We Love Your Feedback. Seriously. Really.

Hello, I’m Amy…or as some on the PDC09 Core team like to call me, ‘the marketing wolf pack of one’.  (If you’ve seen the movie ‘The Hangover’ then you’ll get the reference.)  My hands touch everything from PDC09 brand creative, online ads, print ads, and promotional emails to various communications and copy on our conference site, Twitter and Facebook page.  It’s a pretty cool gig, and I especially enjoy the opportunity to meet PDC09 followers in-person, so introduce yourself if you see me at the event! 

Now let’s get down to ‘business’ here.  Back in May, I asked the PDC09 Twitter audience about how we can improve the PDC online experience and how we communicate with you.

I asked / you said:

- What should the online team focus on?  Make session content easily discoverable on the site; simplify the UI, session evaluations online/mobile

- How do you typically share event information and content with your friends/colleagues? Blog, word-of-mouth, email links, community sites/forums

- How do you prefer to learn about registration, discounts, offers or other announcements? Email (very popular response); event news blog with RSS; Twitter

- What’s the most important factor when deciding which events to attend? Session content, clear understanding of the event’s focus; pricing; opportunities to meet with Microsoft technical experts

And my favorite quote (you know who you are!):  “I vote for RSS. Anyone not using a news reader at this point doesn't deserve to attend the conference."  

How we’re responding…

COMMUNICATIONS
- We launched a PDC09 email list, which has been very popular - over 2,300 people have added themselves to the email list to date.  We communicate via that list about once a month, providing updates on event announcements, sessions and special pricing offers.

- You can now subscribe to RSS feeds for New Sessions and What’s Happening. 

- You’ll see PDC09 newsletter placements and information in various user group and partner newsletters

- We’re sharing more of the inner-workings of how the PDC experience comes together through the ‘Behind the Scenes’ blog.

 CONFERENCE WEB SITE
- We’ve simplified the I.A. for easier navigation and discoverability.

- You can now link to and share sessions and speaker bios.

- We’re currently working on improving the mobile experience at the event, and the options for moving session evaluations to online.

SURFACING CONTENT
- We added a New Sessions RSS feed that allows you to keep up with newly published sessions as we get closer to the conference date.

- Sessions are featured prominently on the homepage (no longer buried in the I.A.), and we’ve improved the UI for filtering/searching for session content.

Well, that’s all from me for now.  You can reach me on my personal Twitter account or by commenting below on this post.  To prospective Twitter followers – follow me at your own risk!  Most of my tweets are about music or obscure movie references.

-Amy, PDC09 Marketing Manager