SQLSaturday Events Leaders – Notify Speakers of Selection As Soon As You Can

I was reminded of this when I got a nice email from the SQLSaturday Tampa team letting me know that I had been selected, though it would still be some time before they decided which of my sessions would go on the schedule. This is a great courtesy to a speaker. It allows me to […]

SQLSaturday Austin

I was pleased to get the email yesterday confirming that I was selected to speak at SQLSaturday #362 on January 31, 2015. I think the last time I was in Austin was 2004 or so when I was at Dell for a week for SAN and cluster training. It was a memorable trip for a […]

SQLSaturday Tampa Announced For February 28, 2015

SQLSaturday Tampa is the first SQLSaturday in Florida for 2015, scheduled for February 28th, 2015. The event is held at the USF College of Business Bldg, 12212 USF Maple Drive, Tampa, FL 33620. Easy to find, free parking, lots of hotel options near by. The weather at the end of February is typically pretty good […]

SQLSaturday Orlando Marketing Plan-Part 49 (Plan Notes)

Introduction After finishing up six months of managing the marketing for SQLSaturday Orlando I’ve been going back through all my blog posts to outline stuff we (or any other event) can use next year. It’s not a complete project plan, but I hope it gives you some ideas and a structure to start from. I […]

Notes on SQLSaturday Admin Tools

Introduction One of the items I’ve had on my todo list for a while is to write up notes on the state of the admin tools for SQLSaturday as they pertain to marketing. For those who haven’t managed an event, SQLSaturday is really three different sites; the public facing one that most of you see, […]

Notes On SQLSaturday Orlando #318

Notes from a speaker/volunteer perspective: It was a lot of fun to talk to the students at our Student to IT Pro Seminar. Interesting to hear their questions, easy to forget what it’s like to be a true beginner. 70 people in the seminar. Win! I had about 20 in my 9 am presentation. Went […]

SQLSaturday Orlando Marketing Plan–Part 48

This past Saturday we held our eight annual SQLSaturday. I’ll write some notes about the event and post today or tomorrow. The final registration count after marking 20-30 people as cancelled (things got hectic, was hard to track) was 640 (vs 344 last year) and our best effort on attendance count is 450 (and was […]

SQLSaturday Orlando Marketing Plan-Part 47

Notes: We sent out a final you haven’t paid for lunch reminder on Wed, asked for a reply if they were planning to bring their own. 20 or so are, so far. We don’t mind that they do of course, but it’s really valuable information because it’s another block of attendees we can confirm (or […]

SQLSaturday Orlando Marketing Plan-Part 46

Registration count after some cancellations now at 577, way above my goal of 500. We’ve decided not to spend on LinkedIn this week, our numbers are good and we’re not thinking it would drive a lot. Tough call. I’d like to find out, but agree it’s money we can spend elsewhere. Sent the final message […]

The Student To IT Pro Seminar We’re Doing at SQLSaturday Orlando

Ever since SQLSaturday #1 our venue has been Seminole State College (Seminole Community College back then), provided graciously and perhaps more importantly, at no charge. Finding a venue is a big deal when it comes to planning an event and finding one that’s free, that’s harder! Putting a bunch of IT people on their campus […]