Social Fabric University Brought to Life at SoFabUOTR

This grant was provided to me by Collective Bias, Inc. 

All opinions are mine alone. #SoFabUOTR #CollectiveBias

WOW! I had the most amazing time at SoFabUOTR Chicago over the weekend. I loved the speakers, got to meet and talk to many other bloggers, and I learned a lot about Social Fabric.

My weekend started out with me catching the train to Chicago. It was my first time going into the city by train and I was super excited. I arrived on Friday, checked into the Wyndham Grand Chicago Riverfront and then met up with a few other bloggers. We took one of the architecture boat tours along the river, ate, and checked out the area.

Saturday morning had me up early because I was excited about the start to the conference. I was a little nervous about being overwhelmed by too much information and worried that I would find out that I am doing something wrong with my blogging, but my fears were quickly put to rest. The atmosphere was relaxed and not at all intimidating. After a lovely breakfast, the learning started. Rebecca Parsons of Social Fabric University told us about the learning opportunities at SoFabU and let us know about future classes. Then Beth Rosen and MJ Tam had a wonderful presentation about videos. They challenged us to improve our video making. Since I have not been doing videos (other than some gif tutorials), this is a challenge to start creating them. The video planning worksheet that they provided us is going to really help with this process.
The keynote speaker was Jennifer Evers of Me, Myself and Jen. I was already a follower of Jen, so it was great to hear how she shifted from blogger to business owner. She had a lot of great advice and tips. She created a post on her blog for the attendee with resources to help us shift, but that is available here for you too. He had us do a few exercises, including writing an elevator pitch and creating an action plan with goals and due dates. The sheet outlined five goals, but I've added a few more than that to it. A few of them were the goals I shared with you back in May. Additional goals include establishing myself with videos and creating a newsletter.

The panel discussion on how to excel with sponsored posts was extremely helpful. It was great to hear what the campaign managers had to say. There were some really good questions that they answered that will help me with future posts.

The day wrapped up with a fun, but wet bus tour with Chicago Trolley & Double Decker Co. It started raining right when we got on and stopped right when we got off, but it was just a drizzle and they provided us with ponchos. The tour guide was very entertaining and I learned a lot about Chicago. The bus dropped us off to happy hour at 52Eighty, where I got a chance to get to know other bloggers and several of the SoFab staff.

I wanted to stay longer, but I had to grab an Uber and get to the train station. I made it with 8 minutes to spare! I had a GREAT time in Chicago and plan on going back to explore with the family sometime, but there is no place like home!

So would I recommend that you attend a SoFabUOTR Conference? ABSOLUTELY! SoFabUOTR (Social Fabric University On The Road) brings Social Fabric University to life in an intimate setting that fosters learning, growth, and interaction. All bloggers will benefit from the information and be challenged to improve their blogging. SoFabUOTR isn't just for bloggers and influencers who already work with Social Fabric. All are welcome to attend! There are still two more chances to attend this year. Minneapolis - August 29th and Atlanta - September 19th. I cannot wait to attend again next year!! If you aren't with Social Fabric, then I invite you to apply. Even if you don't plan on doing many sponsored posts, the free education from Social Fabric University is worth the time!

Social Fabric® is Collective Bias’ proprietary community of nearly 3,000 shopping-focused influencers with an aggregate multichannel reach in excess of 130 million. For more information, please visit Collectivebias.com or find them on Facebook and Twitter.