No PPT, Great Conversations

A couple months ago, I spoke at the Yahoo! Shine launch on a panel with a number of other bloggers. I was fed a nice lunch, given a swag bag, some magazines and went on my way. Some women involved in Ladies who Launch were in the audience, enjoyed what I had to say (thanks!) and I was then invited to speak on a panel today.

I was tickled to be on the panel with Amy (the founder of Venus Zine) and Jess (an editor from Shine ) and we were given the topic of Viral Marketing. After a couple years working with Rick Murray, I used our mantra to kick of my answer, "Viral is not a strategy, it is an outcome."

We were in the Evanston Women's Club (which is my new imaginary wedding location) and the ballroom was packed with women at various stages of launching their own business. Other women that I saw speak were Katrina Markoff from Vosges, Ami Ankin from MonAmi Productions, Debi Lilly from A Perfect Event, and Daryn Kagan from DarynKagan.com.

These women were amazing, as were the women in the crowd that I got to talk to. Here are some of my thoughs after the day.

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I am sick and tired of PowerPoint. Ladies who Launch was wonderful in part because there were no presentations, just conversations. Just successful women talking about how they became successful. 

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It is about passion. It is about planning. It is about luck. But more than luck, it seemed to be about serendipity and the law of attraction. I think it was probably frustrating to some of the women in the room, to hear woman after woman say, "Well then this person offered help, this person was kind, this person made an introduction."

I can imagine a woman in the audience thinking, "I paid all this money to learn how to launch a business and you are telling me the pieces just fell into place?" Being incredulous, being annoyed. 

But I heard that and thought, "Yes, that is exactly what happens. It all just comes together." I do not have my gig because I planned to have a career at a PR firm or to become some sort of expert in digital stuff, it happened. Things lined up, I learned and now I can teach some of that.

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Women dress for other women.

I saw three men in the room and 150 or 200 women. Most of us in cool skirts, kickin' shoes and carefully done make-up. We dressed for each other.

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I think I have something to offer groups like Ladies to Launch. I want to speak more often to large groups and small groups. This is my third in speaking gig in as many months. Again, please?

I promise I won't bring a PowerPoint if you hire me, I'll just talk for a while, crack some jokes and answer your questions.

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Were you there? Would you like to see me speak again? What would you like me to talk about? 

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