Bridget Willard

WPblab – Looking back over a year of learning, video platforms, and community.

Community, friendship, video, learning, guests, oh my! So much has happened since Jason Tucker invited me to co-host WPblab Oct 1, 2015!

Table of Contents hide
1 A Day that Will Live in Infamy
2 Video Platforms are Fickle
3 Cross-over Opportunities
4 A New Career
5 A theme song is born.
6 Favorite Episode
7 Life Happens
8 Accidental Community
9 We’ve become a virtual meetup.

A Day that Will Live in Infamy

Well, not really. But October 1, 2015, changed my life forever.

Blab(dot im) came out and Jason Tucker sent me a message. Would I want to co-host a new show on the WPwatercooler network?

“Did you ask the right person?”

A developer and a marketer is the perfect combination. And so, Thursday, October 1, a show was born.

You can watch that episode here:

Video Platforms are Fickle

With live video, you learn to roll with things. Seriously. Blab(dot)im was there for quite a while. But when they shut down, we were ready. Jason Tucker had already moved us to Firetalk. But when Firetalk stopped reliably providing video download, we went to YouTube Live in a Custom Post Type.

Gee. When I started this journey, I had no idea what a CPT was.

It’s been a great year. But I digress.

The point is, if you’re hosting a live show — especially on video — you have to have grace and be ready for anything.

Main takeaways besides that are:

  1. Wear headphones.
  2. Don’t allow anyone to stream in your house.
  3. Be hard wired.
  4. Have a good attitude.
  5. Laugh a lot.
  6. Make friends.
  7. Take selfies.

Cross-over Opportunities

Adam Silver of KitchenSinkWP has appeared on our show dozens of times, too. We’ve had tons of people from The WP Crowd, too! They even made me an honorary member.

Also, Jason Tucker scheduled a cross-over with Jeffrey Bradbury of Teacher Cast that was epic. Be open to these opportunities. They’ve always been awesome.

*My disclaimer is that we’ve had so many amazing people, I’m probably leaving someone out. Apologies in advance.

A New Career

On December 1, 2015, I was offered my dream job doing marketing at WordImpress. You can read all about that transition in my blog post here.

A theme song is born.

Jason Tucker challenged me to come up with a theme song. And, so, I did.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/243111943″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]

It debuted on January 14, 2016. My favorite part is when Jason went “woo” at the end.

Favorite Episode

It’s hard to pin down my favorite episode because they all have great moments. That said, this episode with James Laws of Ninja Forms and Josh Pollock of Caldera blew my mind. I didn’t realize forms were that functional.

Life Happens

So, when the worst thing could happen — and did — the WordPress and WPblab community was there for me, quite literally.

You can read about it in detail here.

My Coral Reef: The WordPress Community

Accidental Community

I can’t even start listing all of the wonderful people I’ve met both there and in-person since we started this show.

Russell Aaron has been a regular regular. Regular regular? Yes. He’s been on the show dozens of times. I finally got to meet him in person this year at WordCamp San Diego and we chatted again in person at WordCamp Orange County. He’s become a mentor of mine. Would that have happened without WPblab? I doubt it.

https://twitter.com/jasontucker/status/677709022657716226

I’ve also met Josh Pollock from Caldera and Jacob Arriola from Zeek Interactive.

I expect to meet so many more people as I attend more WordCamps around the nation. This is partly why I made the GuruSelfies page.

I can say without a doubt that I feel more connected to the WordPress community than ever before. And I feel invested. And I care.

We’ve become a virtual meetup.

People have shared their struggles and triumphs. We’ve chatted. We’ve become friends on Twitter and Facebook. We’ve met in person. We’re planning to meet in person. People have started blogs, meetups, quit jobs, leveled up their careers, and applied to be WordCamp organizers.

I feel safe to say that Jason Tucker’s gift of hospitality really shines through in this show’s format and I’m proud to play a part in it.

Bridget Willard

17 responses to “WPblab – Looking back over a year of learning, video platforms, and community.”

  4. Awesome Bridget – Can’t wait to see what year 2 brings! So glad Cheryl and I found WPblab, you, Jason, and the great little community of ‘regulars’ that has sprung up to watch each week =) I look forward to every one – happy Blab-iversary!

  5. I feel the same! 🙂 Congratulations on your first year of Blab and almost a full year at your job! LOVE the Guru Selfies page – we’ll definitely need to take one together at #WCUS!

  14. Bridget, thanks for accepting my offer to be my co-host of WPblab, it’s been an amazing ride learning together and building a community. I’m looking forward to all that we will do with the show and how many more people we can impact as the show goes on.

    There has been many ups and downs as you outlined here, I’d glad that the community was able to come together and pitch in and help out.

    Thanks for being an awesome friend.