Over the past 6 days I’ve given a (very brief) Lowdown of what to expect from the London Screenwriters Festival: how to pick your schedule, what to focus on and how to make the most of it.
The easiest way for me to summarise it is just to link to all of those blog posts:
Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 6
But that’s a bit of a cheat’s summary.
Day 7: Final Checks, Please
In truth, if you’ve not prepared yourself for the festival by now (starting at 10am tomorrow (Friday) with a sit-down natter with Tim Bevan), you’re not going to get as much out of it as you’d hope to.
There’s still time, though! You can still sit down and run through the schedule; you can still work out your goals for the festival itself; you can still brush up on my networking tips and find out how to connect with the right people in the right way.
What you can most usefully do as a delegate of the festival, which will also help ensure the demand is there for a repeat event next year, is to blog, Facebook and Twitter about the whole thing while you’re there.
There are myriad people with myriad reasons who cannot come along and I know they’ll be watching with eagle eyes for tips, tricks and tools that emerge from the festival. If you’re on Twitter, use the festival’s hashtag #londonswf to spread the word in a format that people can easily follow. (And, as a bonus side-effect, you may even pick up some new followers in the process).
If you blog, be sure to give us your opinions in a quick run-down when you’re finished.
And talking of finished, I promised one last networking tip in yesterday’s blog: Follow Up. If you meet someone exciting, interesting or just plain useful, make sure you grab their card from them and as soon as you get home (Monday morning), drop them a line. It’s just a memory-jogger and a “pleased to meet you”, but that single point on contact could stand you head-and-shoulders above the other delegates who make the same connections but either wait a week to touch base or fail to make contact at all.
Most importantly of all, be sure to feedback to LSWF after the fact. Only by telling them what was great (and what wasn’t) can you be sure to get more of what you want next year. And, in the cold, hard world of arts cuts and huge losses, if you want to see the fest again next year, your testimonials are going to be a MAJOR selling point for them when they’re looking for sponsors, supporters and speakers for next year’s event.
Go in peace, leave in pieces and enjoy every moment – after all, it’s about you.