As PodCamp Boston II approaches, it’s time to look back on PodCamps in general and their use as a marketing tool.

In August of 2006, I decided to attend the first PodCamp in Boston. This was the first in what has been a series of events given by podcasters for podcasters. Given that podcasting was our exact target market, I decided that it made sense for TalkShoe to attend, and we contributed $500 as a company. It was certainly a risk in terms of money spent, but I had a hunch that it was going to be worth our time, effort and money, given that I’ve been to many new conferences and trade shows that turned out to be a bust.

PodCamp Boston was billed as an “unconference” which meant that instead of having high-profile speakers and mostly companies speak, instead anyone, and everyone was allowed and encouraged to give a talk in one of the 4 breakout rooms and the large main room. For our sponsorship, TalkShow was sort of given a table to display our product, given out litterature and talk to PodCampers. Personally, I signed up for two speaking sessions.

It soon became clear that the PodCamp was going to be a unique venue. It was strange. Everyone was actually helping everyone else!!! It wasn’t like your typical conference where companies would spend every moment figuring out who to sell something to.  Instead, it was about podcasters who knew something, helping out podcasters who didn’t, including how to podcast, how to market your podcast, audio and video gear selection, and so on. And the people were truly from all walks of life, young and old.

For a while, I was feeling like a fish out of water. I’d been so used to giving sales pitches, that it took some time for me to just talk to people about themselves and their podcasting experiences. But it was great! I felt like I was back during Freshman Week at college when you could walk up to anyone and introduce yourself. And when people were indeed interested in what TalkShoe could do, they quickly got other people interested too.

Since Boston, I’ve been to 5 other PodCamps (New York, Pittsburgh I, Pittsburgh II, Atlanta, and Toronto), and other TalkShoe people have been to several more. They continue to be worth our time and effort as a company, but most imoprtantly, they’re fun, interesting and a great way to interact with others of similar interests.

Overall, more than anything else, I began to understand how to un-market, and un-sell at the un-conference.  

We just finished our 1st trade show where TalkShoe exhibited – Podcast & New Media Expo. It went well. The highlight for me was our <$1,000 booth (compared with $5-$10K) average for a 10×10 booth. It was filled with cubbies and shoes — lots of shoes of all types, and a large screen with a projector showing a live continuous Talkcast. Over 100 different people joined the Talkcast from somewhere out there on the Internet. The live Talkcast really got the idea of our product across to those coming by the booth. Overall, the trade show cost us $6000 + $3800 for travel expenses = $9,800 which is the least amount I’ve ever spent to exhibit at a show. Basically trade shows aren’t cheap. In addition to the booth, there’s travel, shipping, electricity, badge readers, t-shirts, booth space ($3K), etc.

The other hit for us was having iJustine (an extremely popular social networker) in our booth. She knows just about everyone, and her exuberance about TalkShoe’s project shines through. It doesn’t hurt that she’s also quite easy on the eyes. At one point she was LifeCasting (a running video of her life), talking on a live TalkShoe call, Twittering what she was doing, and roving around the trade show wearing her TalkShoe polo shirt. As she put it, she was “buzzing”.

TalkShoe is going to the Podcast Media Expo trade show in L.A. next week. It’ll be our first real trade show where we’ll have our own trade show booth. To say the least, trade shows are expensive. Really expensive. Including everything (space, booth, shipping, furniture, etc.) most 10×10 ft booths cost $10K+. And of course, as a startup, we basically have no money. What to do ???

As they say, if you can’t fix it, feature it. We decided a few months ago not to buy one of those typical “Skyline” popup booths, which including graphics would cost about $5-$7K (ouch!). No booth you say? Well, I told my graphics guy, “let’s get creative.”

Our booth will certainly be different. There will be a large screen with our live software projected on it. Around the sides, will be cutouts of people from cardboard and painted to look like the images on the TalkShoe website. And there will be shoes. Lots of shoes. On shoe racks, hanging on the projector, on the tables, you name it. And a bunch of balloons with the TalkShoe logo because we can’t afford to hang a banner. We’ve also made the booth components to be very portable because we can’t afford to ship lots of heavy boxes. All-in-all, the booth should cost us around $1,000, a nice savings. And if you’re at the show — check us out — and wear your shoes!