About 5 months ago I was blogging away and something struck me “there is no tradeshow for blogging!” At least not a tradeshow for all bloggers that I could find. (I produce very big tradeshows for a living). Sure there were lots of great events but they each addressed a particular niche BlogHer, the Blog Business Summit (a very cool event btw), or Yearly Kos for example. I wanted to go to something that had everything any blogger could ever want. From publishing platforms, to broad band providers, to lap tops to badges, widgets and plug ins, to a dozen other things I could think of off the top of my head. It seems everyday I come across some new product or service that Bloggers use /want/need.
Of course I would also want all of my blogging questions answered like how do I get a certain plug in to work right, How do I work this newsreader thingy?, What exactly is RSS and why does everybody tell me I need it? How do I get more people to read my blog? And thats just the basic stuff. Analytics, Search Engine Optimization, Affiliate Programs, Ad networks, it goes on and on.
I think you see where this is going. I told a very good friend, former boss and one of the best tradeshow people I know about my idea and her response was “I want in and we have to launch this show right now!”
We held our idea very closely but we had to approach several important vendors before we made our announcement. We also needed to find a couple investors. It didn’t take long before we recognized a pattern. Every person we told about this idea had the same response “I Want In!”. Now when everyone you know in your professional life has this kind of reaction to your idea, especially when many of them have heard a million ideas and worked thousands of shows you know you are on to something.
We named the show BlogWorld right out of the gate. It’s just something us tradeshow people do. There is a world for just about every industry you can think of.
When I started telling a few of my closest blogger friends about the idea they were all excited as well. However several people told me you have to include all new media. The techy bloggers and business bloggers said you have to include social media. Sounds good to me. It’s all related and blogging is really just the tip of the iceberg. Vlogging, podcasting, internet radio, social networks, and who knows what in the future is going to continue to change the way people get their news and make buying decisions.
So the name has evolved to what you see today. BlogWorld & New Media Expo.
In the upcoming days I will be posting more about how this show came about and dropping a lot of names of people we have gotten involved. But I will sign off for now and look forward to hearing what my fellow bloggers have to say and to seeing all 57 million of you in Las Vegas next year. Particularly the 30 million sploggers out there. I never met a robot before and I’m curious to see what you guys look like.
Oh by the way, it seems like good karma to me that Confabb launched yesterday. From Marshall @ Tech Crunch:
Confabb is a new service launching today that offers a centralized place to find information about all kinds of conferences. The site offers everything from speaker and event reviews to photos of the events after the fact through integration with Flickr. It’s an impressive full service site that could become the go-to spot for at least tech conference attendees and possibly a wider audience.
and from Scobleizer:
Since I’ve been involved in planning, attending, or speaking at dozens of conferences and expos and other events this was very interesting to me.
Is this a cool demo? Nah, not like last week’s Photosynth. Will it put Microsoft out of business? Nah. But is it something that you will probably use? I think so, at least if you’re going to go to a conference.
I’ll definitely use it to update the CES 2007 site on Confabb and add mention of our BlogHaus, which will be in the Bellagio there (Seagate, Microsoft, and AMD are sponsoring that).
I have of course already submitted BlogWorld & New Media Expo.
Sounds like a great event but why is it so far off? A year is like a lifetime in internet time.
Good question Mike. Im an ok blogger but I am a really good tradeshow producer. To do it right it takes a year to launch a new show.
You need time to line up all the speakers, allow the exhibitors time to budget for the event, get the word out so people can mak plans to attend, not to mention reserving a convention center is typically not something you can do in 3 months time.
This is particularly true of of the Las Vegas Convention Center which is sold out most of the year. Las Vegas is the number one trade show city in the world holding more “city wide” tradeshows, and more tradeshow week 200 events (the largest shows) than any other city in North America.
Honestly we believe this industry and this event deserves the best and we wouldnt consider having it any place else.
Make sense?
Because people not living around the corner actually need at least 4-6 months out to get a decent airfare to the states and need to make plans and travel budgets NOW for 2007.
As the event is happening so late in the year it is a good thing that it actually is put on the radar right now.
please also add it to upcoming.org 🙂
Thanks Nicole,
added to upcoming.org Did you see the new conference guide mentioned at scobleizer and techcrunch the other day?
you might also try TSNN.com they have a great database of tradeshows.
Did you know Vegas was the 2nd least expensive city to fly into in the United States?
Orlando is number 1.
“Did you know Vegas was the 2nd least expensive city to fly into in the United States?
Orlando is number 1. ”
Yep. That’s because those cities will be taking the rest of your money later.
;-p
Sounds like a good idea. (Saw this story through Excite and marketwatch.com news.) Rick, I was wondering if the emphasis of the convention is just for support services for blogs, or also the actual bloggers themselves from ALL industries, (entertainment, advertising, sports, tech, etc.)
Seems like getting a few A-list bloggers or at least B-level would help the cause and draw the rest of us ordinary blog folk out of the woodwork for a few comped drinks.
;-p.
Otherwise, won’t it become just another industry trade show where all you have is vendors hitting on each other trying to sell you their latest versions of Blog 2.0 whatever?
(I’m just thinking of the recent ad:tech I attended in NYC, even though they had keynotes during the day, the main floor was like shopping at the tech spam mall during Christmas.)
Appealing to the content creators as well could create some buzz as well, (like a Steve Rubell from Micropersuasion, a Guy kawasaki, etc.) Free Wifi with live blogging from the event, podcasts, etc., that make it truly all-encompassing featuring every aspect of blogging, not just the behind-the-scenes widget stuff.
Thanks and another good question.
Yes this is open to all bloggers on all topics. We are encouraging little mini events within BlogWorld & New Media Expo. For example the Milbloggers might have a group function, meeting, and seminar,
same for Sports bloggers, and politics.
Any group of organized bloggers is welcome and encouraged to contact us about holding a function for their group at BlogWorld.
We will have lots of very well known, very recognizable bloggers, podcasters, and other new media content creators attending and speaking (they don’t like to be called A-List). In fact we have several on our advisory council already but want to wait until we add a few more folks before we announce the council.
Check back in the next couple of weeks. You will be hearing more news, and more details.
Yes there will be a tradeshow with booths because some people make a living doing this and a lot more would like to. There will also be an extensive conference where people can learn about the things important to them, like monetizing, building readership, improving their writing skills, podcasting, and a lot more.
this will be the biggest event, tradeshow, conference, and party that the New Media industry has ever seen. Business will get done, people will really learn something, and it will be fun.
gotta run to a dinner here at Webmaster World but I hope that answers your question.