5 Unforgettable Lessons I Learned Working for Blog Action Day 2008

October 27th, 2008 by Easton Ellsworth

I was recently blessed with the opportunity to serve as the assistant event coordinator for Blog Action Day 2008, which persuaded thousands of bloggers to address the subject of poverty on October 15.

That event changed me forever.

May we never forget that we are all beggars.

5 things I learned from my BAD ‘08 work:

1. Scalability is crucial to virality.

If you can’t scale, you can’t spread. Your idea may spread somewhat on its own. But if you can’t handle huge spikes of incoming information, you won’t be able to give your meme the constant attention it needs in order to achieve maximum reach and effect.

Blog Action Day 2008 was highly scalable in structure. The organizing team did a fantastic job preparing this event to spread virally. We had a solid strategy for contacting high-profile blogs and non-profit organizations. We had a website that made it easy and appealing to register for the event. We had a viral video.

But we all wished we had a few more members on our team. Especially when the big day came and I found myself hosting a live 12-hour-long radio show, manning the event Twitter and email and social media accounts, and fielding last-minute phone calls.

2. There is an unspeakable amount of needless suffering in this world.

The thousands of wonderful blog posts, photos, podcasts and videos published for Blog Action Day 2008 made my heart deeply feel what my mind already knew – that you and I have millions upon millions of brothers and sisters on this planet who are suffering needlessly at this very moment.

There is suffering and then there is needless suffering.

None of us can afford to ignore the monstrous magnitude of worldwide poverty.

We should do all we can, always, to rid poverty from the earth.

As I wrote for The Blog Herald:

“Last Friday, Chris Garrett asked what you are doing for Blog Action Day 2008 – Poverty. If every blogger involved in the annual October 15 event would have left a comment at Chris’s post, there would be well over 10,000 of them. And yet, if every person living in poverty were to comment, there would be more than 3 BILLION comments. Can you fathom it?”

3. There is an astounding amount of love in this world.

We just need to spread it.

No sooner had the Blog Action Day team launched our 2008 campaign than we began to receive emails and phone calls from people who wanted to help the event. Dozens of volunteers showed up at our doorstep, translating our website into at least 25 languages and promoting our event in dozens of countries all over the world. More than 80 companies and organizations willingly partnered with us, some of them offering their space, resources or tools for free.

Not to mention the incredible acts of kindness and selflessness manifested by thousands of people on Blog Action Day itself. Just look at the event website for a glimpse. People gave money to charity. They taught each other about poverty in their neighborhoods. They pledged to be more caring from that day on.

I was overwhelmed at the responsiveness and generosity of the Blog Action Day community.

4. Keep track of everything.

I sent hundreds of emails in my capacity as an offical Blog Action Day 2008 team member and read thousands more. I also created and maintained dozens of social media accounts and other online accounts for the event.

The only way I was able to do this without going bonkers was to keep track of everything I possibly could.

Spreadsheets, email filters and RSS alerts became my best friends. Without them, I never would have been able to remember who needed what by when, or who was saying what about Blog Action Day where.

At first I had to force myself to stay organized. But a little truly went a long way and the event went much more smoothly as a result.

5. Flow quality is much more valuable than flow quantity.

On the Web, you’ve got to give people a clear path to follow. This is especially true of events like Blog Action Day that have a central hub online and revolve around a single point in time.

We generated more buzz by doing and being and offering less. We were one day. One topic. Two officially supported ways to give money. One page with all the images/banners/widgets to embed on your blog. Etc.

More than once, I fell behind on answering emails for Blog Action Day. There was just so much coming in. What finally conquered the pile-up was attacking it with a system for directing flow. I made several template emails to save typing time. I filtered incoming messages extensively. I made each response as complete as possible to reduce the number of follow-up questions.

Give people clear instructions and simple choices all the time and you (and they) are bound to get more of what you want and less of what you don’t out of an event or a business.

And just for fun, here’s a bonus lesson I learned.

6. Sleep is wonderful. Try to get enough of it.

I came to cherish sleep while working for Blog Action Day 2008. During the last few days, I came to absolutely crave it.

I spent 40 hours or so in a row on October 14-15 working feverishly for Blog Action Day. Zero sleep in that span. The last 12 hours of that was the BlogTalkRadio talkathon. When I finally got to bed on the night of the 15th, I fell asleep within seconds and remained motionless on my back until morning. My wife had to check to make sure I was actually breathing at several points throughout the night because I never moved. There was no prying the precious prize of slumber from my exhausted body and brain.

So I resolved that, barring life-threatening emergencies, I will never again do that to myself.

If I could do it over again, I would have at least taken a catnap or two during that final 40-hour stretch. And every day I would have tried to grab a few more winks of sleep. It probably would have made my work more effective and less stressful.

Thank You to the Blog Action Day 2008 Team

To Collis Ta’eed for inviting me to contribute to this year’s extraordinary event; to Fuad Ta’eed for helping me see the vision of the event; to Cyan Ta’eed for adding an incredible amount of cheerfulness and energy; to John Barton for his tireless development and tech support work; to Leo Babauta for picking poverty as this year’s theme; to the dozens of volunteers who translated Blog Action Day materials and helped us promote our event worldwide; and to everyone who participated in any way, I say THANK YOU. You made Blog Action Day 2008 unforgettable for me and for many, many others. I hope that someone in this world will be less poor as a result.

What Did You Learn from Blog Action Day 2008?

I’m interested to know what lessons you have to share. Please leave a comment below. Or if you have any questions for me about Blog Action Day, please feel free to share them as well!

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