The panel discussion went well today at IACP.  I was pretty nervous leading up to it, primarily because I didn’t feel like I was prepared.  One of my college professors, the late, great Larry Hovis (from Hogan’s Heroes) lived by the mantra:  Be on time, Be prepared, and Be sober.  Simple, right?  It’s good.  Pretty much covers the bases.  It’s interesting to see how many people you come into contact with during a day can’t meet these criteria.

So the lack of preparation was with me.  I was up late last night trying to finish my presentation and practice.  I should have been at this stage days ago.  Instead, I felt like I was preparing for a personal BD pitch – pulling things together at the last minute.

But alas – I did finish, of course, and everything came together and when the panel started, all was good.  I was worried that I would be speaking over everyone’s head, talking about social media and social objects and content/context and all they wanted to hear from me was Video 101.  But I think I broke it down well, where it was digestable for everyone in the audience (wide range of audience, in age, digital acumen and focus).  I got some good feedback from some of the attendees, so mission was accomplished.  And now, I have a pretty good POV on content (objects) and context (relationships).

In the spirit of getting better, I’m always looking for feedback, so if you have any, let me know.  Would love to hear your thoughts.

Additional note – I hung out with Pat Hellberg from the Preset Group for a few hours last night and I’ve got to say, I really like those guys.  (Pat ran Nike’s digital signage network for a long time.)  They’ve been really good to me, which I appreciate.  They’re all very smart and it’s always fun to talk to smart people.  They’re also huge advocates of the DOOH space and doing everything they can to help companies navigate in the space.  Pat listened to my POV (which was really my presentation) on content/context and provided a bit of insight (via something kinda unrelated).  In any case, if you’re looking for someone (or a group of guys) to give you the 411 on digital signage/DOOH, look no further than the Preset Group.  They’ll steer you right.