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Event · January 5, 2014

BarCamp Charlotte 2013 – My Key Takeaways (Writing and WordPress Tips)

Have you heard of BarCamp before? It’s an un-conference. Yup, you read that right. An UN-conference.

From the BarCamp Charlotte web site:

What is BarCamp Charlotte?

BarCamp Charlotte is participation and enthusiasm. We are Charlotte’s premiere un-conference technology and innovations event. Professionals and creatives attend and pitch to speak on emerging trends, technologies and topics that they love. Attendees then vote for the day’s agenda.

(Click here to read more about BarCamp’s origins)

The event sounded really interesting, and since I’m always open to learning new things, I was curious to attend and see what types of presentations would be pitched. It also helped that the event was on a Saturday (great for a 9-to-5-et like me) and was free. If you’re looking to get into your local tech scene, see if there’s BarCamp near you (see end of post for a link). It could make for a great first event for you.

BarCampClt.jpg

{The auditorium where we did pitches}

The event was fun, playful, and a great way to see some of my local tech friends and meet new ones. Charlotte Piedmont Community College (CPCC) hosted the event at their beautiful midtown campus. The pitches ranged from one about women in technology to one about brewing beer. There were so many great ideas and things to learn about.

Here are some of my key takeaways from my two favorite sessions:

Good Words, Right Order (Writing) by Patrick Mclean:

  • What is good writing?
    • Getting point across with least amount of words
    • Capture and hold people’s attention
    • Evoke emotion
    • Experience through you
  • Power = meaning / # of words
  • Are you starting in the right place? First sentence (paragraph) is the most important
  • If you’re writing a series of posts/articles – write everything before it has to go out so you don’t freeze on delivery at a later date (if you have writer’s block or something else comes up)
  • For reading on mobile device:
    • Quotes and headings jump out
    • Use them to catch attention instead of the first paragraph
    • People want to decide if they want to dive in further
  • Try putting recommendation right up front and explanation below – if you agree, you’re done
  • Look into the Pomodoro Technique for time management
  • For more, check out Patrick’s site http://goodwordsrightorder.com/resources

WordPress by Brett Bumeter:

  • Never update x.x. only update when it’s x.x.x (for example: not 3.7, wait for 3.7.1)
  • Hosting – options come in and go out of favor
  • The new ones are usually better than old established
  • 2 premium/full-service WordPress hosts to consider – take care of stuff for you – do back-ups, upgrades, themes, WP itself – will help troubleshoot things and keep server running at optimal level:
    • WPEngine
    • zippykid (now Pressable)
  • Look into cloudflare.com – it will help speed up your site and help with security and blocking of spam
  • Mobile / Responsive design:
    • Building for 3 audiences – desktop, tablet, smart phones
    • Two old ways of looking at this – 1) proportionally shrink site down for phone. if it’s not great, it’s okay 2) hide stuff they don’t need to see. only show critical stuff
    • Result – themes with responsive design or themes with old way of handling mobile
    • Responsive design – important to understand basics of web site design
    • Could put columns 1, 2, 3 instead of left to right, top to bottom
    • Try plugins to put theme in different formats and see what it looks like
    • Will links that go across the top of your screen look as good on a phone? may May need to get rid of it in responsive state
    • 40-50% of traffic going through mobile now
  • For more, check out Brett’s site Softduit Media

I had a great time at my first BarCamp and learned some great tips and tricks to try out in the future. Big thanks to the organizers – Jill, Joni, Adam, Megan, David, and Richard! I’m looking forward to the next one!

Click here to find a BarCamp near you

***

Have you been to a BarCamp before? What was your best takeaway?

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