Although higher ed wasn’t the focus, there were plenty of tips to pick up on. I went to the youth marketing session, and picked up a tip which I’d long suspected: that kids are so jaded from being advertised to all the time that they’re really looking for authentic information. They want the freedom to access your messages on their own time, and more and more they’re looking to feel involved and included in your message.

Later in the day, a session on leadership evolved into a discussion on how to call the most effective meetings (tip: not on Monday mornings). A way to help people develop a pride of ownership in your meetings could be to decipher their want or need to be there…drawing those wants/needs out will foster a sense of inclusiveness. Also, if you’re calling a meeting, be able to say in one sentence what the desired outcome or action item is!

And for a note on trends, people are coming up with more and more ways to manage their social networking sites in such a way that they no longer have to visit separate Flickr, Facebook, or Digg pages to update their profiles. They can use a browser like Flock or tools like friendfeed to aggregate and manage them. Amber Case, Cyborg Anthroplogist from Portland, recommended these tools – she’s got a great list of 2009 creative conferences on her blog.