Heading to Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged

I’m heading out to Mountain View for Arkansas Women Bloggers Unplugged, a bloggers’ conference sponsored by Country Outfitters and Healthy Families, a state agency that’s offering e-books for parents.

The chances that you happen to be a female blogger in Arkansas are admittedly slim (hey, if you are, leave a comment — I’d like to say hello to you!), but you might consider attending a blogging conference even if you just blog for your company.

Here are five good reasons to do so:

1. Inspiration Nothing like talking with people who are excited about something to help you feel excited about it, too. If you’re like most business owners, blogging is hard to fit in and maybe even stressful. You know you need to do it (or you need someone to do it), but a shot of encouragement could be just the thing to get you back on track.
2. Ideas Take your editorial calendar along and fill in a square every time you hear someone’s great idea. If you’re blogging for your cleaning service or your dental practice, you can feel fairly confident that no one else at the blogging conference is in direct competition with you. So you hear someone talk about their great post on “My 5 Proudest Moments” and you can write about your five proudest moments at your business. They won’t mind.
3. Problem solving Do you have trouble getting your pictures to line up right? Are you frustrated because you can’t figure out how to schedule a post? Are you struggling with titles? Your fellow conference attendees will certainly include people who have met your problem and vanquished it.
4. Toys Sometimes the toys are actual swag. Sometimes they’re cool plugins or tools you hadn’t heard of before. Whatever the form, you’ll always come home from a blogging conference with something new to play with. My toys from this conference will include a pair of cowboy (or cowgirl) boots to give away in time for Christmas, so check back if you want a chance to win them.
5. Networking Typical blog conference attendees are blogging for fun, for self-expression, or for a site monetized with ads. If you’re a typical blog conference attendee, you’ll have the chance to network with other bloggers, which is a lot of fun. If you’re blogging for your business, you might underestimate the benefit of networking, but think about it. If you’re blogging for your print shop, you will quickly become the Printer Who Blogs, a fascinating creature whom the bloggers will remember. Of course they’ll bring their business to you, their kindred spirit.

I intend to be back on Monday with plenty of interesting stuff to report.