Mom 2.0 Recap

The Good, the Meh, and the Pretty
*Yes, this is formatted weird and No, I can't figure out how to make it better. I apologize. But, pretty pictures at the end, so soldier on.*


It seems that every Mom 2.0 attendee has blogged about the conference. Seemingly a recap would be over saturation at this point. But, then I remembered that most of my lovely readers may not read the other Mom 2.0 bloggers (because I am your favorite, right?!). Besides, when has over saturation ever stopped me before?! Last year I went to Mom 2.0 at the encouragement of Karen (if it gets her seal of approval, then I generally will heed her advice). I got a party pass and had a wonderful time meeting the bloggers I read for years. It was a no-brainer for me to attend Mom 2.0 again this year, it was relatively close and I reasoned that it was the equivalent of a really fun & fabulous girls weekend. I'm not at all upset that I attended, but, for various reasons, likely won't attend again for some time.


The Good


Mom 2.0 does a really great job of attracting the right people to its conference. The attendees are overwhelmingly smart, creative people who have concrete ideas for making blogging their business. Likewise, they have great ideas on how to change their communities for the better. I like to be surrounded by smart, goal oriented people (especially women), so my fellow participants were a huge draw for me. I also really appreciate that the conference is limited to a manageable 500. I have gone through sorority rush, I don't need to go through that again. Anything over 500 people would be too much for me. The relatively small number of attendees allowed me to interact with people and form friendships.


The conference does an excellent job of selecting the right women to give its opening and closing remarks. I already mentioned how wonderful Abigail Disney's discussion was, the closing keynoters were likewise extremely accomplished women with exciting ideas and different worldviews.


I think Mom 2.0 also does a great job of encouraging interesting discussions. I attended sessions that have little to do with my blogging world, such as dad blogging and the new family. I was really happy I selected those session since both were really interesting.

The Meh

I can't quite figure out the Mom 2.0 brand. In one sense, it is absolutely THE preeminent conference for women (primarily mom) bloggers to connect on a professional level with marketers. On the other hand, the conference does not always act professionally. By that I mean, that Mom 2 chose not to release agendas or speakers until the tickets were full price. I suspect this was their way of creating excitement. I just found it frustrating. I really wanted to know what the conference would offer. As a professional, I would never attend a legal conference that refused to release its agenda or speakers until a few weeks before the conference. I was also disappointed in the lapses in communication on the Mom 2 website for most of the year and then daily updates with the newest greatest addition in the couple weeks before the event. Just release an agenda with a full roster of speakers, why is that so hard? There were plenty of little surprises at the conference that did not require the furtive PR campaign.

The other two large issues that I couldn't figure out, but are easily corrected for next year, were the food and the lack of internet connectivity. The conference organizers kept boasting about great food. Yea! I thought, it's the Ritz, in New Orleans, I am going to EAT. Um...no. The conference selections were meager and not very good. Maybe I am a foodie snob, but I expected more. Much more. The lack of internet connectivity meant that most of the attendees (like me) weren't able to connect to the internet to blog, tweet, or even email for most of the conference. As a result, Mom 2 missed out on opportunities for real time social media excitement. I have high hopes that Laura and her team will continue to improve.

The Pretty

The people. The end.
Mom 2.0 Summit-0067
Me & Mir-Courtesy Sarah

The women who attend this conference are AMAZING.
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Me & Georgia (BOSSY) courtesy of Sarah

Make you so glad you know them great.


Me & Susan Come up with amazing ideas amazing.


These are women that I would be (and am) friends with in real life. These are women that I could hang out with for weeks and not get tired of seeing their lovely faces. These women are the reason I attended the conference. I was inspired, I learned, I laughed-oh, how I laughed. I got to meet tons of my twitter folks like Regan (BEST shoes ever), Britt and Rachel, and reconnect with amazing women like Laurie and Sarah. Not to mention my amazing roomies- Pam, Sarah, and Jennifer. In fact, many of my best times at the conference were the times I was just hanging out with awesome women. I really loved doing things that were not scheduled sessions like running with the group below on Saturday morning, walking around the French Quarter, and just chilling in my room while Mir made carpet angels (as soon as I can figure out how to make a video, that goes up here). That was well worth it. Run 2.0 (or 3.5!) courtesy of Rookie Moms


I laughed, I met new friends and reconnected with old friends. I came thisclose to meeting a fairy- I DARE you to listen and watch Erin Loechner and not think she is a real life fairy (an extremely savvy fairy). I was complimented by Gabby, Allison (who I desperately needed more time to hang out with!), and Susan, so pretty much I am complete. I learned that blogging as a business is not for me. I also learned that when you get a group of educated women in a room for any amount of time, the talk will inevitably lead to boobs, poop, or shoes. And, possibly I may be wearing the wrong bra (That was for you, you know whos).

There's my recap. And, as a thank you for reading that, I have a special Birthday present for you tomorrow, so come on back!

7 comments:

  1. Erin is TOTALLY a real life fairy. She might be the most adorable person ever in the world!

    LOVED finally meeting you and I really enjoyed reading this post.

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  2. Great recap (and lovely photos of lovely ladies!)

    You bring up a good point about releasing speakers...and I promise you they are released/announced the moment (or only a few moments after) we have final confirmation that they will be attending and they send us their photos. We always aim to get that done earlier and earlier...so we did it in phases as we could this year, with the first two speaker announcements happening in October...but it's always a process. For a variety of reasons...one being, at the rate that things change online, we almost feel weird announcing what we'll talk about 6 months prior to a social media conference. I think 6 months is like 6 years in social media time, right? And believe me, no one wants that line-up completed and announced more than I do! I'm not sure what the solution is, but we're always up for making it (and everything) better.

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  3. Heeheehee! Agree on ALL accounts. Except the food at the actual conference wasn't that bad for me...the food that I payed a gazillion dollars for at restaurants was unsatisfying.

    Oh and holla if you need help posting the video of Mir...I'm a video ninja ;)

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  4. Great recap! Sounds like the conference was enlightening in many ways for you. I sure wish we had met up prior to late Friday night though...had fun chatting with you and hope our Texas paths get to intersect at another time!

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  5. Wait. There is VIDEO of me doing carpet angels?? This was not explained to me earlier.

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  6. OK- so what is the right bra? ;)
    xo~
    T

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