WordCamp STL Recap

Ideas, Inspiration and a Creative Perspective on Marketing from Inside the Embassy

August 10, 2011

WordCamp STL Recap

BY Chris Long Category Digital, Insights, Inspiration

This past Saturday, 140 local WordPress users met at Maryville University for an all day workshop to share and learn all things WordPress. Workshops were developed by the local St. Louis web development community, as well as local bloggers and designers. Topics ranged from Blogging For Brands by Michael Daehn to WordPress Security by Andy Crofford.

WordCamps occur around the world several times a year, and are developed by the passionate WordPress community. They are intended to help anyone learn how to use the CMS software. Over 50 million websites are developed on the WordPress CMS, including The Loud Few site.

The highlight of WordCamp STL was the Q&A session with the founding developer of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg. Matt took questions about various custom WordPress development topics from the crowd. Matt also shared his vision of the newly founded WordPress Foundation and his goal of making it an organization focused on topics ranging from proper usage of the WordPress logo, to women in technology initiatives.

Another great session, developed by Russ Henneberry, was Guest Blogging – How to Build & Leverage Relationships With A-list Bloggers. In this workshop, Russ talked about his 3-step approach to finding great guest blogging opportunities.

Find – Find a blog that you believe you can write relevant content for. If you are a financial blogger and want a guest spot on a parenting blog, think about how you can write financial topics for parents, such as college savings accounts.
Stalk – Russ doesn’t want you at the blogger’s window at midnight, but he does suggest interacting with the blogger on every social network they have a presence on, as well as commenting on their blog as often as possible. This way, the A-list blogger will start to recognize your name.
Pitch - After you have built a solid interaction base with the blogger, find a relevant topic that is not already covered on the site. Then, send the blogger an email with your blog post. It is important to make the post customized to that blog’s readership base instead of yours.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is an open source CMS platform. WordPress roots lay in blogging, but it has developed into a robust CMS platform that allows custom WordPress development. WordPress sites range from small blogs to sites you may use everyday, such as the CNN Press Room. Learn more about what a CMS is here.

Were you at WordCamp STL? Tell us what you thought about the event, your favorite workshops, or leave a link to your recap or photos in the comments.

Tags: Andy Crofford, CMS Development, Custom WordPress Development, Matt Mullenweg, Michael Daehn, Russ Henneberry, st. louis web development, WordCamp STL, WordPress Foundation

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10 comments on WordCamp STL Recap

Michael Buffa says:

Great post. I attended WordCamp and have mixed impressions. I’m an account person at an agency who uses WordPress for both internal and client-related purposed. That said, I didn’t attend any of the back end coding/development sessions. As for the branding/marketing/blogging type sessions, I was less than impressed.

Call me a snob, but I felt that a lot of the sessions lacked an authoritative speaker. It seemed as if all the sessions were run by freelance professionals with very little credibility or case studies to prove their knowledge/expertise in the area.

My favorite session was from Ed Morrisey at Integrity. Granted, I know him on a personal level, but his presentation about how he used WordPress to create a website (not a blog) for the St. Louis CVB really opened up my mind to the potential of WordPress as an open-source platform to create fully-functional, client friendly websites.

As for the next WordCamp, if they want to open it up to non-coders, I think they need some more influential speakers. I want to hear about reputable clients and companies using WordPress to brand their business, start a blog, or crowd source content, etc. etc. I would be open to Moose or TLF presenting because they are credible experts. Joe Schmo who codes in his basement for local restaurants isn’t quite as compelling.

Then again, maybe I’m just barking up the wrong conference.

August 10, 2011 @ 11:34 am

chrislong says:

Hi Michael.

I also thought there was a large gap between beginner sessions and more advanced WordPress topics. Perhaps future WordCamps could indicate expertise level in the track descriptions. When Matt was speaking about the upcoming San Francisco WordCamp, he mentioned there would be thousands of participants. I would assume it would be easier to set up various expertise tracks with a larger gathering like that.

In relation to using WordPress to create fully-functional and robust websites, I believe there is opportunity to grow more sites in that direction. There is a growing number of WordPress sites that feature customized solutions, and we believe that will only grow with time.

The Loud Few would love to speak on topics ranging from custom development to interactive marketing strategies at the next WordCamp. I think it will get bigger and better every year, but it was definitely a great start.

August 10, 2011 @ 12:23 pm

Erin Eschen says:

Great post. Another way to reach out to bloggers for guest posts and engage with them is to follow them on Twitter as well. I do that a lot – I subscribe to experts’ blogs and follow them on Twitter at the same time, retweet their stuff, comment on it, comment on blog posts, etc…

August 10, 2011 @ 1:31 pm

Dan Morton says:

I was also at WCSTL and while I had a good time, I too came away a little disappointed. Some of the sessions (SEO, Anatomy of a WordPress Theme) provided some interesting tips and best practices, many of the others were either too high-end (to avoid talking over the heads of the beginners) or the speakers were unprepared.

I was also disappointed with the Q&A with Peter Westwood. Most of the questions were very generic, like “How long was your flight?”, “How long have you worked at WordPress?”, and “What have you personally worked on?” It took until the end for people to start asking questions that actually pertained to the WordPress Core.

All in all though, it was a good time and I was very happy to see the WordPress community in StL come together. The event itself was well-organized and Mullenweg was very interesting (and surprisingly funny).

Hopefully this is the start of something good.

August 10, 2011 @ 2:02 pm

Michael Daehn says:

Thanks for the recap Chris. I got a lot out of the presentations by Russ Henneberry and James Dalman. Definitely worth more than the $20 registration. We even got shirts and lunch!

August 10, 2011 @ 2:13 pm

chrislong says:

Erin, Thanks. I’m glad that Twitter can make access so easy now. I don’t know what we would do without it!

Michael, Agreed. There was definitely value in the entire event, and the shirts are great. Plus, free lunch can never be disagreed with.

Dan, I was also (pleasantly) surprised at how funny Matt Mullenweg was. That was a fun session. I really liked his vision for the WordPress Foundation as well.