Storytelling in Toronto

The Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. Photo: Blogger’s own.

I had the good fortune to attend a content marketing conference (CONEX) in August 2018. It was an incredibly memorable experience and I picked up lots of great knowledge.

I also felt that it was my first real business trip. I’ve traveled for business before, but this was the first time a trip involved a hotel stay, a passport and a foreign locale.

Getting to Toronto was easy. It’s a quick flight — you have enough time to get in the air, have refreshments and read a magazine. After that, you’re landing.

Firkin on Bloor in Toronto. Great eats, great art, friendly staff and most excellent hot tea. Photo: Blogger’s own.

I made my way into the city, settled in and walked around to explore. My conference didn’t begin until the next day, so there was enough time to wander around. Toronto is a great city for walking around — mostly I explored up and down Bloor Street West on the first day.

There was a restaurant across the street (Firkin on Bloor), so after I finished walking, I wandered over there to have some hot tea. I went up to their balcony that overlooked the street and just savored the fact that I was where I was.

Me. In Toronto. Even now, I still marvel at that.

The next day, I did a bit more wandering and then it was time to go to the first workshop of the conference. A Canadian company called Überflip was hosting the conference, and the first workshop was held at their office.

I liked the look of their offices — open plan like the Anne Hathaway/Robert DeNiro movie “The Intern”. It was one of the most attractive offices I’ve ever seen — tons of open space, lots of color and inspirational quotes. The building had a history — there were some antique machines around which me, the history buff, had to check out.

So we learned a lot about search engine optimization (always a good skill for bloggers to have, I’ve always felt) the first day and how SEO experts keep their knowledge up to date.

I picked up some good resources. I’ve experimented with some of them and found them equally handy.

Some SEO resources. Photo: Blogger’s own.

Later, I chatted with some other people and eventually headed back to the hotel. The next two days of the conference would be at the Royal Conservatory of Music — ohhh, yeahhhh. More to come on that in future blog posts.