image: okaygreat

So while we have regaled ya’ll with sassy stories from the Altitude Design Summit, we wanted to share a little bit of what we learned. For those of you who are bloggers I hope you’ll find this useful!

Faster, Smarter, Better Blogging
Here are some great tips and tricks for time management wrangling—thanks to: Not Martha, Design Blahg, House of Brinson

Erica (Design Blahg) had some fabulous quotes, my favorite being “Imagine water is your life….and blogging is the drain.” She was refreshingly frank about all the things we love about blogging but also all the things we hate. I loved having someone be so honest about the fact that yeah, sometimes blogging sucks! It takes up soo much of your life….to help out, here are some great tools to make you more efficient.

+ Evernote to create an excellent online “notebook” — allows you to save  images, links and more
+ Instapaper to save interesting blog posts to read for later
+ Pinterest as a fabulous (and fun!) visual bookmarking tool
+ Flavors to cCeate a simple “busines card-like” homepage
+ Zinio to turn magazines into a portable, digital format
+ Squarespace as a clean, simple, easy-to-use blogging platform
+ Mention Notifier to help you keep up with Twitter mentions—you get an email or text any time you (or a topic you like) are mentioned on Twitter.

Tips on Growing Your Community
Dottie went to this session and it sounded really great. The panel included  The Jealous Curator, A Practical wedding, Little Green Note Book and Babble. Here were some highlights:

+ Regular posting will give people something to come back for.
+ Learn to re-work what you have… instead of wasting time ALWAYS developing new content.
+ Find three points that resonate with your readers.
+ Be a part of the conversation: After you post, initiate discussion, ask questions, follow up on comments to connect to your readers.
+ Network. Find ways to network with other bloggers and collaborate. Be of value to them too.
+ Create original content. Have at least one really good post every week.
+ Look for inspiration and record it everywhere you go.
+ Splash in personal stories and content so that your readers connect with you personally.

Advertising Beyond the Banner

From the amazing trio of: Erin Loechner, Liz Gumbinner, and Maggie Mason

Again, one of my favorite panels—mostly because these ladies are all such entertaining speakers. Erin had a really brill idea to help you get ahead. Throw a Resource Party. “Zoinks! What the hell’s a resource party??” I’mma ’bout to tell ya! Get together with a group of friends and hand out index cards. Everyone writes down one or two things they would like to accomplish in the near future (“I want to get featured on Apartment Therapy” “I want to write an article for a magazine” “I want to redesign my blog”). Everyone reads their card aloud and anyone who can help out raises their hand. So say you are a graphic designer, you might be able to help advise in the site redesign, while someone might have a great contact at Apartment Therapy and can get you seen by their editors!

There was so much more, but I’m just givin’ ya a little taste of it. Beyond all the learning, I think the best part about ALT was the sense of community and positivity. I met SO MANY genius people….fun, sassy, cool, cute ladies (honestly there were like, FIVE guys there). I HIGHLY recommend you check it out!

Here are two other recaps that I think you might enjoy—both really funny:

8 Steps to Get Over Post ALT Summit Depression // Old Sweet Song

The Alt Design Summit: A Review // Design Blahg