BlogHer: From the Eyes of a Reluctant Newbie: Part 1 -Exhibits

by Deb Ng on August 7, 2010

I’m a reluctant BlogHer attendee. As someone with a limited conference budget I wasn’t sure in the past that BlogHer was the best place to invest in my blogging and social media education. Tales of swag rooms and brand courting only served  to keep me away as this wasn’t as important to me as the educational experience. Plus, many of my friends and colleagues in this business are male and I enjoy meeting up with them on these occasions.

BlogHer also has a reputation for being a “Mommy Blogger” conference and though I blog and I’m a mom, I’m not a “Mommy Blogger.” I have plenty of thoughts about mommy blogging and why I don’t think all the attention paid to Mom Bloggers is well directed, but I’ll talk about that another time. Today, I have BlogHer on my mind. Specifically my opinion of the exhibits.

First Impressions

When I walked into BlogHer yesterday, I was there as someone who has been to blogging, interactive and tech conferences to learn about blogging and social media, plus the latest tools and technology. The exhibit floor for many of these conferences are always filled with vendors having to do with, well, social media and blogging, plus computers, Internet and maybe other types of business or tech services.

Blogher is a whole different animal.

Very light on the tech and social media, the BlogHer exhibit floors featured photo taking with Dora the Explorer, Marmaduke,  Elmo, the Hillshire Farms Sun guy, Bruce Jenner and Padma Lakshmi.Booth space was taken up by brands hawking their wares.  There were plenty of food samples and I could even have a makeover if I was so inclined. Many women walked the floors lugging several swag bags chock-full of cheese samples, lip balm, girdles, purse holders, Play-Doh and cereal containers. Clearly BlogHer is not the place to go for laptop stickers and mouse pads.

I wandered the floors looking for vendors who I could talk to so I could learn about the latest widgets and plugins for my blog and didn’t find a single one. No one was talking about the newest social network, nor were there host and serving companies hoping to get us to switch hosting to their service. I saw no blog ad networks or podcasters doing interviews from the showroom floor. This made me wonder: Were these businesses not invited? Did they feel BlogHer wasn’t an important enough event? Or were they not interested in the demographic? Why, at a conference for bloggers, was there nothing on the exhibit floor having to do with, well, blogs?

When one vendor asked me if I heard of social media I almost died. Why would anyone ask that at a blogging conference? From the second I entered the exhibit floor I realized this was a conference unlike any other I’ve been to. If I were to form an opinion from the exhibits only, I wouldn’t think BlogHer had anything to do with anything tech or social media. It was clearly a place for brands to court consumers. Now, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with this if your reason for blogging is to receive free stuff and talk about cheese wedges. I’m not sure what someone who wants to learn about building and growing a social media career will take away from the exhibit floor.

Not Done Yet

Again, if your reason for blogging is to review stuff, I suppose this all makes sense. Maybe if I started attending BlogHer from the very beginning I might “get it” more.

I’m not done yet, though. Today I’m attending educational sessions to learn more about blogging and social media. I’m not only attending in a learning capacity, however. I’m also attending as someone who helps to choose the educational content for a different social media conference. I’m going to be watching the speakers, listeing, learning and especially watching the audience to see how they react. I’m looking forward to sharing this with you next.

I don’t want you to read the above and think I’m having a negative experience, because I’m not. I’m enjoying the time with my team, but I’m also enjoying the time with other BlogHer attendees. I bumped into old friends and made many new friends. I tried wines that aren’t even on the market and I had some spectacular meals. Anyone who ever attends a social media conference will tell you much of the enjoyment is derived from the networking and the good company, and BlogHer has that in droves.

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  • http://www.trainwithshane.com Deborah Shane

    Thanks for your insights. I have heard that this is an awesome networking event and celebrates women who are using the platform, but are they “putting their voice” out there or just their products. Women have an amazing opportunity for Social Leadership. Trick is to take advantage it using all the platforms available to extend their brands and causes! What better cause then to promote “Momism”.

  • http://andyhayes.com Andy Hayes

    Interesting. I was just at a travel blogging conference and had a similar feeling at times on the “consumerism” of the event.

    However, reflecting back, I think the event was balanced, which is the key. These are great opportunities for everyone to come to the table and then you can look for the people that you want to talk to.

    I hope you find some more interesting people. Oh, and don’t forget your free frozen pizzas before you head home. ;)

  • http://Blog.Stealthmode.com Francine hardaway

    As someone who has blogged since 1999, and write about social media and social CRM, I don’t learn much from BlogHer about blogging. But I learn a lot about women’s issues, and how much they apply even to someone like me (and you) who lives in a largely male world.

    I find blogHer fascinating. Almost like anthropology.

  • http://www.jenn.nu Jenn

    You made some very good points. I have been blogging for over ten years, and I just got home from BlogHer ’10 (I’m utterly exhausted, thanks for asking ;) ). My theory is that a lot of these companies have been prepped to approach bloggers as brand ambassadors. Furthermore, the “simple” approach and assumption that all bloggers are newbies to social media and other things that I feel come naturally to bloggers and are relevant to blogging has a lot to do with wanting to “dumb things down” so that nobody feels left out.

    On a related note, I did not take anything new away from the panels I attended, though I did really enjoy listening to a lot of the speakers and hearing their personal anecdotes.

  • http://www.accidentalmusings.com Amy Phillips

    I completely agree. I felt like I was in high school. What are you wearing? What parties did you get invited to, on and on. I’m not saying I won’t return, but it will only be as a speaker or sponsor. As a blogger, they have nothing to offer me.

  • http://blog.blogworldexpo.com/2010/08/09/blogworld-v-blogher-the-differences-are-apparant/ BlogWorld v. BlogHer: the Differences are Apparant | Blog World Expo Blog

    [...] and Laughing Cow are there with plenty of free samples and gifts. (For more information read “BlogHer From the Eyes of a Reluctant Newbie: Part 1 – The Exhibits.” [...]

  • http://www.handmadedetroit.com Lish Dorset

    Great post, really agree with your points. I was hoping to see blogging platforms represented like WordPress and Tumblr, as I had questions about features and any upcoming enhancements they might be working on.

    I’ve been attending BlogHer since 2006 and, “back in the day,” there was a much heavier tech representation.

  • http://justlinda.net JustLinda

    It’s not possible to be all-things-to-all-people so they will always miss the mark with some.

    I was there, and while I’ve been a blogger for 5 years, I sat with no fewer than 3 women who hadn’t yet even BEGUN their blogs – they came in a research mode. I hope they had a good event. I expect if they had gone to a much larger expo, they would have been overwhelmed and left in the dust of the event.

    I noticed that quite a few come for social reasons, and to commune. As for the marketers/sponsors and all the swag… well, I didn’t take much and I don’t do reviews or giveaways on my blog. But to me, they were evidence that the blog world enforce has unrealized power. As the one woman said in the closing keynote – they aren’t here because they love you, they’re here because they NEED you. It was proof of the validity of bloggers and the power they can yield.

    I took from the conference what was valuable to me and didn’t worry much about the rest.

  • http://www.stimeyland.com Stimey

    This is interesting. I only briefly visited the Expo Hall, mostly because I was spending my time at sessions and keynotes, but you’re absolutely right, there were no tech/social media booths that I can remember. That is fascinating, and honestly, if those companies were there, I would have wanted to visit the Expo Hall more.

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