Everybody loves a good conference. The nights out can certainly be even better. And there’s a killer chance to do some networking. However, if we want to preach breaking down silos internally, I think we very seriously need to get out of our own a little bit. I’ve been involved with some great events this year, and one thing I’ve learned is that we absolutely have to get outside our boxes. We read and share information from all over, trying to expand and learn from others. Yet when the time comes to get feet on the ground, we stay very close to our community. That’s not bad, it’s just somewhat limiting.

Everyone knows how important HighEdWeb is to the community. There’s no secret there. But, HighEdWeb has a problem. Size. So many people want to go, yet you can’t keep growing the conference without the risk of damaging some of the networking and personal time that comes with it. And while there is great catharsis in sharing war stories with the like-minded, we have got to start looking to industry events as well. So, in no particular order, here are some other ideas for your budget planning (note: pricing is the top listed, last minute, no extra frills cost, so you can likely get in cheaper on many of these if you register early):

Confab

Price: Up to $1349
Date: May 14-16
Location: Minneapolis, MN

Whether you love content strategy or hate content strategy, this is a great conference to talk and listen to the absolute top industry folks on how to plan and manage content on your sites. Good representation from book authors, consultants, and site managers at organizations both large and small. Kristina Halvorson (founder of Brain Traffic and author of Content Strategy for the Web) makes it a point to encourage people to get out of their comfort zone and listen to things they don’t necessarily agree with. Good advice for any conference really. Upcoming speakers include Kristina herself, Ann Rockley of The Rockley Group, Colleen Jones (author of Clout: The Art and Science of Influential Web Content), and Lou Rosenfeld (consultant and IA expert).

JBoye

Price: Up to $2095
Date: May 7-9/November 6-8
Location: Philadelphia, PA/Aarhus, Denmark

JBoye conferences are about networking in a big way. With events in both the US and Denmark, going to the JBoye conference is a chance to learn from some of the best people about web, intranet, and digital marketing techniques in the world, all the while connecting and building relationships you can take home with you. Attendance ranges from about 200 up to 350, plenty small enough to meet and interact with a lot of the folks there. I was fortunate enough to be invited to speak at their international conference this year where I had a fascinating discussion with Yousef Elbes of the World Health Organization about how their multilingual content strategy works. Yeah, I’m a nerd – but this is ridiculously valuable information that we don’t necessarily get at normal .edu web conferences. They do offer a higher ed track of talks, but I’d encourage you to sit in on some of the online communications and digital marketing stuff too. Past speakers include founder Janus Boye (possibly the best interpersonal networker I’ve ever met), Mark Greenfield (of HighEdWeb fame, among others), and Cathy Marshall from Microsoft’s research division.

UI Seventeen

Price: $1349+
Date: Early Novemberish
Location: Boston, MA

The annual UIXX event is the user interface and experience conference organized by the kind folks at User Interface Experts. Spearheaded by the one and only Jared Spool (who can also entertain with some mad card trick skills), it attracts speakers like Luke Wroblewski, Kevin Hoffman (Happy Cog), and Brandon Schauer (Adaptive Path). If you’re doing anything related to UI or UX design, this is a great place to learn from some of the people that started the discussions to begin with (in other words, since the next one is UI17, that means they’ve been doing this event for 16 years. Just try to find another group with such a long standing tradition in the field). The conference focuses heavily on practical examples and application of concepts and ideas so that you have real world takeaways that you can look at implementing at your own organizations.

In Control

Price: Up to $995
Date: February 20-21
Location: Orlando, FL

In Control is a two day event that features ten speakers on topics raging from the technical (HTML5 and jQuery) to the abstract (strategy, techniques). They focus on 90 minute talks from industry professionals to cram in as much practical experience as they can, without making you feel overloaded with dozens of different sessions to choose from (by comparison, I believe #heweb11 had something in the area of 60 total presentations). While the event is newer than most (in its second year), it’s still bringing in speakers like Kristina Halvorson, Chris Coyer (css-tricks.com), and Dan Rubin. It is hosted by Austin local (see, I remembered this time!) Christopher Schmitt (Chris’s organization Environment for Humans also helped put on the .eduGuru Summit earlier this year).

This isn’t to say these four specific events are the end-all and be-all of alternative conference venues (for instance, many people recommend SXSW – though personally I’d say stick to somewhat smaller events). These are just some opportunities to get you thinking about the kinds of places you could go that look at things from a bit larger picture. Just as an example, think about how many parallels there can be between how websites operate in the health care industry and higher ed – large sites, many stakeholders, unskilled editors, privacy and legal considerations, balance of marketing vs. service providing. What could you learn from the people functioning successfully in that field? It’s so important to keep sight on the fact that our problems aren’t that unique. We like to think so sometimes, but it’s not true. And of course, always keep an ear out for various An Event Apart, XCamp, or TEDx type events that are hosted at locations across the US and might be organized locally. These can be great, low cost chances to talk to all kinds of exceptional people outside of higher ed. What have been your favorite non-.edu specific web conferences?

---

Photo Credit:  Some rights reserved by HighEdWeb

1. #heweb10 Conference Welcome & orientation
2. Bonus Social Media Story: Show Me Yours and I’ll Show You Mine!

The content of this post is licensed:

• Subscribers

• 2586
• 4019

• Social Networks

• 
• 
• 
•