Tips and Permission to Attend a Blog Conference Alone

Listen to Chrystina discuss her tips for attending a blog conference alone (plus one bonus tip!) on Episode 24 of the Party Ideas & Logistics with Chrystina Noel podcast, above.

A lot of people assume that because I’m an extravert, there’s no stress that comes with attending a conference alone. While I wish the answer to that was yes, it doesn’t matter if you’re an introvert or an extravert, walking into a conference alone with 600 people who all appear to know each other already is intimidating.

I’ve been to my fair share of creative conferences through the years: Bloggy Boot Camp (2012), Texas Style Council (2013 and 2015), Lady Project Summit (2016 and 2017), Venture Pop (2016 and 2017), Thrive (2016), The Yellow Conference, Craftcation, NEPA Blog Con, and most recently, Create and Cultivate. With the exception of the duplicate years, I knew very few (if any) people at those conferences. Let’s start at the beginning –

Choose a conference in which you are super interested

No matter what happens, if you choose a conference with topics and speakers that you are interested in, you are going to get something out of the conference.

Also. Smaller conferences will definitely be less intimidating to walk in the door. There’s a huge difference between walking into the 10,000-person PA Conference for Women and the 150-person VenturePop conference. Know what you’re getting yourself into before you arrive.

Consider volunteering

This is one of the best ways to meet someone at a conference because you are given a team, put to work, and expected to accomplish things together. It’s a built in friends group. Volunteering for Texas Style Council 2015 was one of the best decisions I ever made, I met so many people there that were incredible. I also volunteered at The Yellow Conference, and while I didn’t leave with too many connections, I’m still very much in contact with the two amazing women with whom I ran the sales booth.

Know your conference goals

Here’s the introspection part. If you know what your goals are before you walk into the conference, you know exactly what you’re trying to do when you get there. Learn the schedule ahead of time. See what sponsors will be there. See if there’s a shopping component to the day. Make a list of the speakers you’re most excited about. If you plan your day ahead of time, you’ll know what to do when you show up.

Admittedly, my conference goal (at this point) is always to meet one or two cool people. But I actually need to ease myself into this goal because I need to start working up the nerve to talk to people.

Bring all the things you need

While it’s always important to be prepared for a conference, you’ll feel better about a conference you’re attending alone if you at least know that you prepared as well as you could for it yourself. (That said, asking somebody for a pen might be a great way to meet somebody.)

Things to bring: water, business cards, phone charger, portable battery, notebook, pens, deodorant, and layers of clothing.

You may also consider bringing your DSLR camera, but I’ve found over the years that it’s a burden to carry and most of my photos are for social anyway these days so I just use my phone. Same goes for a laptop, I’ve found I just like handwriting notes – and then I don’t need to deal with a charger.

Make small talk

Yes, in the grand scheme of life everyone hates small talk, but it’s a really solid way to start a conversation. Examples:

• It’s so cold in here.

• It’s so nice outside today.

• I love your skirt.

• I’m so excited to hear _ speak today.

• What are you eating?

• Are you from around here?

• What do you blog about?

You can use this with somebody in the line for food, you can use it with someone in the bathroom line, you can use it with the person who sits down next to you for the session – the possibilities are endless, and nobody’s going to know if you use the same line over and over again.

Know that you have not failed if you’re standing alone

There were so many times during Create & Cultivate that I ended up sitting or standing alone. It becomes one of those things that you need to accept the uncomfortableness of. Bonus points if you can do it without looking at your phone. This is absolutely an okay thing to do. It makes you way more approachable for other solo conference goers.

This is how I met the folks that I ate lunch with, who were lovely. We all had left our previous sessions a little early and were sitting at the picnic tables waiting for lunch. We didn’t start talking right away, we all sat exactly far enough away from each other that we could talk to each other, but were not right in each other’s space, but eventually, we got there. How? We started talking about lunch. Food is always a good icebreaker.

No one else knows you feel awkward

This was a big one for me to remember. No one knew how awkward I felt. I was just standing alone. People stand alone all the time. And the people on Instagram definitely don’t know how awkward you feel. And on top of that, if someone is talking and hanging out with friends and laughing, they’re not going to notice the random girl (or guy) off to the side because they’re too busy talking to each other. Once I started to realize that it was all in my head, I felt much more okay settling into the feeling.

Talk to the people who are standing alone

I’ve told you it’s okay to feel awkward. Now I’m giving you permission to go talk to the other people standing alone. Yes, it’s hard to do at 8:00am when the conference starts, cut yourself some slack until you’ve had your first cup of coffee. Maybe by 11:00am you start making moves towards making a friend.

I once posted on Facebook that “there is a special place in heaven for people who talk to people who don’t really know anyone at parties.” I think this holds true for conferences. The person who saves you from being alone at the conference is someone who will always mean something to you.

My first year at Texas Style Council (when I wasn’t volunteering), I met a lovely girl named Katie at Prom on Saturday night, and when the group of people she was with (who were talking to me) moved onto their next location, she made sure that I went with them and that I was not intruding if I considered myself part of their group. To this day, I think so incredibly highly of Katie for that reason. She’s also, in general, a really incredible person.

Another non-conference example, I was at a wedding a few years ago, and I recognized the boyfriend of one of my friends in the wedding standing off to the side alone. It took a pep talk from myself and a pep talk from my date to work up the motivation to go talk to him. But once we went to say hi, you could see the look of relief on his face.

Be that person to someone else. They will be forever grateful for you.

And if that person standing alone turns out to not want to talk to anyone, you’ll know the second you start the small talk and they’re not engaged. Just walk away; no harm, no foul. And seriously, no one else will know.

Also, if they’re not nice, they’re probably not ‘your people’ anyway.

It’s okay to leave

I’m not sure about y’all, but I always like having an out in my head. If I know I have an out, I can pretty much put up with anything. Well guess what, you can leave the session, you can even leave the conference. You can position yourself near the doors so that you feel like you have an exit if you need one.

If your options are: (a) sit there and feel like you get your money’s worth while not actually absorbing anything because you really don’t want to be there anymore, or (b) leaving and going to buy yourself ice cream. Go buy the ice cream. You deserve it, you did something scary today.

(And everybody always deserves ice cream.)

–

And that’s it, everything I’ve learned throughout the years of attending a conference alone. It’s not so bad once you get out of your own head.

Go back to your goals. So long as you accomplished what you went there to accomplish, you’ve succeeded. Your goal could be as simple as, “say hello to someone I don’t know.” Baby steps. You never know who that person might end up being in your world.

If you have any tips, questions, comments, or concern, I’d love to hear them in the comments below.

And if you’re looking for a conference to attend, I host this pretty cool one called The Blog Connect in April. I’d love to meet you there.