Monday, July 25, 2011

Taking Action with What I Learned From #WBC11

At home I am known as a man of action and someone who works with a swiftness of purpose. Whether it is in my IT job, raising money and awareness in the fight against cancer, my winemaking & home brewing or my blogging, people tell me I work and play equally hard.

It is with this in mind (that as I fly home from #WBC11) I am already thinking about what I learned and how I will apply it to my writing and networking. The lessons are motivating. The time to act is now so I can foster maximum potential. Here’s my plan.
  • I am going to get inspired. How? I am going to read more of the writing being produced by you all and this community I am part of. Why? To find and reflect on more examples of others pursuing and sharing their passions, and to be more informed on what is going on in the community.
  • I am going to keep my focus on the two topic areas I am most passionate about. Those are winemaking & home brewing and food & beverage pairing. Smatterings of straight-up product reviews and wine travel posts will continue to show up as well.
  • I’m going to give my blog a facelift. As my content has evolved the look of my site hasn't. Improving the look of my site will be a positive change for both myself and my readers.
  • I am going to get others involved. From the connections I made this weekend several peers emerged that will make great partners through our shared passions. I am expecting guest posts and both virtual and real life events to be the likely outcomes.
  • I am going to get more local. I always have been an advocate of my local wine and food scene and I am going to increase my commitment to that. At the Saturday night conference dinner I was already networking with another local blogger about how we can emulate the obvious success of the Virginia wine bloggers in our own backyard.
  • I am going to continue to challenge myself to be creative and project my passions in my writing and social interactions.
And to make this all work I expect to be held accountable for these actions by you. I write for myself (screw all of you!) but I highly respect the experience and diverse opinions of the community of readers I have developed. I know that your opinions and questions will drive me to do what I say I am going to do.

Game on!

Jason

4 comments:

Marie Payton said...

Jason, great post. I felt inspired as well by all the great people I met! One action I'm taking is to add links on my site to all the great blogs I've learned about. My target audience is the average wine consumer and they may be interested in diving deeper into topics that others are writing about. Great meeting you!

Lesley said...

Great post, Jason! WBC certainly was inspiring, and I'll bet a lot of us are considering what changes we'll make as a result. I also hope to get inspired by committing more time to reading my fellow bloggers (as well as commenting and engaging). Nice to meet you and glad you made it home safe finally!

Wining Ways said...

Jason my mind is spinning with all of the ideas I came away with. Wabt to organize a New England Wine Bloggers group and get together to strategize and plan how we can use our collective clout to be the influencers we can be for our region. Let's stay fired up. DM me your thoughts.

Annette Boyd said...

Jason - Loved your post. I have come away with many new ideas and lessons learned as well. It was great meeting you and I look forward to seeing you perhaps at #WBC12.