A few days have passed since IZEAFest and I’ve had the pleasure of conversing with the new friends and business associates that I met there via Facebook, on Twitter, via email, on the phone, etc.

The face-to-face networking that takes place at events such as IZEAFest is truly the springboard to the “virtual conversations” that continue on, post conference.

The unfortunate part about conferences is that eventually, they come to an end and somehow you just don’t get to talk to everyone you set out to meet.

In the last two days, I’ve heard from a couple of people who told me that they didn’t come up to me to say hi at IZEAFest because they always saw me talking to someone and they didn’t want to interrupt; or when I was alone and checking my email, they didn’t want to be a bother.

Please.. bother me!

I love meeting new people. I enjoy finding out about what you do and how I can help you grow your business.

I want you to be more than a Twitter avatar to me.

So, here’s the deal. In the next two months, I’m going to be at the following conferences:

BlogWorld Expo: October 15-17 (Come swing by my booth #328)
ShareASale Think Tank: October 23-25
Ad:tech New York: November 4-6 (Come swing by my booth #1455)
Audience Conference: November 5-6
Social Fresh Cruise: November 12-16 (Come swing by my lounge chair)

… and I really want to make sure I get to meet you.

Why don’t we set a time that’s convenient for the both of us to do so? This way, there are no awkward moments, no shoulda’s and no if-only’s that can get in our way.

Once I get your information, I’ll shoot you off an email to connect to set up a good time for us to meet.

Here’s looking forward to meeting you!

I get a lot of requests asking me what conferences I recommend to folks that are into affiliate marketing, search marketing and social media.

There’s certainly a lot to choose from and since every dollar counts these days, I decided to put a list together of conference and tradeshows that I personally recommend and plan on attending this year.

If I run out of steam based on this schedule, my wonderful business partner Shawn will be there in my place.

PubCon South – March 11-13 – Austin
SXSW Interactive Show – March 13-18 – Austin, TX
Search Engine Strategies - March 23-27 – New York
BarCamp Orlando – April 18 – Orlando
Ad:Tech – April 21-23 – San Francisco
SOBCon – May 1-3 – Chicago
Inbound Marketing Summit – May 27-28 – Dallas
Internet Retailer – June 15-18 Boston
Linkshare Symposium East – June 22-23 – New York
BlogHer – July 24-25 – Chicago.
Affiliate Summit East 2009 – August 9-11 – NYC*
Gnomedex – August 20-22 – Seattle
Avon Breast Cancer 40-mile Walk – September 12-13 – Los Angeles
IzeaFest – October 1-4 Orlando
SMX East – October 5-7 – New York
a4Uexpo – October 13-14 – London
BlogWorldExpo – October 15-17 – Las Vegas
Ad:Tech NY – November 4-6 – New York
Social Fresh Cruise – November 12-16

If you’re going to be at any of these events, let’s make plans to meet up. I just love seeing old friends and meeting new ones.

If you’re not going to make any of these, look for coverage of the events in upcoming issues of FeedFront Magazine.

Lastly, if you know of an established conference not listed here, that you think I should be attending, let me know. I’m always looking for new opportunities.

*Shameless plug. But hey, it’s my blog, I can do whatever I want.

I just finally got back to Gate B2 at McCarran airport after dragging my exhausted butt on crutches across the hall to get some frozen yogurt from TCBY. To add insult to injury, as I finally sat down to dig into my White Chocolate Mousse with Heath Bar Crunch, I realized that the lady behind the counter did not give me a damn spoon. So as I type this post, I am squeezing my cup of yougurt and sticking my tongue in it, to avoid schlepping all the way back there.

I learned a few things during this trip, most of which have to do with how folks in wheel chairs are treated by some people, but I will save that for another post. Let’s just say that it was great to have my friends Shawn Collins, Connie Berg, Lisa Picarile, Tris Hussey and TrishaLyn, Billy Kay, Jim Kukral and a few others, around to help out. Sorry ’bout your toes…

Anyway…. Shawn and I hosted an Affiliate Summit dinner at Chinois, on Friday night. 40 people were confirmed / 35 showed up. Mr. & Mrs. John Chow, Zac Johnson and his girlfriend, Steve Hall, Ian Fernando and Shawn dined at my table.

Note to the folks that didn’t show up (you know who you are): John Chow, Zac Johnson and I ate your dinners, too. We figured, what the hell — they were already paid for. Blogposts, wine and a nice lunch in Orlando should make up for it.

I shared my story of how I fractured my foot, Tweeting and Walking. John Chow promptly labeled it the World’s First Highly Pubilicized Twitter Accident.

After dinner we rolled over to the Tech Set party at Bare. It was fun and crowded. A little too crowded for the likes of my scooter, so we bailed a little early.

I attended a few sessions on Saturday, and I especially liked the Affiliate Marketing panel with Mike Allen, Tim Jones and Shawn Collins. It was pleasing to see how much room there is for Affiliate Marketing as a lot of Bloggers in attendance have never even contemplated its use when it comes to monetizing their blogs.

A few of us dined in the Mexican Restaurant inside the Hilton for dinner. I kind of felt like I held back my friends from going other places because I couldn’t get around so easy. But they seemed to be ok with it — or they just felt sorry for me.

After dinner we went over to the Blog World party inside the Hilton as well, only to discover that the same food that we ate at the Mexican Restaurant was provided to the party-goer’s for free at the party. Live and Learn.

I ended the night with Michael Buechele, Connie Berg and Karen Garcia over a glass of wine and some funny conversation.

While I wanted to head back to BlogWorld today, I just didn’t have it in me. Between repacking, returning the scooter and getting to the airport – heading to the Convention Center to make a session just seemed out of reach.

I did snap quite a few pictures of the weekend. Click on the picture below to check them out.