I returned home from Austin at 9pm Tuesday night, after a 12 hour bus ride that required I take six Dramamine pills to keep from getting sick. The majority of the trip I was kicking myself for signing up to go to SXSW Interactive with a group.

SXSWi is a huge event well attended by geeks and social media types. It’s a fabulous opportunity to network and meet people. There are a plethora of panels to attend during the day and parties to attend at night. In order to satisfy the requirements of having to go to multiple places…you need to be able to make fast decisions and move from one location to the next quickly. Groups just aren’t conducive to that.

As much as I love being social, I’m also quite a loner and I need time alone to recharge. I can’t be around people 24/7. I’ll be flying next year and living large in my own room in a downtown hotel.

Highlights of the Trip – The best part of any conference is the people

Catching up with People: It was extremely nice to catch up with all the people from DC. I really missed those guys (and gals). The Cakoge after party was like a big DC tech community reunion. The DC tech community started coming together about three years ago and now it’s vibrant, strong and well represented at tech events across the country. I’m proud to see how far everyone has come within the community and how far the community has come together.

Meeting New People: I got acquainted with a few people from the New Orleans Net2NO group; people I really look forward to collaborating with in the future. I also got to connect in real life with some of my twitter friends.

• ConnieReece
• Aruni
• Quixado
• Immunity
• GloriaBell
• DavidEckoff

Another person I met was Nan Palmero at the Mashable Party…thanks to Nan I will soon have video capabilities on my BlackBerry. I’m pretty stoked about that; he’s been a big help and it’s great having someone to turn to for assistance since I know I’ve been under utilizing my BB.

The Sessions: Sessions at conferences in my opinion are hit or miss. You never know if they’ll be any good. I made it to a handful of sessions, the best one was Building Your Web Startup After Hours: Aruni Gunasegaram – moderator (Babble Soft), David Altounian (itaggit.com), Jeremy Bencken (buzzstream.com), Gretchen Heber (naturallycurly.com), Elisa Camahort Page (blogher.com)

Since returning to having a full time job back in the Marine Corps, I’ve been beating myself up about the progress I’ve made and wondering if my startup will ever get off the ground. Listening to a panel of entrepreneurs who have built their startups after hours made me realize what I’m experiencing is normal, others have been there as well and made it happen. I walked away re-energized and with the willingness to accept that it’s okay if it takes awhile to make things happen.

Next Year

I plan on returning to SXSW next year, to include attending the Music portion. I’ve also been brainstorming some sessions that I might submit for next year. A conference like SXSW is something you have to experience, live and learn from.

When I started looking for another opportunity in the Marine Corps – the Marine Corps provides me ideal work, pay and benefits.  For 6 months at a time, I get to juggle being a Marine Officer and entrepreneur.  Anyway, when I was looking for a new opportunity, a very good friend sent me information about an opening at Marine Forces Reserve in New Orleans. 

I applied for the position and got it!  I checked-in to MarForRes 4 days ago and so far so good!!  I am truly already enjoying and loving New Orleans.  On the Marine Corps side of things…MarForRes is a weird animal, but from my point of view; it’s much better than Quantico.  I’ve been running into Marines I know and meeting new ones.   

I have my own office (no cubicle) and my job is that of a Task Order Manager.  I’m here to provide oversight into a contract that involves all the contractors that Marine Forces Reserve hire.  I’m here to bring order, standardization, ensure compliance and verify the government is getting what it should be getting.  

It’s not in the social media alley, but I’ve already told the Public Affairs Office that I would offer them help with Blogger X.  They were really happy to know my background so I look forward to working my magic there. 

Currently I’m staying in the Navy barracks on the West Bank and working on the East Bank.  This morning I took the Navy ran ferry across the Mississippi river.  The sun was raising, the weather was gorgeous and I really appreciated the uniqueness of my commute.   

I found an amazing condo in the French Quarter…unfortunately, I’m facing some issues right now with closing the lease, so I’ll wait till I know it’s mine to really talk about it. 

I’m going to do some exploring this weekend and start looking into the New Orleans tech/startup scene.  I’m also going to get back into blogging over at the Yut Media blog.  I’m sure I’ll be able to find some fabulous entertainers to interview and talk social media with.

Set Your Objectives Before Arriving

Make a list of your top three objectives for attending the conference. Once you’ve set your objectives engage in making a plan to meet each of those objectives. You’ll want to allow some room for flexibility but you should hit the ground ready to meet your objectives.

I failed to do that for BlogWorld Expo. Looking back on BlogWorld Expo these are the three objectives I should have set for myself:

1. Meet Five New CEOs I Don’t Know

As the CEO of a startup – some of the best people for me to network with are other CEOs of startups. They are wonderful people to share knowledge and resources with, learn from, and cooperate with.

What I should have done was take a very close look at the list of exhibitors and figure out who the CEOs were for each of the companies. Then, I should have looked into their background, read their bios and prepared a list of questions and information on each CEO I wanted to meet.

I ran into Daniel Ha the founder and CEO of Disqus but I didn’t maximize my conversation with him. It would have been good to ask Daniel more about what his journey has been like in the last year since launching Disqus. Micah introduced me to the CEO, Todd Vernon of Lijit and again, I wasn’t prepared to make a good impression to start building some rapport.

2. Been Clear on What I Wanted to Learn

This is a no brainer. I really should have taken a closer look at the schedule of sessions before arriving to the conference and done some homework on who the presenters were that I didn’t know and been clear on what I wanted from each session.

I ended up attending too many sessions and not learning much. Had I done my homework a little better; I would have successfully leveraged my time in and out of the sessions.

Going the Extra Mile: If you are very session focused, you could start your blog posts before attending…getting the background on the presenters (or panels), the topics and then wrap up your blog post during or immediately after a session to include all the live twittering from the session.

3. Additional Contacts with Key Attendees

I was in a hurry to get to the bathroom after one of the sessions and coming out of the bathroom on his cellular phone was Guy Kawasaki. I knew he been a speaker on Friday but I hadn’t realized he would be there on Saturday. As soon as I saw him I said “Guy” and shook his hand. That’s it. I said his name, shook his hand and went on my way.

A few steps later I was thinking DOH! Ann, you didn’t even introduce yourself. When I came out of the bathroom I caught up with Geoff who introduced me to Brian Solis. They were both there for the book signing of Now is Gone. I shook Brian’s hand but again, I didn’t make my mark. I might have redeemed myself a little with Brian. I managed to get him to follow me back on Twitter so we’ll see (he has over 6,000 followers and follows only about 400 back). I do plan on building much better rapport with him over time.

An hour later, I was sitting outside when Adam Hirsch and Sharon Feder from Mashable came out and sat with me. We were chatting when Scoble came out. We all went to say hello. Again, I missed the opportunity to leave a good lasting impression. Two other people who were there were ready with a Flip to get Scoble on camera. I had my Flip in my purse but didn’t know what I would have wanted to ask him – on hindsight, I should have just recorded what the other two were recording. Obviously, my mind and ability to react were out for the day.

This all happened on Saturday. I didn’t have my A-game on Saturday because again, I hadn’t prepped myself. On Sunday, I arrived with my A-game and that made a huge difference but I wasn’t able to recoup my missed opportunities from the day before.

I should have prepared myself to meet the key attendees I didn’t already know. Once more, this would have involved knowing what I wanted to say to them and what type of conversation I wanted to engage them in.

Live and Learn

Piss poor planning equals piss poor execution. Yes, I’m an extremely busy person but having taken the time to plan and prepare myself would have resulted in having a higher yield on the investment of my time and money.

Hopefully my experience will help you so that you don’t have to pay the same price for the lesson.

On Saturday (first day of the conference for me) I found myself getting very aggravated. My time (and money) are extremely precious to me, so anytime I sense I’m wasting either one or that I could be doing something better I start to get frustrated. Four days of time off from the day job would have been huge if applied towards making progress on Tickets with a Twist.

The more I got frustrated and disappointed in how things were turning out, the more obvious it became that I needed to answer two questions for myself: “What am I doing at BlogWorld Expo?” and “What will make being here worth it?”

@Dayngr answered the question with “Why meeting all the great people of course!”

It was definitely my #1 reason for being there: make contacts, make contacts and make contacts. Problem is that just meeting people isn’t enough. It must be quality contacts that will bear fruits and be helpful towards what I’m working to achieve (although that might sound like a selfish statement – that’s all I have the time for.)

On Sunday, I attended a session called Entrepreneurship for Artists lead by Larry Chiang. As you can imagine the title was a huge attention gainer for me. On the panel were Pete Cashmore from Mashable and Bambi Francisco from Vator.tv – didn’t quite get why. The session ended up taking a turn that I didn’t expect but the saving grace were the few folks attending the session. One person in particular was Michael Paige. Michael is an Indie artist.

After the session, I had a few good conversations with Michael. It looks like Michael and I are going to be doing some work together that I believe will kick off what I’m imagining will generate what I’m looking for and assist Michael achieve his goals.

I met a few other good people at BlogWorld Expo, caught up with some folks I hadn’t seen in a while and learned a thing or two about SEO. However, I did not maximize my time or opportunities there. Read about what I could have done better and how that can help you prepare for the conferences you attend in my next post!

The drinks were actually free and they had blankets available (although, I have already started to bring my own). The stewardess were all very nice, courteous and helpful. The flights left on time and as a matter of fact, my last two flights today both came in early. My last flight came in 20 minutes early.

When I arrived to Reagan National, I made a quick stop in the bathroom and by the time I reached the luggage carousel the luggage was already going round and round.

Kudos to American Airline!! They are not my airline of choice.

Also, I booked my ticket through Orbitz.com and I loved receiving the OrbitzTLC Alerts that let me know my flight was on time, from what gate it was taking off and where to pick-up my luggage.

I started this blog with the intent of better establishing my credibility as an entrepreneur – my branding. However, in the process of doing so, I lost my voice and the platform for me to just be myself and unload my thoughts.

Since I’m running three other blogs right now that are tied to a brand and serve the purpose of growing a startup or startups depending how you look at it; I’ve decided to reclaim this blog.

The title Incoming and Outgoing Thoughts is exactly what you’ll find here from now on. Expect it to return to more my style…the way I used to write here: www.whygosolo.blogspot.com.

Hello liberation!!

I don’t want to get too much into the status of where Jeff is with his startup since that’s not for me to disclose, so we’ll just say that Jeff is where I was about 9-11 months ago. Putting myself back into those shoes made me so HAPPY to be passed that phase and reminded me of how tough and difficult of a place it is. My heart really went out to him.

I think the real challenges of entrepreneurship come to light for startup entrepreneurs when they realize that they are not going to be able to easily get funding. Having an idea, developing a business plan and a basic product has a .0001% chance (I’m making a point with that figure) of getting you funding. Anyway, I think that Jeff had come to realize he needs to get farther along before he’ll see any funding.

My first advice to any first time startup entrepreneur is consider getting funding your absolute last resort instead of your first and only option. Simply don’t plan on getting money…find other ways to get things done and you’ll save yourself some serious headaches.

Anyway, I ended up passing on to Jeff all the things that I wish I had known back than, the options he has which I didn’t know about when I was in his shoes and some of the random things I’ve come to realize.

Probably the top three takeaways were:

1. How to get creative with convertible debt options for development
2. Go out and sell. Getting feedback from potential clients on an idea is one thing – going out to sell your product will raise a whole new set of concerns. Go out and sell your product now so you know what those new concerns are in order to address them early.
3. The road to getting your startup off the ground doesn’t end until YOU decide it’s not worth it anymore. As long as you believe in what you’re doing – you’ll keep going.

Although at one point I felt the weight of the world coming back to my shoulders from flashbacks and because that’s pretty much what being in his shoes feels like – I’m extremely grateful to have had the opportunity to share with Jeff what I have learned. I really hope that what we discussed today will help him move his concept to the next phase quicker and with less difficulties.

Fast forward three years…one failed venture, losing multiple partners and getting burn by a plethora of other things I didn’t know anything about; I now feel anxious and a certain amount of fear about launching my new company.

I get it now. I realize why people said I was brave and courageous to start my own business. (Although, I’d like to clarify that it’s easy to start your own business – what’s hard is turning it into a success.)

I clearly remember all my struggles, pains, disappointments, lessons learned, and heart breaks. I lost my house, went into the debt and isolated myself from many of my friends and family.

With all that being said, the truth is that the anxiety and fears are based on more than knowing what launching a business and trying to grow it is about – it’s mostly based on the fact that there is nothing else in the world I rather be doing. What happens now that I’ve found my calling if I can’t make things happen? This is the proverbial fear of failure. Many people never try or do the things they really love and are passionate about because they can’t face the possibility that once they try; they might fail.

Three years ago I didn’t realize how passionate and in love with business/entrepreneurship I was. I didn’t know that my world would come to revolve around it and that it would bring me such a high level of satisfaction and happiness. I never would have guessed that being in business would challenge me and push me to grow faster than anything else I had ever done before. I definitely didn’t have a clue of how free being an entrepreneur would make me feel. As a matter of fact, I didn’t actually realize the depth of those things until I took a billet back in the Marine Corps. But now I know.

Defining Moment – This Fear is a GOOD Thing

I will soon step back out from having steady income (from being back in the Marine Corps) to running my own business full time again. My hunger to succeed is greater than ever before. The anxiety and fear that exist is new and actually welcomed.

It’s not the absence of fear that makes us brave – it’s doing those very things we fear in the presence of fear. I’m glad I’m feeling this fear. It will keep me conscious of not repeating any past mistakes. It will keep me on my toes and make me think things thoroughly instead of my former “jumping into everything head first.” This new fear is making me a wiser entrepreneur and although, I have never in the past appreciated having fears – this time, it’s a good thing.

What I like about his new post: PR Secrets?? It’s Bullshit is that he acknowledges the amount of ground work he has done to establish his community in order to be able to launch his company without the help of PR folks and he points out that anyone can do this.

I wrote a blog post back last August called Who is Your Front man?? The blog post was something I was beginning to realize as an extremely important thing to identify and establish, as I was developing myself as WhyGoSolo’s front man.

What I wrote about back then and what Loic is writing about now is a topic I have been wanting to get into on this blog at some point, but looks like sooner is more an appropriate time than later. And that topic is Establishing Your Foundation: Building Your Personal Brand

I’ll write more about that in the next few days but here is some food for thought…since it is highly probable your first company will fail; wouldn’t time be well spent developing your own personal brand in order to increase your odds for your second attempt???

Back to Loic’s Post and a Comment that helps prove the Point which came from Jeremy Toeman

Loic, I think your assessment is fairly biased to your personal experience. The truth is most companies and individuals aren’t nearly as well connected as you are, and to just dismiss PR by saying “just go build a community” is frankly, naive. Even your business needs *significantly* more users than you have today, and at some point, if you truly want to accomplish your goals, PR will probably come into play.

Furthermore, many startup CEOs are heavily engaged in building their products/services, and don’t have the time to do the outbound marketing work.

There’s more to this than you make it seem. A lot more.

If you are a first time startup CEO let me dissect this comment for you and how you can’t listen to it:

1- It is your job to become extremely well connected. This goes back to other blog posts I’ve written on whether or not you are even qualified to start the startup you’re thinking of starting. If you aren’t well connected – GET THERE.

2- Building a community is a must. Again, your responsibility to excite people about what you are doing and finding your evangelists.

3- Seesmic will indeed continue to need more users, but anyone who is following what Loic is doing knows that he is continuing to grow his community. The main way he is doing this is through PARTNERSHIPS that come from his connections. Loic is bringing big names to Seesmic and those big names he brings to Seesmic have their own following…see how that works. PR is not required. Loic is a very smart business man. Not saying he might never require PR, but what he does is leverage his community, his product, his service and he adds value to grow on top of what he’s established.

4- All CEOs are equally heavily engaged in building their products – it’s not a reason to not build your foundation. Your team is going to turn to you and they’re going to rely on your connections and the foundation you’ve built to take the product to the next level. Which is why it’s best to establish your personal brand BEFORE launch or even better before you start your startup. You need to know what you’re getting yourself into.

5- Jeremy is right. There is more to this…it took Loic a few years to get to where he is and we’ll cover all the steps you need to start taking for you to be able to do the same.