The courses at the Savvy Blogging Summit will be personal, hands-on, and challenging. Experts in their fields will be teaching us how to improve our blogs, businesses, and brands. Check back soon because we are updating the courses as we have more information.
Summit Course Descriptions
Brand-Blogger Relations
Instructor: Amy Allen Clark of MomAdvice.com
Amy will discuss the importance of working with brands on a long term basis. The most effective campaigns are a result of a relationship the blogger establishes with the brand and PR. Figuring out how to make the contact and then nurture the relationship takes time. In this session, Amy will share tips to help you make the connection with PR that will create a mutually beneficial professional relationship.
Advanced SEO
Instructor: Troy Lerner from Booyah Advertising
Troy will examine several of the attendees websites and give feedback and suggestions for ways to improve SEO tactics. You’ll learn the importance of SEO and marketing your website on the internet. Learn real strategies for how to get your blog posts and blog to appear on the first page of Google. Troy will give you the most up-to-date information you need to better optimize your articles and website. He will also discuss the latest trends and things to watch for in 2011 and 2012.
Beginner and Advanced Business Law
Instructor: Jim Summers from Fulbright and Jaworksi
The business law classes will be divided into two levels this year. First time attendees will discuss the different types of entities available for establishing your blog as an official business. First time attendees will also learn about internet privacy and copyright laws and receive a brief presentation about the different types of contracts and agreements using when consulting and/or hiring employees.
Summit Alumni will receive a brief overview of the above mentioned aspects of business law, followed by an in depth look into contracts. The basic anatomy of a contract, including what should be included to protect yourself and your business, as well as what red flags to be on the lookout for. The group will also discuss the differences, pros and cons to hiring employees and/or independent contractors to help them continue to grow their business.
Accounting Principles
Instructor: Jodi Stevens, CPA of Stevens and Associates
Jodi will discuss the latest tax laws and issues that face bloggers in this ever-changing internet landscape. She will share the basics of ledger accounts, financial statements, and will explain credits and debits in a way that makes sense. She will also equip you with tools you need for filing your own business taxes, or help you find an accountant in your area.
Effective Email Marketing
Instructor: Phil Hollows from Feedblitz
Phil will be sharing why email marketing, lists email and subscribers are not only relevant but essential to maximizing your blog’s audience and revenues. Tips will include how to increase your list’s quality and quality, how and when to add autoresponders, the power of incentives, and how to land in the inbox and avoid the dreaded spam trap. Attendees will leave with clear, actionable tasks that will enable them to quickly grow – and make the most of – their email subscriber base no matter what their email service platform.
Question and Answer Session with the Savvy Blogging Team AND their Husbands!
Come and glean from the experiences of the Savvy Blogging Team members. They will be sharing more about what they have learned in the past 3 years of blogging. And this year, their husbands will be joining them on the panel!
We hope to show other bloggers and their husbands the importance of keeping family first, keeping wide open lines of communication between husband and wife…and children, and working together to find the balance of a full time working husband, full time working mother and part-full-time working wife. We will bring sheer transparency and raw honesty to the panel, plus a little humor too!
Summit Electives
Be Your Own Graphic Designer
Instructor: Joy Miller of Five Js Design
Joy will offer creative solutions for attendees’ design projects, teaching critical design principles in the process. Attendees will have the opportunity to put these principles into practice as they become their own graphic designer.
Take Control of Your Template – Coding 101
Instructor: Joy Miller of Five Js Design
Learn some important CSS and HTML tips and tricks that will allow you to take control of your template. DIscover that code isn’t as scary as you once thought.
Bloggers in the Traditional Media
Instructor: Valerie Hoff from 11Alive News in Atlanta
Learn the ins and outs of working with local and national media, including how to contact them, how to pitch to them, and how to plan segments that meet the needs of your local community. Practice doing live, on-camera interviews with a seasoned reporter and anchor, who will critique you and help you best connect with the viewers at home.
Intermediate and Advanced Photograpy
Instructor: Matt Slaby of Slaby Photography
Matt will equip attendees with the tools to make the photographs on your site stand out, bringing readers back for more. He will give an overview of the technical processes for taking great photographs, as well as the creative aspects that go into telling a story with photographs. Matt will also critique photographs submitted by attendees to help you make your photos better.
Bookkeeping 101
Instructor: Beth Bullock of Stevens and Associates
Now that your blogging business is making you some money, it’s essential to learn the best practices for keeping track of your earnings and your expenses. Beth will give you all the information you need about setting up a chart of accounts to preparing financial reports. She will teach you the importance of the balance sheet, the profit-loss statement, and how keeping your own books will help you spend less on accountant fees, or have no doubts about filing your own, come tax season.
Deepening the Blogger-PR Relationship
Instructor: Kevin Dugan of Empower Media Marketing
Kevin will share with us the basic essentials for your media kit, your site’s media and/or contact page. Kevin will also share the differences between PR, advertising and word of mouth marketing, then discuss how to best work with the different kinds firms and agencies we come across on a daily basis. He will discuss the importance of the relationship between these firms, agencies and bloggers…it’s more than just free stuff! He will take a closer look at how PR firms and ad agencies define influence, as well as the best approach for pitching ideas and concepts to PR firms and brands. He will also look at the main differences between advertorial and ed-vertorial content.
Vlogging and Branding
Instructor: Maria Bailey of BSM Media
Adding video to your blog can be beneficial in many ways. You can provide instructional information for your readers that is value added for your blog’s content. By doing this, you are also solidifying your brand. In this session, Maria will provide general vlogging tips that will help bloggers at any vlogging level. She will also discuss ways to monetize and brand your videos.
Monetization and Productivity Session
This session will provide one on one time with our partners who can help attendees better monetize their blog and business. Attendees will be placed into small groups and go from partner to partner, learning how to best work together, build relationships, and help each other grow and expand their businesses. Partners will show attendees the behind the scenes of their business, and attendees will learn the best techniques for ad placement, affiliate links, and increasing income.
Note: These course descriptions may change slightly as we get closer to the event, as trends change and as we seek to meet the various needs of attendees.
