Thursday — Newbie/Recent Convert Sessions

OSX Lion Walkthrough & Tips/Tweaks – Finis Price

The newest operating system has been released, and the “Big Cat” is the biggest leap forward since Leopard in 2007. Whether you’re an early adopter or waiting to see how things shake out, this intro session will have you on the road to taming Lion.

Top 30 Utilities for Your Mac – Ben Stevens

Your Mac works pretty well out of the box, but there are programs that can help it work better for longer. Spending just a minute or two per utility, come learn 30 ways to tune your computer for optimal performance.

MS Word Tips, Tricks & Tweaks – Brett Burney

Much as people love using Pages, Microsoft Word is the default word processor for the legal world. Do you think you know everything there is to know about using this must-have software? This session will cover both the basic stuff and the advanced techniques.

Real-World Security – Randy Juip

There has been a lot of debate lately about file security and cloud options. Most of the other conferences feature speakers telling to go running into the hills away from solutions like Dropbox. Randy Juip takes the opposite view; come hear what he has to say.

The Steve Jobs Appreciation Sessions

iPad for Your Practice – Finis Price

Finis Price has developed quite a reputation for giving one of the top sessions on using an iPad in practice. These are practical, real-life suggestions for integrating the iPad into what you do day-to-day. This presentation has been heralded every place it’s been given and we’re lucky to have Finis give this presentation to MILOfest attendees.

PDF Magic – Mark Metzger

PDFs have become a standard way to trade documents, but the file format is a lot more powerful than that. Mark Metzger is going to show you how to manipulate data using Adobe Acrobat to automate workflow and streamline your practice. This is going to be a top session.

DepoSmart/TrialSmart/DocSmart –  John Callis

Clarity Legal is the leading software developer for trial presentation and litigation software for the Mac OS. John Callis will walk you through all of the software you need to take a trial-bound case from prep through closing argument. John was a featured speaker at the Macs In Trial II conference in 2007, and is making his return to show off all of the new features that Clarity has cooked up.

Encryption – Jack Newton

How secure is your data? Do you know how to make it more secure? This session will walk you from setting up security in the most popular programs all the way to creating sparse images and sparse bundles.  Your data will be more secure than the gold in Fort Knox.

Mail.app Ninja Tips – Brett Burney

Every Mac ships with Mail.app to help you manage your email. While some people opt for GMail, most people use this program out of default, but it is an extremely powerful program if you know how to use it correctly. Brett Burney will help you do that.

Podcasting 101 & 102 – Victor Medina

One of the beauties of the Internet is the way it permits everyone to be a distributor of content. Whether you use it to educate your clients or solely for entertainment, this session will show you how to get your podcasting efforts off the ground and turn your computer into a recording studio.

The TED-like Sessions

Marketing Lessons From The Movies – Mark Merenda

More than providing entertainment, the movies carry lessons for our practices. This engaging session will weave movie clips into an educational set of marketing lessons for your practice.

Using Flow for Collaboration – David Satterfield

Lawyers rarely work in isolation. Flow is a task management app that makes working in collaboration with your team a breeze. Flow is used by companies like Disney, Square, TED and our own beloved Apple. You’re not better than them are you?

How To Work Like a Computer – Larry Port

In this thought-provoking session, Larry Port will show us how using principles of how a computer works can be extended to your practice and you life. This is a must-see session.

Quick Hit Sessions

Quick Hits are 20 minute sessions on topics that are MILOfest-worthy, just not for a full hour.

Back-up Done Right – Mark Metzger

Dropbox Bonanza – Victor Medina

Working On Your Practice v. In Your Practice – Mark Merenda

I hope you’ll consider coming to MILOfest 2011. Here is the link to register: Register for MILOfest 2011

Kindly,

Victor Medina

*Note: Titles of Sessions are subject to change, and we’re waiting on confirmation from one of the speakers, but I named him in the hope he’ll realize he’s locked in and would disappoint everyone by not showing up.

Hello Mac-Lovin’ Lawyers! It’s time for another MILOfest conference.

First, here’s the stuff you want to know:

MILOfest 2011 in a Nutshell

Dates: November 10-12, 2011 (Thursday-Saturday)

Thursday – Recent Convert/Newbie Track beginning at 11am (so you can fly in)

Thursday Evening – Social Event

Friday – General Programming – 8:30am to 4pm

Saturday – General Programming – 8:30am to 4pm

Venue: Disney World Coronado Springs Resort & Conference Center, Orlando, FL

Hotel: $119/night – good for 3 days prior to and after the event (or more if you’re sweet to the reservation person and there are rooms available at that price).

Price: $450 2010 Attendee Appreciation Rate,  $500 Early Bird Pricing, $550 General Admission Pricing, $600 Last Chance Pricing (See the tickets above for details.)

Parks: Discount pricing for part-day tickets to the Disney Theme Parks

Dates

For our kind of conference, the only weekend open was November 10-12, 2011. I think we’re just going to settle into keeping it the second weekend in November assuming people keep wanting to have a conference.

Venue

I’m happy to announce that we’re back in the room we had for Year 1. If you were there, you remember that there were plenty of electrical outlets (yay!) and we were right off the patio for the breakfast buffet. It’s a bit longer walk from the rooms, but it’s worth it.

What Happened to Vegas?

I know I floated the idea that I was going to move it to the West Coast, and specifically to Vegas, but two things happened. First, Vegas wanted twice as much as Disney in food, rental, and room guarantees. Much as I love this conference, I couldn’t stick my neck out for a proposition that we would double our attendance.

Second, my law practice has really picked up in the last year and it’s going to be tough enough to organize this without dealing with the uncertainty of a new venue. Disney has been good to the MILOfest conference, and it’s nearly a turn-key event from a “facility” point of view. I want to focus on speakers and getting attendees, not on negotiating rates for a projector screen, or worrying that they’re going to serve old pretzels. I hope that you can understand, forgive, and decided to attend anyways.

What You Get

In addition to the space rental, your registration fee covers breakfast on Friday and Saturday, snacks on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

Bring your mi-fi if you have one because Internet is not guaranteed. I will do what I can, but last year, mobile wifi was nearly ubiquitous and there were plenty of people willing to share their connection with the attendees. This year, since we’re back on the outside of the building, I predict that connections will be more solid than last year.

Room Rates & Theme Park

The conference rate for the hotel is $119/night and that’s good for up to 3 nights before and three nights after the event. The rate is also about $30 less than last year’s rates. I can almost guarantee that we won’t see them this low for future years, but let’s enjoy it while we can. In addition, for those of you looking to turn this into a Disney vacation, there are special discounts on part-day tickets for conference attendees – these will let you get into the parks at 2pm or 4pm for dinner, fun, and more.

There are a limited amount of rooms booked at this rate. The conference space is really being used a lot and it took a lot of negotiation to get this rate and this many rooms set aside for MILOfest. That rate is good only for the first 60 registrants. I might be able to increase it if there is a big, early rush to registration, but no promises.

Programming

If this is your first experience with MILOfest, let me welcome you and let you know, you’re in for a treat. This conference is outstanding, by all measure, and it’s due almost entirely to the superb speakers and programming. (The other part is how warm and collegial the attendees are. Honestly, these are the nicest attorneys I know, and the only conference where I can sit down with any of you and enjoy a drink.)

If you’re a repeat attendee (as nearly half of you last year were), I’m committed to keeping you up-to-date with fresh presentations. Last year, there were a few iPads in the room (actually about half of you had one), but no real way of presenting sessions on how to use them. This year, however, with mirroring, we’re going to feature at least 2 official sessions on the iPad. These will be useful whether you have the iPad 2 or the first generation, as nearly all of the programs run on both.

In addition, Mark Metzger is coming back to build on his presentation on how to enter information once and watch it work wonders. You’ll learn how to create fillable PDF forms, which you can use to generate retainer agreements, form letter, official filings, etc. Extremely powerful stuff whether you are a solo attorney, or running a larger practice.

Finis Price promises to make it this year. I promised him I’d mark him down in pencil.

As more sessions get booked, I’ll announce them, but you can expect to hear about things like Encryption & Backup, Actually Going Paperless, Peace & Tranquility in the Workplace, Mind-Mapping and Practical Security. I hope you’ll register early and take advantage of the lower price, trusting that the speakers are going to be great.

More Programming

As with last year, there will be plenty of time set aside for networking and informal learning. We’ll take last year’s relaxed pace and try not to jam too much into those 2.5 days.

Another carryover from last year will be the “Basics” course for Thursday. I know I didn’t have enough time to cover everything I had for grade-level programs like Pages and most of you enjoyed learning tips and tricks for other programs and OSX. So, we’re going going to have the “Recent Converts” track, but we’ll cover some new ground too. Again, the point of this is to make sure that first-time attendees and people new to the platform don’t feel left behind.

Price

I’m happy to report that we were able to hold the prices level from last year – no increase. There were a few bucks left over, which mostly went to my admin help. This is more of a labor of love than anything, but it costs money to run, and I respect that you pay good money to come. I try to hold up my end of the bargain by giving you the best tech/law on Macs in the country. (It helps that there isn’t too much competition.)

The price breakdown goes like this:

$450 – 2010 Attendee Appreciation Pricing (good through August 1, 2011)

$500 – Early Bird Pricing (good through August 1, 2011)

$550 – General Admission (good through October 10, 2011)

$600 – Last Chance Pricing (good through day of event)

To register for the event, follow the instructions on the EventBrite registration page or on the badge alongside the MILOfest webpage. To avoid the processing fees, you can call Elizabeth Incrocci, my Client Services Director, at 609.818.0068 and arrange to pay by check. Do not attempt to pay by check on the EventBrite site, or you’ll have to pay the processing fees. I’m a reasonable person – if you are registering within a few days of the expiration of a pricing tier, call with a promise to send a check in 3 days and I’ll honor the lower price.

Conclusion

I hope that last year’s attendees will decide to come back and that some of you will come for the first time. We’ll be sharing more news about the event on MILOfest’s Facebook page, Twitter and the MILOfest website. Any questions – please email me at info [at] milofest [dawt] com

Thank you in advance for your interest. See you there!

It’s been about 7 months from MILOfest 2010 and I’ve been fielding questions about MILOfest 2011. First, the good news – MILOfest 2011 is definitely happening. The dates will likely be November 10-13, 2011.

Next, the frustrating news. As much as I’ve been trying to plan to take MILOfest to the West Coast this year, most of my facility options have been significantly more expensive than where we’ve held it the past two years. In some cases, the fees would make it nearly twice as expensive to produce, which means I would have to double the cost of attending — and I won’t do that to you.

It’s my goal to keep the registration price as close to last year’s as possible. I think it’s awfully fair to ask $500-$650 for a 2.5 day conference and I hope you do too.

Lastly, I owe MILOfest 2010 attendees an apology and some videos. To be quite blunt, I over-promised on distributing videos of last year’s conference and I seem to lack the skills and time to get it done. Finis Price has been generous enough to volunteer to help, so we’ll see if we can’t get them to you somehow. Here’s the point, though — I’m not sure I’m going to promise anything by way of videos this time. If someone wants to volunteer their talents in that area, send me an email, but it’s clear I shouldn’t put myself in that position again. It’s enough work getting the conference off without a hitch. That also means that if you want the benefit of the conference, you need to plan on attending in person.

I think I’ll have the details nailed down by the end of the week and then we can open registration. There’s a decent chance that we’ll be back at Disney again, if only because that’s a known quantity and the prices haven’t gone up too much. Same deal as before with ticket prices in that I envision cutting last year’s attendees a break if they re-register for MILOfest 2011, then Early Bird, General Admission, and Last Chance. The price might go up just a bit as I’m trying to get us some inexpensive wi-fi for the room.

Oh, about the conference itself, I already have a handful of excellent speakers and topics. I’ll be adding to it over the coming months once I know whether folks can make the dates and the location. I’m fortunate enough to know people that will travel anywhere, and at any time, for MILOfest. I can’t tell you how much that means to me.

If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section, and I’ll try to answer them all.

Thanks for your patience —

Victor Medina

The S1100 is an ultra-portable version of the ScanSnap and I’ve included a picture here. The unit is powered by a USB-to-miniUSB cable from your computer. The idea being – you don’t need to plug in for power. Of course, if you run out of power on your computer battery…well, tough luck.

The main competition for the S1100 seems to be the Neat Receipts scanner, a scanner from Doxie, and Fujitsu’s own S1300.

It’s been Fujitsu’s habit to make Mac-specific scanners in a nice shade of white. The S1100 does not have the “M” designation for Mac, so it comes in “sleek black.” But, honestly, I don’t think that matters much these days. Macbook Pros (and Macbook Airs) are made out of aluminum – so the whole “white” movement seems a bit played.

I auditioned the S1100 on a professional development conference where everyone brings copies of handouts for all the other attendees. There is some trading (like in elementary school with your peanut butter & fluff sandwich) and you end up coming home with a stack of paper. My goal was to leave the paper behind and come home with just scanned versions of everything in my Quest To Travel Light.  (See, for example, my review of the Ristretto for iPad.)

For those of you who read the last page of a novel first, here’s the summary: I succeeded, sort of.

As you might expect, this scanner is an exercise in compromise: Size and Portability vs. Functionality and Speed.

I’m not someone who is big on technical specs, though the promotional materials say that this scanner runs at about 7 seconds per page. My experience is that the scanner is surprisingly “peppy.” That is, I expected it to run slower than it did, but it moves the pages along at a good clip and it doesn’t seem like the scanner is “thinking” too much. I’ve used other “portable” scanners and it always seems like I’m begging the device to run the whole page through the scanner. The S1100 is anything but pokey, which is great because it makes you want to keep using it. If the scanner was too slow, then it would feel like a real chore to scan anything but one or two pages.

One of the compromises in functionality is that it only scans one side at a time and if you want to scan both sides of a page, you have to manually feed the page on the other side. This presents a problem because you can’t drop a stack of 7-10 pages on the “feeder” and wait for them to go through. I would have preferred to be able to set the scanner to scan all of the first pages on one pass, and then flip them over and scan the second page.

This device comes with Fujitsu’s ScanSnap Manager, which allows you to set the compression levels, scan in color, and create a few different profiles. For a great tutorial on how to use ScanSnap Manager and profiles, check out this post from my buddy, Finis Price. One problem I’ve had with the ScanSnap software generally is in the way you can, or can’t, customize your file naming convention. Fujitsu includes a choice to do YYYY_MM_DD etc – all the way down to minutes and seconds. That’s a little too granular for me, but if I could just have it name by year, month, day and then a 3-digit serial number – that would be awesome. However, I can’t get it to do that, so I have to name each file separately, which is a real pain.

Other than that, I think the software is pretty good. You can scan directly to Word, Excel, Google Docs or Evernote (as either a PDF or JPG file). You can also scan directly to a folder, as you might expect, or to an Email. There’s also an option to OCR or keyword tag files as they are scanned – however, this really slows down the scanning speed. All of these scanning options make it really easy to use scanned copies of files in lots of different applications.

Obviously, the idea is that this is a “portable” scanner so you deserve to hear how portable it is. The S1100 reminds me of a 1×1 piece of kindling that’s just over 11 inches long/wide. It’s a mini block that I drop into the bottom of my bag for travel. I like that there’s just one cable to bring with you, but in my tryout, I found the mini-USB cable a little difficult to situate in the S1100.

One other annoyance was the fact that the “output” cover, made of plastic, tends to open with the slightest bit of pressure. The problem with that is that I’d find the cover open when I took the scanner out of my bag. It made me think that a carrying case, which Fujitsu sells (but which I did not review), is necessary for travel.

In retrospect, the only reason I didn’t think I succeed in my Quest To Travel Light was because most of the handouts were double-sided. I didn’t expect the scanner to scan both pages at once, but I also didn’t expect to have to hand-feed every double-sided sheet of paper to get both sides. I suppose I could have scanned them all on one side and rearranged the pages after I scanned them, but that seems like a lot of extra work. I would like to see them come out with a software update that lets you run a stack of papers and then just flip them over.

I think the S1300 is the competitor that comes closes to handling my objections, but at a major compromise of its own. The S1300 handles double sided documents, and seems to be a more solid machine – but at nearly triple the size. That completely destroys the portability advantage of carrying a scanner with you.

The NeatReceipts and Doxie scanners solve the problem of the opening piece of plastic, but they run nearly twice as slow – a dealbreaker in my book.

Overall, my minor quibbles aside, I think this is another quality product from Fujitsu and, at $199, a good value for a travel scanner. The NeatReceipts and the Doxie scanner are nearly as much money ($199 and $149, respectively), but I think the speed advantage alone makes the S1100 the better choice.

If you have a huge briefcase and lift weights, you might do better with a S1300, but I don’t think they are supposed to be compared in the same category. I would like to see how the device holds up, however, being used with a carrying case and not loose in my bag. I’ll continue to carry it with me to conferences where I don’t want to bring home paper in my Quest To Travel Light.

The Fujitsu ScanSnap S1100 is *Recommended*

Posted by Victor Medina

*Disclaimer: I asked Fujitsu to send me one of these so I could test it for the conference I discussed above. They did so without charging me for it and without indicating that they want the scanner back. Decide for yourself whether my review has been tainted by the fact that I didn’t pay for the scanner. Then again, I have two other ScanSnaps in my office that I paid for…I’m sure that figures into the equation one way or another.*

In addition to the Co-Pilot bag contributed as a MILOfest 2010 giveaway, Tom Bihn sent along two other bags for me to review. Specifically, they sent a Ristretto for iPad and an Empire Builder. (Great names, right?)

The Ristretto is a satchel bag meant to be worn over the shoulder for short trips, and this model has dimensions that an iPad in the main, protected compartment. <Incidentally, Tom Bihn has since released an updated version for the 11″ and 13″ inch Macbook Airs. I’d love to test it out with my new 11″ Macbook Air.>

The Empire Builder is the traditional business bag, which fits a laptop (large or small), a number of file, and just about everything you need for court.

Now, there are a number of videos and reviews that talk about all these bags can hold. One of my favorites is from Brett Burney, and you can read about it here. I don’t want to spend a lot of time going over the same ground, but I thought I might share with you my impressions about these bags from the perspective of an attorney that does mostly transactional work, and who travels to a lot of conferences.

Ristretto for iPad

This is an interesting bag in that’s best suited for a quick trip (maybe one or two days). First, you’re going to have to get over the fact that it’s a satchel, a man-purse of sorts. I’m comfortable enough in my masculinity to wear it just about anywhere, although my wife has requested that I don’t wear it in her presence.

If you can feel comfortable wearing it, and it’s very comfortable to wear, you’ll find yourself using it to go back and forth to work as your daily bag. Whether you use it with your iPad or get the model for one of the small MBAs, you’ll find that it fits all of your tech, pens, and cords with a little room to spare. That is, it doesn’t feel “stuffed” and it safely protects your tech with padded sleeves and a hard-core, canvas fabric outside.

I think the use case for this bag is for the ultimate paperless attorney that travels between work and home with just a laptop or an ipad, and not a lot of paper or files. Although you can slip some 8.5×11 papers into one of the sleeves, it’s not really meant to be use to transport files.

I’ve used this bag to travel to short conferences (1-2 days) where I’m just going to use my iPad and a keyboard, and not need my laptop at all. Although, if I had the model built for the 11″ inch MBA, I’d probably use that bag with my laptop and leave the physical files at home. In fact, if you pair the laptop with a travel scanner like the ScanSnap S1100 (which I’m reviewing now – and I’m very impressed), you can work entirely paperless-ly. I’d be interested to see if the Ristretto for Macbook Air fits the ScanSnap S1100 for a trip like that.

Empire Builder

Now, this is a bag meant for attorneys. It’s got the traditional look of a briefcase (with a laptop insert) and a cavernous interior. You can fit plenty of files in here, whether or not you use one of the Tom Bihn inserts like the Brain Cell or Horizontal Freudian Slip. The bag comes with some heavy-duty dividers to keep loose papers separate and protected. If there’s a downsize to a bag that fits this much, it’s that it doesn’t roll. Lots of paper can get heavy and if you have a document intensive litigation case, that will start to make the bag unwieldy.

What I like about the Brain Cell insert is that it “locks” into the interior of the bag with tough clips. The lock brings the laptop sleeve tight against the back of the bag, maximizing the use of space in the rest of the interior.

Did I mention how much space this bag has? I’m always shocked how much I can fit in it and how well it all remains protected. In addition to the main compartment, there is a front section protected by a large flap & buckle. This front part is where you put your pens, cords, business cards and keys. I’ve even used it to hold an additional keyboard for my iPad.

On the front of the flap are two pockets I use in travel all the time. All. The. Time. Here’s how it works: When I’m ready to go through security, I open the top pocket (which uses a high-quality zipper) and drop in all of my metal in my pockets. Then, there’s a mini pocket that holds my boarding pass. It’s super intuitive for making quick deposits and withdrawals as you pass through security (or as you’re hunting for your headphones from a comically small airplane seat).

The problem with this bag, for me, is that it causes me to bring more back and forth to the office. I’ve moved to the Empire Builder as my everyday bag, but I’ve got my MBA plus my iPad, a file folder that seems to just carry the same paper everywhere and other things that take the ride to work with me in the backseat of my car. I’d like to get away with less, but I’m paranoid to stop carrying the paper around.

About Tom Bihn Bags

There are some things about Tom Bihn bags that you should know. First, they are exquisitely designed. Everything about the placement of pockets, zippers, latchets, buckles and handles has been a deliberate choice by a top designer meant to benefit the user. There are no corners cut here.

Second, Tom Bihn uses the highest quality materials. Look, none of this is leather. If you want leather, buy a Saddleback Leather Company bag at 4 times the cost (and someday I might). But, the materials that Tom Bihn uses are best-in-class. That goes for the exterior to the zippers to the stitching to just about everything. I’ve been using these bags pretty hard for about 6 months and nothing has broken or given way in the slightest. One of the clearest examples of perfect marriage between design and materials (and quality) is the way the outside buckles work (on either bag) with one-handed operation. Simply elegant.

Third, you’ve got to spend the money on the Absolute Shoulder Strap if you get one of the bigger bags. I don’t think it’s necessary with the smaller bags (it might be overkill), but as you stuff more and more into these bags, they’re going to get heavy. The Absolute Should Strap will lighten the load by about 30%. It’s almost magical the way it works and I’m not smart enough to explain it, but I’ll never use another bag without this strap. It’s that good.

Wrap-up

In conclusion, I like these bags a lot. I’m happy to have them in my life, and they’ve replaced a beautiful bag I got in Italy 8 years ago. I’m almost ashamed to admit that I’ve moved from from the nostalgic to the practical. Perhaps one day I’ll switch back, but for now, these bags are my “daily drivers” and they come with my no-reservation recommendation.

Posted by Victor Medina

*Note: It seems to be in good taste these days to tell people when you’ve been given things for free. Tom Bihn sent me these bags for free and without any promise about what my review would say, and without asking for them back. By now, I either have enough credibility with you for you to believe this is my honest opinion and a trustworthy review, or you think I’m a shill who can be bought for cheap. I hope it’s the former, but I’ll understand if it’s not. Disclaimer over.

No other details quite yet (amount, on what products), but it’s always appreciated when software (and hardware) companies ease the path to dedicated (or interested) users.

Do you have an under-performing website? Maybe you built it in 2005 and haven’t touched it since? Maybe you’re embarrassed by it? Or maybe it’s okay — but just okay — but you don’t get any clients from it, and you lust for a great, knock-their-socks-off site? A site that you will be proud to send visitors to? A real client magnet?

Now’s your chance to get one for free (that’s F-R-E-E) from one of the best marketing companies in the country!

This is the big one — one final push to get you to attend this year’s MILOfest conference. General Admission ends tomorrow and I’ve saved the biggest giveaway prize for the end.

I am thrilled to announce the Grand Prize giveaway for the MILOfest 2010 conference. With deep thanks to Mark Merenda and SmartMarketing, there are two great prizes being awarded:

Grand Prize: 5-10 page comprehensive website

Second Prize: Complete corporate identity suite/Logo Package

To make this fun, we’re going to have a contest to award these prizes. However, before we get to the details of the contest, you should know that SmartMarketing is known as one of the top marketing companies for attorneys, renowned for its design and website creation services.

Here’s how to win:

The contest is called “My website stinks and I deserve a new one!”

To participate, you need to submit a 300-500 word essay, or a 2-3 minute video on the above topic — essentially letting us know why you hate your website and why you are the best choice to recieve this prize.

Entries will be judged on creativity, insight, humor, sincerity, and “potential for positive transformation.” As you might expect, all entries become the property of MILOfest (you might be featured the website, at the conference, or by SmartMarketing in its promotional materials). In addition, the contest will be judged by me and Mark Merenda. Our decision is final, un-appealable (if not unappealing) and completely subject to our discretion as to who is most deserving.

Entries must be received by October 25th to be considered and the winners must be present at the time of award, which will be just before the final session on MILOfest on Saturday afternoon.

Here are the details on the Grand Prize: The winner will get a custom-designed website of between 5 and 10 pages. The prize will include an embedded blog and any copywriting work by Mark’s writing staff (after an interview with you). In addition, the site will be fully SEO optimized (including Google analytics so you can objectively measure its performance), and SmartMarketing will set up all of the social media pieces for you, if you don’t already have them, so your updates are posted to Twitter, Facebook, etc. You should expect that the site will take 2-3 months to create, and if you would like video on the site, Mark has extended his relationship with a professional video company so you can get an intro video done for about $500 (which is “at cost”).  Finally, SmartMarketing will set it up so you can host it on your own, or you can host it with SmartMarketing (currently $348/year).

By the way, if you wanted to “buy” a website from SmartMarketing, you couldn’t. The company doesn’t normally unbundle its services like this — you have to be on retainer to access any of their talent. If you went out in the market and got a website of this quality, you would pay anywhere between $5,000-$10,000.

Here are some examples of the kinds of websites that SmartMarketing creates, including the one they created for me:

http://www.jerseyestateplanning.com/

http://www.vannattorneys.com/

http://www.caassetprotection.com/

http://www.lifeandlegacylawcenter.com/

http://www.sandstoneconstructionco.com/

(On a personal note, let me take a second to say that this is a very generous offer from a good friend of mine. So I’m going to ask that you don’t be a jerk if you win. I’m sure Mark will work with you to make changes, but don’t abuse the nice gift that you’re getting.)

Second Prize is a logo-stationary package. This is like getting a new brand identity for your law firm. It will give you a fresh look, and I can tell you that the designers at SmartMarketing are amongst the best that I’ve ever worked with. This prize includes logo design, copywriting if needed (say, for a “tagline”), and a full stationery package design including business cards, letterhead, envelope, note cards, labels, etc. The market price for a corporate identity package like this is around $1,500.

And just to make it interesting, I’ve decided to take the $110 Tom Bihn Co-Pilot bag that I’ve received as a giveaway and award it as Third Prize.

If you’ve been on the fence about attending, this is your chance to act. Unlike a random giveaway, you have a chance to determine whether or not you will win, depending on how crappy your website, how devastating your critique of it, and how good your sob story.

We want this to be fun, and we hope that you will enjoy taking part in the contest.

But, remember… you must be present to win!

Victor

P.S. I want to express my appreciation to all of our sponsors and giveaway partners. This conference keeps getting better and better.

Hey folks,

Just a few more days before General Admission pricing expires, so I wanted to remind you to register for the event, even if you haven’t booked your flight or hotel yet. (Though you should probably do that soon.)  After September 30th, the price goes up $50.

Regarding the room rates, we’ve reached our maximum and I’m on the hook for any increase that isn’t filled. So, I’m on the verge of closing it off. If you haven’t reserved your room yet, I encourage you to do it soon so you can get the rate guaranteed. As I’ve mentioned before, Disney is not as desperate for the business as the economy might suggest. The hotel is nearly booked entirely. Again, you’ll want to get on this soon – I probably won’t be able to extend the room block beyond October 11th (or one month before the conference).

Now, I’ve got two quick announcements. First, we’ve been able to wrestle away a 1-year enrollment to Solo Practice University. You can read more about SPU here – http://solopracticeuniversity.com/about/ The 1-year scholarship is worth $595 and I can tell you personally that there is tons of good information there for lawyers looking to do what they do better (or more or differently).

Here’s a quick note from Susan Cartier Liebel -

We are very pleased to support MILOfest and in the spirit of building better practices, Solo Practice University(TM) the # 1 web-based educational and professional networking community for lawyers and law students, is offering one lucky registrant at the MILOfest a one year scholarship to help them create and build their solo practice.

Second, we will be announcing shortly a very significant ($5,000-plus, and that’s no hype) giveaway for one lucky attendee. Watch here for details of this big prize. This one will involve a bit of a contest, but the point is that you’ll have to be at MILOfest to win the prize. This one’s a real doozy.

FINALLY, it looks like we’re going to be able to extend the CLE accreditation for the conference to a larger number of sessions and wider array of states. We’ll get you the details as soon as we have them – but this is a GREAT development.

Thanks again for considering attending MILOfest 2010.

Victor

As is always the case, I try to bring the best and most interesting things to MILOfest. This year is no exception. In the world of premium bags, there are are only a few companies worth mentioning.  In my mind they are, Tom Bihn, Timbuk2, and Waterfield. Of those, the one that keeps coming out on top in terms of build quality and attention to detail is Tom Bihn.

For the MILOfest attendees, I got bold and asked them if they’d be interested in sponsoring a giveaway for the MILOfest conference and they agreed! They’ve sent over a beautiful Co-Pilot bag with their top-shelf Absolute Shoulder Strap. This is a $150.00 value easily when you include the keystrap they included.

Here’s a picture of the actual bag (it’s red-red).

Here are some more giveaways, such as suede cloths and luggage tags:

Many thank to Darcy @TomBihn and the other good folks who have agreed to sponsor MILOfest.  I’ve agreed to review a couple of their bags with no pre-conceived agreement that the review would be positive.  Look for the review coming up at LawyersUSA Online and here on this blog.

OH!!!! Before I forget, there’s one more (INCREDIBLE) giveaway coming for MILOfest attendees. This one’s worth at least $5,000 and it has a contest attached to it. Details will be released on October 1st, so get your registration in ASAP.

Posted by Victor Medina