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The Crowd at Wordcamp 2008One of the first articles on Social Photo Talk was a look at What Should a Photographer Blog About. In that article, I mentioned that it’s important to identify the audience for your blog. Another important aspect of blogging as a photographer is to decide how your blog fits into your business. Is it just another page on your website, or is your blog a core marketing medium? Are you merely providing more information on your existing services, or are you using the blog to reach others in the industry or as a revenue-generating service?

If you’re serious about your blog for your photography services, it should be treated as any other marketing/advertising activity, meaning that you’ll want to spend some time and money to become as proficient as possible. Reading Social Photo Talk falls into this category. It also might mean purchasing some books (either paper or E-books), listening to some photography podcasts, or attending blogging or social media related events.

Last weekend, I was in Seattle to present at WordCamp Seattle, a conference about blogging and the WordPress blogging platform. While some of the attendees definitely fit into the geek/techie crowd, a large portion of the audience were people with businesses unrelated to tech that are using blogging as part of their business strategy. While I was there, I recorded a few brief videos with these people; I’ll be posting the videos in the coming weeks as testimonials of the benefit of attending social media events even when social media isn’t your core business.

How do you learn about blogging and social media?

Photo by Randy Stewart, used under Creative Commons licensing

These other posts might be of interest to you:

  1. Social Media Events for Non-Techies: Meet Laurie
  2. Social Media Events for Non-Techies: Meet Andy
  3. Social Photo Podcast #21: Google’s Photo Business, Social Media Lost and Found, Outsourcing Your Blogging

Tagged as:
blogging,
conferences,
events,
photographers,
social media,
wcsea,
wordcamp,
wordcamp seattle

talk talk (FSOD)There are a lot of great online resources to learn about social media, but it’s a good idea to occasionally get together offline with like-minded people and talk about the tools and processes as well. How easy it is to meet people offline depends on where you live, but here are a few resources:

  • The Social Media Club has local chapters in many cities around the world. See their list of local chapters and find out of there is one near you. From what I’ve heard, the topics and nature of the groups vary by city. The group nearest to me (Portland) is led by folks with a heavy PR background and the events tend to reflect that.
  • See if there’s an active Flickr group in your area that gets together offline. Here in Portland, the pdx group has a monthly social get-together where we’ll chat about photography and such in a very casual way (usually at a local pub).
  • If you’re a blogger, attend a local or national conference. The local WordCamp events (see the list of WordCamps) are low-cost, fun one or two-day events that bring together bloggers from a variety of backgrounds. If you’re looking to get really serious about blogging, a national or international event such as the Blog World Expo (in October in Las Vegas) can be a great place to learn and connect.

Where else do you connect offline? Share your tips and ideas in the comments below.

Photo by pinkmoose, used under Creative Commons licensing

These other posts might be of interest to you:

  1. Online and Offline: It’s All Real
  2. Social Photography Offline: Scott Kelby’s Worldwide Photo Walk
  3. Social Media Events for Non-Techies: Meet Andy

Tagged as:
blogworldexpo,
bwe09,
flickr,
social media club,
wordcamp