This year the theme of the Meet the blogger conference 2015 was: Build a Blog Empire. Over 100 international bloggers came together in hotel Casa 400 to network and learn from each other.

It has been my job as a program manager to get great speakers. For keynotes I was looking at advanced bloggers who have a real good, mostly (personal) story. We had three keynotes:

1. Dream, Make, Grow

from blog sisters Emma and Elsie who can live of their blog A Beautiful Mess and apps ‘A beautiful Mess’ and ‘Party Party.’ What I learned from their keynote: Search for creatieve friends to help you with your blog and also give yourself permission to be creative, as the biggest succes comes from  the unexpected. But still, try to be organised too, organisation is the key to success. Have a plan, make blogging your top priority’ Reminder to prioritise!

2. How do you start a blogging Brand without losing yourself,

by Yvonne aka Yvestown. She is a very funny lady that tells stories like no one else. She tries a lot of stuff, if it does not work, she changes her strategy. After writing three books she will be focussing on blogging again. Biggest learning from Yvonne: have a strong visual identity you can use in your blog, your house, your books and don’t be afraid to try out new things like a book, a store, a collection etc.

3. Growing a community and letting it thrive

, by interiorblogger Igor Josif and designer Joelix. They started the Urbanjungleblogger movement to get more green in the cities. The have new plant and flower challenges every month where over 600 bloggers join in. My learning from this duo: a community can only grow if you care very much about the subject and you have no commercial goal. With love and attention it can grow. You have to look after the community daily. I found a quote about networks versus communities: networks connect, communities care. That is so true! Get people to interact and to ACT in real life. Only then a community will be successful.

4. Learnings from other sessions:

– Book a hotelroom for yourself to blog. Let’s call it a blog retreat. Focus!
– Write articles that are in the heart of your target group like Me-to-we does. This article about not wanting a third kid went viral and does not match the viral content ‘rules’ as it is a long personal blogpost with a title that is also personal (no: what’s in it for me). But it seems to be the subject many parents think about a lot.
– There is a an actual website with all Pinterest group boards you can join, what fun! Go to Pingroupie Nienke’s presentation on Pinterest was full of good tips, check it on her website The TravelTester.

Here you can read the best tweets and see the coolest pics from the two days of the Meet the Blogger conference: