
We hope you like the agenda, which we feel is a good mix of blogging content, networking opportunities, wine tasting, and focus on the Finger Lakes host region. Thank you to all who participated in our surveys and call for content. We are working on securing a keynote speaker. If you would like to volunteer to lead the Intro to Blogging or speak on the Blog-to-X session or any other session now on the agenda, please email info@wineblogawards.org.