In May 2009, Susan and her husband James Byrd devised, developed and hosted the first virtual event for self publishers, the Self-Publishers Online Conference (SPOC). The annual event ran for four years and featured 16 expert speakers over the three-day event.
Just two people working from a log home in the middle of the forests of Idaho organized, managed, and marketed this large content-related project.
In addition to developing the concept, lining up the speakers, writing and designing the Web site, Susan also marketed the event. Every year for four years, she hosted promotional webinars, wrote press releases, posted in Linked In and Ning groups, posted speaker profiles and other posts on the event blog, wrote articles for her web sites, wrote guest posts, did interviews/podcasts, put mentions/blurbs in newsletters, and wrote ads for relevant publications and pay per click.
During the years she did SPOC, she also led the Book Authors Circle author mastermind group and offered author and publisher training at her SelfPubU training site.
