Con is short for convention. You may be familiar with ComicCon, a massive comic convention that is famous in San Diego, and found roots into so many other cities around the world.
Nowadays, they have cons for just about everything: video games, beauty, sports, and travel! My first reaction as a new travel blogger was: omg – I need to go to this! 2019 marked their second year (the former being hosted in Austin, TX), where TravelCon moved North to Boston, MA. I quickly pulled up my schedule to check June 27-29, only to realize I was invited to a family wedding! A bit disappointed, I searched a bit deeper into their website to discover they offer a virtual ticket for those who are unable to attend – score!!!
TravelCon started in 2018, as mentioned before, in Austin, TX. It is founded by Nomadic Matt himself – Matt Kepnes (here’s a link to Matt’s Website – Nomadic Matt). The goal with TravelCon is to help people develop the skillset necessary to have a successful travel career. Their focus areas around travel are: video, photography, writing, and blogging. TravelCon hosted experts from the industry to act as keynote speakers, workshop leaders, and vendors in their travel marketplace in order for guests to network and learn from the successes and failures of those who have experience in travel.
Now that you know a bit about TravelCon, I want to share my experience with purchasing the virtual ticket. Buying the ticket was as routine as buying anything else online – create your account with a username and password, enter your payment information, and voila! You’re in! I received an email confirming my purchase and enrollment in the TravelCon courses.
When you return to the site, you have to login with your particulars, so I just bookmarked it and told chrome to remember my username and password for ease of access when returning. Now let’s get into the pros and cons of the virtual ticket.
The good stuff
When you first log in, the interface is very well organized and super easy to navigate. They’ve showcased the keynotes at the top of the page, arranged by the presenters. TravelCon brought in some amazing keynote speakers this year:
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Kiersten Rich (The Blonde Abroad)
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Tahir Shah (Author)
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Tony Wheeler (Lonely Planet)
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Mark Manson (Author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck)
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Cheryl Strayed (Author of Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail)
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Clay Hebert (Marketing Expert)
There is so much to learn from these travel experts who all gave excellent presentations. Notables were Kiersten Rich’s presentation on building a million dollar blog, and the unique interview style with Matt Kepnes and Tony Wheeler. Matt did a great job asking informative questions which helped me build my interviewing skills (something I want to get better at). From the talks that I’ve listened to so far, they have all culminated with an audience Q&A, which again, was helpful in digging out other tidbits of information from the presenters. I’m certain that this trend carried forward to the rest of the keynotes and workshops.
Along with the keynotes, the breakout workshops cover a range travel topics ranging from: SEO for travel blogs, building your social media channels (Instagram, YouTube, etc.), Writing 101, photography and photo editing, and blogging tips (among many others). For a complete list of all of the workshops, click here. Some of the workshops I have at the top of my list are and recommend are:
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Writing 101: 10 essential tips for every time you publish with Spud Hilton
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Grow Your YouTube Channel with Kristen Sarah
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Grow Your Email List in 30 Days or Less Using Challenges on Instagram with Jadah Sellner
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Get Press Attention For Your Project with Brent Underwood
I can’t stress the importance of the Time Management workshop with Chris Oldfield. You can learn all the tips, tricks, and skills you want, but if you want to be seriously productive in your work, you need to learn how to manage your time. Once perfected, this will be a game changer for you! I’m still working on this skill, as confirmed by having the TV playing in the background as I’m writing this (I am watching a travel blog though – so that counts right?)
This brings me to the Q&A. My opinion is mixed on this one, because they did a fabulous job on this for the keynotes, but fell a bit short in the workshops (more on that later). During the keynotes, there was a cube – yes, a cube – which was tossed (gently) around the audience members who had Q’s. Once the presenter provided their “A”, they would toss the cube to the next audience member. The cube was outfitted with a microphone, so the audience and virtual audience could hear the question very clearly. How cool?! Matt even entertained the audience with a running joke that he was “getting better” with his cube tosses as the convention went on. Heads up!!
Another huge positive about the virtual ticket may be obvious, but, needs to be stated. Not everyone is able to make the trip, due to financial or personal reasons, so allowing guests to virtually attend is an excellent addition to TravelCon this year. The team worked very hard on the platform to make a positive digital experience.
The so so stuff
I wanted to start this section off by saying the TravelCon team did an excellent job organizing this year’s event, and that since I wasn’t able to attend, I am extremely grateful that I could participate virtually. The “so-so” stuff I will highlight is being nit-picky, and only slightly detracted from my overall experience.
Being a virtual presence you can’t expect to have the same level of immersion as in-person guests. One thing you should consider between attending in-person or virtually is your interaction during the talks. I had questions during some of the workshops, and found myself going elsewhere (Google, YouTube) for answers instead of being able to ask them directly. Some presenters even stayed after their workshops to take more specific questions, which I wish I could have met them and networked. If you buy the virtual ticket, you won’t be able to ask questions or be directly involved. Maybe this will be improved for the future with live streams?
On the topic of asking questions, most workshops had 1 camera and microphone for recording, which made it impossible to hear the Q&A from the audience. I remember one time when a guest asked a question, and the presenter simply stated: “Yes, that’s a great question, I definitely recommend that!”. What is a great question, and what do you definitely recommend? I want to know! In the future, I’d love to see TravelCon pass around a microphone (like they did during the keynotes) so virtual guests can be more included in the Q&A.
My last (remember – nitpicky) thing centers around the viewing experience. If you’re someone who likes watching a slideshow, take notes, and watch to the speaker, you may find it difficult to set yourself up to watch the workshops. The videos of the keynotes cycled between the slides and the presenters, but the format was a bit different for the workshops. TravelCon included the slides underneath each video recording, but I found you have to open them in a separate tab in order to follow along. My solution was to have two screens. On my TV, I had the speaker giving their presentation, and on my laptop, I had a word document open to take notes, and ALT + TAB’ed over to the slideshows to follow along. I made it work for me, but it wasn’t the best way to stay engaged. In the future, having the workshops cycle through the slides and the presenter (similar to the keynotes) would make for much better experience for virtual guests.
Here is what the screen looks like now:
The Final Verdict – Is it Worth it?
At the time of writing this, the virtual tickets are still available for purchase on TravelCon’s website for $150usd (compared to the $349 for attending in person). Now comes the question, is it worth it? It is definitely worth it if you are new to the travel industry or you have footprints all over the globe. The keynotes and workshops provide a wide array of valuable information for beginner and experienced travel bloggers. If you put aside the time to watch a few videos a week, you will most definitely build and refine your skills necessary to grow your travel business. Despite a few things that can be improved on in the future, there are so many benefits to TravelCon’s virtual ticket, and you will not be disappointed with your purchase. I certainly wasn’t!
Interested in attending TravelCon next year? Here is a link to TravelCon 2020 which will be hosted in New Orleans, LA on May 8-10, 2020.
