Going Solo

If you’ve got your calendars straight, you know that Going Solo is in less than two weeks. More like 10 days!

Though we’ll like to keep registration open as long as possible:

• by tomorrow evening, it will not be possible to pay by bank transfer anymore (you’ll have to use PayPal)
• we’re planning on closing registration a little less than a week before the event, at the end of this week-end.

Register now, don’t put it off!

If you check out the Programme page, you’ll see that the agenda has been published. We may still be seeing a few minor changes (session length or place in the day), but that’s what you’ll get on the 16th! Speaker bios and session descriptions are currently being beautified.

It’s funny how the importance of certain things is not obvious right at the start, and suddenly it hits you and you wonder why you didn’t realize it earlier.

It was clear to me from the start, when I started imagining Going Solo, that the programme would be built in such a way as to cover a range of topics I thought were relevant. What I didn’t realize is that this is quite different from having a conference/event “theme” and hunting for speakers who have something to say around that theme.

I’ve many times tried to express that although Going Solo is not a workshop or a training session, it is training-like, but I never quite seemed to find a way to explain this clearly. I wanted to say “yes, it’s a conference, but the aim is for people to learn stuff they can use when they walk out.” I think I’ve nailed it now, though: Going Solo is educational more than inspirational.

Most conferences I go to fall in the “inspirational” category. Of course, I learn things there, but mainly, I am inspired, or lifted (if the conference is LIFT). When I planned my Open Stage speech to present Going Solo to the audience at LIFT (watch the video), I wanted it to be inspirational. It’s not a video that teaches you anything, but that inspires you to attend Going Solo (and it did indeed inspire people!)

Even if the conference theme is more technical, and the sessions actually teach you stuff, most often it is a series of related sessions grouped together around a given theme. Reboot is a perfect example of how a theme is used to collect all sorts of contributions.

Not so for Going Solo. Putting together the programme for Going Solo feels much more like being in charge of defining the teaching programme for an academic year (only it’s a day, thank goodness, not a year). At the end of the day, I want the programme to have covered this, that and that. I try to organize the content into sessions, and then I talk with my speakers to see who can cover what.

I’m realizing now that this is the difficult bit — and as a speaker myself, I should have thought of this before. “Speaker topics” do not necessarily match “Steph-defined sessions” — which means I need to go back and reshuffle my sessions (perfectly doable, but it’s more work) to avoid overlaps and important topics slipping through the cracks.

Has anybody had similar experiences? And for any people reading who speak at conferences, if you agree on a topic with the chair and you’re asked to make sure your talk covers aspects x, y and z of the topic, does it make you feel micro-managed? Or is it something that happens regularly?

Understanding all this is helping me a lot in the process of finalizing the programme. I hope we’ll soon have the final session descriptions (I should probably call them “lectures”, because that’s closer to what they are) and speaker bios on the site, as well as the agenda. I know it’s important for people who are still not certain if they want to come or not, because the programme/agenda gives you a clear idea of what you’re paying for.

Yes, quite a few people have been asking if it was still possible to register. It is — there are still seats left (the exact number is of course national security top secret information and will not be communicated even under torture).

You should not wait too long though, because organizing travel and accommodation is more fun if you do it in advance (unless you enjoy stress and sleeping under bridges… we have a bunch of those in Lausanne) — and also because we’ll have to close online registration a week or two before the event so that we can give final numbers to the hotel for food.

Many voices have been asking for more information on the speakers and the sessions. Well, here we go:

• Speaker bios for our confirmed speakers
• Session descriptions and speakers

Bear in mind that there is more than a month left until the event, and that many things are likely to change (not least the descriptions, bios, and summaries, which I wrote up pretty quickly tonight for the most part). I’ll update those two pages (and the main programme page which will shortly be home to the agenda) regularly to reflect the state of things.

Waiting for your feedback!

Things are moving pretty fast here at Going Solo. With 6 weeks left until the big day, everything is starting to feel very real! We’ve put up a page with presentation of the conference for interested sponsors (Lily is currently talking with a bunch of interested companies, which is fun!), and I’m currently working hard on the programme, so that I can publish more information about the agenda, speakers, and precise sessions by the end of the week-end.

Keep your eyes open!

Here’s a little status update — because although a lot is happening and things are making good progress, it’s mainly progress. So it looks like nothing is happening (from my point of view), but in fact, we’re getting close to some really exciting stuff.

• Registration: I’m working on setting up the registration site right now (it’s a tad more complicated than I expected), but it shouldn’t be very long. If you want me to inform you directly when registration is open, just leave a comment.
• Design: we have pretty badges and a logo now, and the design of this site will shortly be adapted to the new visual identity. Dealing with the whole design issue was em way more complicated and painful than I anticipated (there’s stuff to blog about there, later maybe).
• LIFT08: as I mentioned my open stage speech at LIFT08 was received very positively. Many people came to ask me if it was still possible to register (yes it is, once registration opens!) and I’ve had promising discussions with a bunch of interesting (possible) partners. A little overwhelming but very exciting.
• Pricing: pricing was a headache, like many other things. I want to write a more detailed blog post about this, but basically, you can say events fall into 3-4 categories, as far as pricing is concerned. (1) free (most barcamps and unconferences) or (1b) a small cover fee ($20-$50), then (2) “affordable”, meaning “not cheap, but which can be afforded”, and (3) high price events with fees around/above 1000€ or more (TED is $5000). Going Solo is in category (2), meaning some may find the price expensive, but I’ve done what I could to ensure it was an amount that can be paid by freelancers.
• Audience: there’s been some confusion about who this event is for, and I want to blog about it in more detail. In the meantime: it’s open to everybody (we’re not refusing anyone) but the content is geared towards freelancers or very small businesses somewhere in the internet/tech industry. I personally think that any freelancer or small business will find it invaluable.
• Programme: in addition to Stowe Boyd, Suw Charman, and Martin Roell, we now have a fourth confirmed speaker. Laura Fitton will be in Lausanne on May 16th to speak about how taking care of your online presence will help people find you. (I’ll find a better way to phrase that later.) I have roughly half my speakers, so now is time to go back to the programme drawing board, sort out who is going to talk about what, and look for people to talk about the specific topics that are still uncovered.
• Partners: I don’t yet have the fancy PDF to hand out to prospective partners, but it’s near the top of my priority list (up there with all the rest, hehe). As I said, things look good on the partner/sponsor front, particularly after LIFT08. Possible media sponsor found, looking for others. “Packages” (I don’t like that name) for Gold, Silver (etc.) partners have been defined, so don’t hesitate to contact me about it. As soon as the presentation PDF is ready I’ll create a special “Partners” page.
• Video: from what I understood, there was some miscommunication between LIFT08 and Nouvo, who filmed the talks, and the open stage talks have not yet been edited and put online. It will happen (the tapes are safe) but I don’t know when. In the meantime, you should read my speech notes and watch the interview I gave Robert Scoble.

Now, I’ll go back to fiddling with CSS and setting up the registration site 😉

A little while ago, I shouted out “it’s an event site!” because, frankly, it wasn’t really obvious that this was indeed an event site.

I’ve added a few more pages which should help dissolve any lingering doubts:

• Registration, which will soon lead you to our first partner’s service, Expectnation, where you will be able to register for the conference (plan: opening of ticket sales at the beginning of LIFT08, and very special pricing while the conference lasts)
• Programme, to give you a handy place to keep up with new topics, new speakers, and things taking shape
• Practical, with information on the venue, getting to Lausanne, accommodation, and all that kind of stuff
• Support Going Solo, because without you, Going Solo will be way too solo (this is where you head to get nifty sidebar badges to help us promote the event!)

We’ll soon have a Partners page with information about sponsorships and partnerships as well as a presentation of our existing partners. (And wondering, just this second: is there a difference between a “partner” and a “sponsor”?)

Here we go, with the promised post. I swear I’ve been wanting to write this “tomorrow” for a few weeks now, but something always gets in the way. It’s late and I have a mighty cold, but as I promised, here I am, typing away on my chubby MacBook rather late at night (my MacBook looks chubby now because the MacBook Air has just been announced… and it’d make any laptop look overweight).

When I decided to set foot in the event business, I pretty soon had a whole bunch of ideas for conference topics. As a first, I picked the one that seemed the most exciting to me: a conference about freelancing.

As a freelancer, I’ve learnt — sometimes the hard way — that it’s not sufficient to know how to “do stuff” well to be successful in business. I think many of us freelancers are in the business because we have a passion for which there is a demand (ie, people are ready to pay for this stuff!), and we often struggle with the “business” side of being self-employed.

Going Solo is a chance to learn how to do things like set your rates, make yourself known, close deals, find clients or let them find you, explain what you do to the world, find a life-work balance, or deal with administrivia in the networked world we web people work in.

I know that the best value people usually get out of conferences is the networking and the contacts, more than the actual content of the talks. I’ve had the impression, however, that this is starting to be used as an excuse for poor content, “false advertising” of talk topics, and lousy speakers. I want none of that. Of course, I want you to come to Going Solo and meet great people, chat with colleagues, enjoy the coffee with friends, and code in the bean-bags (I want bean-bags in the lounge — anybody got any?) But I also want the content to be rich, coherent, and well-presented. After all, that is primarily what you’re paying for.

Here is an initial outline of the topics I think are important. (This doesn’t mean that these are talk titles — this is stuff I want the various talks to cover.) I’d really like to hear you if you think I’m missing stuff out or including things that are irrelevant. This is for you, after all.

• skills a freelancer needs (doing the work, marketing and networking, contracts and cash flow)
• fixing prices, closing deals, negotiating contracts (the hardcore businessy stuff)
• what kind of work freelancers in the 2.0 world do (some jobs are more suitable for soloists than others)
• marketing and taking care of one’s social capital (blogging… and being a good online citizen)
• tools of the trade (what software/tools/methods can assist you as a freelancer?)
• coworking and staying in touch with “colleagues” (compensating for “working alone” — we remain social animals)
• challenges in making a passion into a job, dealing with the blurring of the life/work distinction
• international clients, travel, different laws and tax rules, accounting
• soloist or small business?
• adapting to different kinds of clients (in particular, how do you deal with big corporations that you approach or who have approached you)

As you can see, there is plenty in there to keep us busy for a day!

I’m happy to announce that Suw Charman, Stowe Boyd, and Martin Roell (all three great speakers and good friends) have accepted my invitation to come and share their experience as soloists and help you benefit from what they have learned over the years. We’re still in the process of determining the exact topics they will cover in their talks, but I already wanted to let you know that they would be here in Lausanne on the 16th.

As we will have more than three speakers (four if you count me, as I’ll probably grab the microphone to say a few words ;-)), I’m open to suggestions. If you know good speakers who could cover part of the program I’m outlining above, do let me know. I’m particularly interested in bringing in people from outside my immediate network — and for that I need you.

I hope you find this first draft of the programme as exciting as I do, and I’m looking forward to reading your feedback.

Cross-posted on Climb to the Stars.