What I learned by not going to South by Southwest

4 ways to advance your professional goals by not attending the interactive festival

I’ll admit it. I wish I had made trip to Austin, Texas, for South by Southwest (SXSW). A number of my friends were there, but it wasn’t in the financial cards this year. And you know what, that was fine because I actually ended up learning a few things by not going.

How could that be? I missed the biggest interactive and social media event of the year. Anyone who’s anyone was there, right? It was full of learning opportunities.Those all may be true, but there’s more than one way to learn. And there’s definitely other ways to advance my professional goals. The following are a few things I learned by not going to SXSW this year:

• Create your own SXSW. I’m not suggesting you create your own mega event. What I am saying is you don’t have to always play by the rules. Frustrated you can’t make a huge industry event 1,000 miles away? Think about starting your own event in your community that focuses on meeting a previously unmet local need.

During the week of SXSW, I brainstormed with two people about upcoming local events that I’m very excited about. Events that I hope will benefit a number of friends, colleagues, and organizations around town. Big ideas. Local impact. Now we’re talking.

• The power of relationships. From all accounts—including some folks who also weren’t in Austin—the real benefit of events like SXSW is the people. And I’m not just talking about the parties. I’m talking about the informal hallway conversations, early morning coffees, and dinners. I attended BlogWorld last fall. It was great, but I didn’t learn a ton. However, I found tremendous value in meeting a number of folks in person for the first time. And, that’s something you can do right in your local market—any day of the week. Make a list of the people you would like to meet in town. Then, think about a strategy for getting to know them better. You will be surprised at how open people are to getting together.

• You can learn almost as much by following along online. Note the italicized word here. You can’t replicate the experience of attending an event like South by Southwest. But you can learn just as much from afar thanks to Twitter, blog posts and Slideshare. I had a #sxsw column in my Tweetdeck and followed along most of the week. I also followed bloggers I trust—most notably my friend Greg Swan from Weber Shandwick who reported on the agency’s behalf (he also spoke during the music portion of the event). Plus, I picked up on a new video that I’m using in some of my upcoming presentations from the tweets. Did I learn everything attendees learned? Of course not. But I did pick up on some key learnings along the way—without the $1,000-plus price tag.

• Expand your network on your own terms. Just because I didn’t attend the lavish parties, meet-ups and karaoke events in Austin doesn’t mean I didn’t network and meet new people. During the time SXSW was going on I met up with four different groups/people. And, I’d like to see that trend continue. So, I’m shamelessly stealing my good friend Heather Whaling’s fantastic idea (I cleared it with her first) and offering my time to anyone who wants to chat in the weeks ahead. Specifically, the 8-9 a.m. time slot the weeks of March 29 and April 12. My tool of choice: Skype. If you’re not using Skype, consider this a big shove. Send me a note at arik.hanson@gmail.com and we’ll nail down a day and time.

Arik Hanson is principal of ACH Communications.