Valpo Chamber Social Media Workshop Over. Confluence Next?

(@NatFinn, @IAmFiction, and @Saan1911 give “Social Media for the Win” workshop at the Valparaiso Chamber of Commerce in Valparaiso, IN. The video picks up at the second half of the session, after the break)

Yesterday, myself and three co-workers gave a Social Media Workshop titled “Social Media for the Win,” on behalf of the Valparaiso Chamber of Commerce in Valparaiso, IN. To my surprise, the place was packed.

The workshop made the front page of The Times of Northwest Indiana’s Business Section. I was the only one of the presenters that didn’t give a quote. That was because during the break I was tweeting and publishing the posts that had our UStream video.

The reporters seemed like Good peoples. One’s on my Google Chat now.

Not only did our Workshop make the front page, but that fact we broadcast it live on streaming video through UStream was also part of the story. Funny part is that was something we had only thought about it a few days before.

When we were putting the workshop together, we were afraid we’d run out of material for the 2 and a half hour sessions, but once we finished preparing we had didn’t have time to share it all.

I was happy that we had as many questions as we did. We told the audience that we’d be disappointed if we got through all our material and the crowd surely did their part. I hope we answered them all. Our cameraman, Nick, even relayed questions to us that were asked on the UStream chat and from Twitter. Great catch on his part.

We haven’t heard a bad thing yet about our presentation. That’s my way of saying it went really, really well. Our boss talked to us about different camera shots to try next time, but overall the presentation was well received. The Chamber’s Program Director even talked about us coming back, maybe even turning it into a series.

The coolest part of the feedback was from Brett Healy of Indianapolis-based Confluence – a national Social Network for Creative professionals. During a RT from our boss promoting the workshop, Healy added the following:

“Will get this group to #IndyConfluence soon”

I hope this bodes well. Putting one foot in front of the other…

Self Critique of Presentation:

1) You didn’t have to sniff. Find a better nervous twitch

2) CTA – we wrapped up quick and told them where they could download the presentation notes and videos we used, but we didn’t wrap it up tight enough.

3) Lose the 50 lbs. gained since writing Book of Blues. I look like I’m wearing a winter coat inside my shirt. Sad for a guy who played a little college ball.