We’re sponsors of the brilliant Second Wednesday events held monthly in Nottingham, which aim to get the local web community together for drinks, talks, and good conversation. As well as doing our bit to support the free drinks (yep, we’ve got our priorities sorted), we’re active advocates of 2W and you can often catch one or two of us down there if you fancy a chat.

We caught up with organisers Chris and Jamie to get their views on what makes a good talk, why events like Second Wednesday are so important, and what it’s like running the event. Grab a coffee for this one and give it your full attention – it’s a fantastic read.

Hi guys, tell us a bit about yourselves.

Chris:

Day-to-day varies massively. At present I’m part of a team working on a huge site launch. Along with designing, my responsibilities involve front-end development too. I’m also heavily involved in working on internal projects, such as the Map app we launched for New Adventures – www.naconf.wearejh.com, which we planned and turned around in a matter of weeks.

Second Wednesday does take up a large portion of my time outside of JH, but otherwise I do try to find time to blog on my recently launched personal site or other external sites. I also work on the occasional bit of freelance if the project intrigues me.

Jamie:

You took over Second Wednesday fairly recently – how and why did you decide to get involved?

Chris:

Jamie:

As an agency, we attended for about 3 or 4 months after Chris, who had been attending for a while, said it was awesome. We saw it flagging quite a bit and thought we could really improve it as an event. From there, we approached the previous owner with our ideas and invited him to our office for some beers and to discuss them. He liked them so much he thought he would pass over the ownership of Second Wednesday to us in order to implement them.

Chris:

Jamie:

Why are regular events like Second Wednesday so important to the digital community?

Chris:

Jamie:

For example, if you have another agency, a typical scenario would be to feel threatened that they were going to steal clients etc. but at 2W, you get to know these guys and realise they’re just awesome individuals and a lot like us. Everybody can learn from each other by having a beer and a chat. This improves the industry as a whole rather than that normal hate-hate situation that doesn’t really breed a great community.

Chris:

For me, it meant that I could actually meet people within the industry and realise that I actually wasn’t just a student. I was meeting people who were agency owners and working freelancers and all of a sudden, this big void wasn’t as daunting as I felt like I was part of the community itself. As a result, we’ve actively tried to encourage students to come along and hopefully they’ll benefit as well.

Jamie:

There are plenty of people out there who would love to speak, but don’t have the confidence. What tips would you give to someone looking to get into speaking at these kinds of events?

Jamie:

Chris:

We see it as this – if you’re passionate about the topic you’re speaking about, it is going to be well-received. People will want to hear what you’ve got to say and discuss it with you afterwards.

What makes a good Second Wednesday talk?

Chris:

It’s also about giving personality within your talk. Not reading straight from the slide and talking through your topic naturally and comfortably puts the audience at ease. It’s not necessarily humour either but just showing your personality makes for a far more natural talk.

Jamie:

Chris:

What has been your “personal best” Second Wednesday so far?

Jamie:

Chris:

Jamie:

What’s the most challenging thing about running Second Wednesday?

Chris:

Jamie:

Chris:

You actively use social media to raise awareness of Second Wednesday events. Which networks do you prefer and why?

Jamie:

Chris:

The thing with our social media is that we are very active because we’re very busy. It’s not just endlessly plugging what we do. We’ve actually got a lot to announce. For example in the last three months we’ve been the pre-event to New Adventures in Web Design Conference, we’ve had five speakers, we’ve been sponsored and we’re doing interviews now. So all in all, we’re actually producing and outputting content at a ridiculous rate. But again a lot of our activity is validated by people externally, so it’s people saying things like “I’m going to Second Wednesday” and tweeting about the event itself or tweeting us and retweeting our posts.

So it started out as us doing the leg work to begin with but it’s snowballed and the community do a lot of the talking for us. On the run up to, and throughout the night of the event, our twitter feed is really active with those expressing their excitement for the event and their support and opinions of the talks going on. For us to see this, it’s really both endearing and quite amazing actually.

Jamie:

What advice would you give to someone looking to set up their own local grassroots event?

Jamie:

Chris:

Jamie:

Chris:

Jamie:

Chris: