The Think Visibility conferences are all about helping you to “get more from your website”, no matter how you use it or what type of business you have.
Think Visibility 9 was the 5th anniversary of this impressive digital marketing, social media and SEO conference based in Leeds, West Yorkshire. I’ve personally attended all but one of these events for a variety of reasons including the quality of the speakers, the location, the other attendees that it attracts. But also for the fact that #ThinkVis isn’t like just any other conference, it’s well different…
In many ways in fact…for starters, it’s the only conference I’ve attended that takes over a casino!…. Also, over the years it’s included crazy golf, Scalextric, Robot-Wars, arcade racing machines, Wii games, Rock Band, bouncy castles at the conference parties! Then there was life-size cardboard cut-outs of the host himself, Twitter Top Trump ID badges and let’s not forget about the gameshow-style lunchtime entertainment that also sees the conference organiser, Dom “The Hodge” Hodgson wearing a very glittery suit!
Think Visibility is a conference that has always set a high standard for the quality of its speakers as I detailed in my write-ups for ThinkVis 2 and ThinkVis 3 and I was pleased to see some established favourites from previous conferences in some of the sessions as well as showcasing some new speakers I hadn’t seen before, a great mix people covering a variety of topics, including some issues that had just come to light in recent weeks such as the Interflora Google Penalty!
For detailed information and slides from the sessions themselves, I’d suggest taking the time to read through some of these reviews…
- Even Santa Loves SEO: ThinkVis 2013 (Propeller) <– There’s even a photo of me in there!
- Think Visibility Roundup – TV9 – March 2013 (StateOfSearch)
- Think Visibility 2013: Burst The Speaking Bubble (Becky Naylor)
- So was it the must-see event of 2013? (Bronco)
- Penguins and Pandas: Think Visibility 9 (Rebel Angel)
- Think Visibility 9 March 2013 – Conference Round-Up (Koozai)
- Think Visibility 9: Show Me The Money (PaidOnResults)
One of my favourite write-ups was Illiya Vjestica’s Think Visibility: Speaker Tips & Advice, I thought his insights into this topic was a rather different approach, but one that makes for an awesome blog post that I’d recommend bookmarking for future reference, very apt given his business is all about creating great slide designs for presentations.
@sk8geek did a great job of capturing a visual record of the Think Visibility 9 proceedings as always with his high-quality photography which you can browse through over on his #ThinkVis 9 Flickr album.
I also read a couple of interesting blog posts from Dom, the first is about how he deals with “post-conference blues“, after spending so much time and effort on an event like this, I can well imagine that it’s like the post-Christmas feeling when you have to take down all the decorations!
However, somewhat more alarming to read about was that the venue itself, the Alea Casino that has hosted the past eight ThinkVis’s (or is it ThinkVisii?) has closed down with immediate effect. It’s a venue that has become the home of ThinkVis over the past five years and it will be a shame to not be going back again. That said, as Dom says in his other blog post, “Farewell to the Alea Casino – home of #thinkvis“, as the organiser he plans backups for all sorts of eventualities, such as malfunctioning equipment, ill speakers, but you can’t really account for a sudden venue closure can you? I’m just thankful that if this had to happen, it happened this week and not last week! Obviously, that’ll come as no comfort to those who lose their jobs – a real shame all round! 🙁
Anyway, great insight from behind the scenes of organising a large digital marketing and SEO conference like this, you should definitely give his posts a read!
As always a big thanks goes out to Dom and the whole Think Visibility team for another enjoyable event!
Finally, if this sounds like the kind of conference you’d find useful (and/or fun), then be sure check it out for yourself next time! 🙂
Oh and here’s the glittery suit in action!…
Photo Credit – @sk8geek and Dom Hodgson
Simon Barker is the founder and editor of Zath and has over 25 years’ worth of experience of using computers and technology in general. He can normally be found researching or testing the latest in technology products.
He has provided IT consultancy services to both home and small business users for over 15 years, building PCs, fixing hardware/software problems and providing comprehensive training.
Simon always likes to get the best out of the technology products he is using, by both making informed purchasing decisions and also optimising how they are used to get the most benefits possible.
