Lightning talks are exhilarating. They’re fast-paced and super-informative because they have be sharp and concise to get their message across in a condensed timeframe.
There are 2 rounds of lightning talks queued up for you this year.
We’ve got a handful of insightful speakers presenting on Blogging and Social Media:
Jessica Rhae
Jessica has been blogging at You Did What With Your Wiener? – a pet lifestyle blog about hiking and camping with small dogs (Dachshunds) – for over 6 years. She currently makes 1/3 of her income from that blog and has won many awards. In 2015 and 2017, she won “Best Dog Blog” from the prestigious, peer reviewed Nose-to-Nose blogging Awards. In 2015, she also won “Best Pet Blog Design” in the Nose-to-Nose Awards.
Jessica leveraged her blogging experience, and notoriety, into a pet-focused social media consulting business – PetTalk Media. She has written articles for both print and online publications including CityDog Magazine, OutdoorsNW, the Sierra Trading Post, and several small to medium companies. She regularly coaches other bloggers who want to improve their blogs and make money from them – online, over the phone, and in person.
She holds a Masters of Communication in Digital Media (MCDM) from the Communications Leadership program at the University of Washington. She also holds a certificate in social media management.
Kimberly Gauthier
I’m a dog nutrition blogger for Keep the Tail Wagging®, a blog that launched December 2011 and is now earning a regular income that allows me to raise my dogs in the comfort in which they have become accustomed.
I have a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Seattle University and I’m a certified Pet Food Nutrition Specialist courtesy of Dogs Naturally Magazine.
Lyndal Cairns
Lyndal Cairns is the Membership & Engagement Director at NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network. She manages the team that makes NTEN membership an invaluable resource for people who use technology in their work at nonprofits and curates a lot of cat gifs.
Steve Case
Steve Case is a systems engineer, technologist, and trainer/advocate for high quality customer service, so naturally those are the things he blogs about. He specializes in figuring-out how things work, and then figuring out how to make them work better.
Most of Steve’s working life has been in the tech industry. He has worked for a vertical market startup, GE, an IBM subsidiary, Dell, and now Xerox. Much of what we now know as social media was born while Steve was at Dell, leading him to become SMAC (Social Media and Communities) certified there. During that time he co-founded #NostalgiaChat, which just passed its 5 year anniversary.
Last year Steve was dubbed both one of The Best and Brightest Influencers on Twitter in 2016 and GeekWire’s Geek of the Week.
And then we’re bringing you some fascinating folks focused on different aspects of supporting a site and supporting your business:
Brooke Dukes
Brooke, a west coast native, currently resides in Seattle, WA. After Brooke received a degree in graphic design she learned she was more passionate about people than pixels. Even so, she still can’t pass up a good conversation about design. When she isn’t engineering some happiness you will find her cycling, enjoying vegetarian food with friends and family.
Hilary Fosdal
Hilary Fosdal is an experienced program manager in Seattle. She started building websites while working in the broadcast television industry. While still a news junkie, she loves to talk shop about all things digital. In her spare time, she seeks outdoor adventures that involve mostly hiking and running.
Jacob Wayne Smith
Jacob Smith has more than a decade experience working with WordPress.
As a co-founder of the Seattle based boutique marketing agency, A Brave New, Jacob has as much experience on the business side and the development side.
He is passionate about WordPress development and is excited to share what he has learned with the community.
Joshua Wold
As a designer turned Product Owner, Joshua has had the privilege of working across a range of WordPress website projects over the years.
Currently he’s enjoying the opportunity to help define requirements for enterprise level WordPress site. This gives him the opportunity to have regular interaction with Content Producers, as well as amazing engineering teams.
He applies his design background to many of the tickets he works on, sketching wireframes and creating prototypes to help bring the tickets to life for his clients.
Justin Parra
Justin Parra is the Senior Interactive Producer at PRR (https://www.prrbiz.com/ ) where he leads design and development teams to produce interactive projects including websites, mobile apps, and web apps, for a mix of government, nonprofit, and corporate clients. Current projects include the new Seattle Streetcar website for SDOT, 2 web apps for the US EPA, and a transportation efficiency website for the Washington State Department of Transportation.
Justin uses his 11 years of experience in WordPress development to guide clients in the right direction and drive the development process amongst internal teams. He specializes in breaking down geek speak into plain English. Justin has been working with WordPress since 2006- Version 2.0.3. That’s around 135 WordPress updates!
photo credit: skeeze