November 3, 2020 — Sometimes adversarial project management relationships can develop between clients, web designers, and developers. Starting even before the very first phone call or email, this talk provides tips and new ways of thinking about the client/provider relationship. And, in a way that respects what the client is asking for while also respecting the knowledge and experience the designer/developer brings to the table. We’ll cover the psychology of the relationships and engagements that typically occur between freelancers, agencies, and even direct-hire employees. In the end, both WordPress professionals and their clients will have a greater appreciation and respect for one another. Clients will be more willing to pay what providers charge for services and service providers will be better able to serve their clients.

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November 3, 2020 — 2020 isn’t like anything we’ve experienced in modern days. The landscape has changed. How we communicate with one another has changed. Masks, online conferences, email, check-ins, text messages… these all have a bigger impact than ever before on how we connect with other — including our clients. Let’s talk about how to maintain human connection with clients given our new “normal.”

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November 3, 2020 — What is a Wapuu? If you’re new to the WordPress Community and a WordCamp or Meetup, seeing these whimsical and playful characters in and around events worldwide. In this presentation, we’ll look at how these mystical creatures came to be, fit into each event’s brand messaging, and sets the tone for each weekend.

We’ll also take a look at the five Wapuu characters I’ve created and the thought process behind their creation, the “rules” of creating a standard Wapuu, the Field & Trading Outpost – their home, review some of my favorite Wapuus spotted, and more.

Need a change of pace during your busy WordCamp day? Stop in for this fun peek behind the curtain.

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November 3, 2020 — There are many ways to edit the look and functionality of a website. You could use an all-in-one solution such as page-builders. While this is still a good solution for building complex websites in a short amount of time, a better solution may be to use a child theme. I want to share my process for creating a child theme and go through a few examples of some typical things I do with child themes that has lowered my dependency on page-builders and plugins. I’ll also do my best to explain why you may want to create a child theme as well.

November 3, 2020 — In this talk Pablo Postigo, co-Founder & CEO of Frontity, will give an introduction to the basics of Frontity Framework and what are the main challenges when developing a React frontend for a Headless WordPress.

In addition he will share his vision of the future of JavaScript in the WordPress ecosystem and also the story behind Frontity, with special attention to the key learnings from these years building the Framework.

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November 3, 2020 — We will talk through:

Different times of days to post
Different uses of the website to drive traffic
The importance of analytics
Knowing your audience and what they want to learn
Finally, talking through the fact that the data does not exist in a vacuum, and learning to trust your personal experience in conjunction with the numbers.

November 3, 2020 — These days, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. The tech industry is facing a veritable raft of ethical, moral, and political crises. Automation and industrialization are reshaping our world. And sitting in the middle of all that? You and me. We’re digital designers, we’re developers, we’re product owners. But each day, our work is changing — more quickly than it ever has before.

Here’s the question we have to ask ourselves: what do we want that change to be? In this talk, we’ll look at some of the challenges facing our industry, and ask ourselves: what kind of work do we want to do?

November 3, 2020 — Speed matters. People are impatient. If your website or a client’s website doesn’t load quickly – within a just a couple of seconds – many visitors will abandon it completely. A slow site means lost time & revenue. But figuring out how to speed up a slow site can be HARD. Everyone’s got a suggestion and an idea for how to fix your performance issues, but most are just guesses, and not based on real data. STOP GUESSING. If you have a performance issue, or just want a faster site, you need to KNOW exactly what is slowing things down, and how to fix it. This talk will show you how.

November 3, 2020 — In this talk, you will learn the importance of online surveys, user interviews, analytics and focus groups to build better websites. Shifting the conversation from client focused projects to user-focused experiences allows you to truly understand and deliver for your users.

We will explore when to leverage tools like Google Analytics, Inspectlet, and marketing automation platforms. The outcome is a stronger relationship with your client, a repeatable method for continued website improvements, and an outstanding experience for both the client and its users.

November 3, 2020 — This talk will include:

lessons learned from our personal experiences looking for work at everything from partnerships to VIP agencies
when to work for yourself and when to hire on with someone else,
and then job trends in 2019 that open up opportunities for people interested in moving away from the traditional opportunities in development and design.

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