If you were on Twitter this week, and couldn’t figure out how to block all SXSW tweets, you might have felt like the only person who wasn’t in Austin. But if you had sifted through the heaps of “These lines are ridiculous,” “My phone’s almost dead” and “Heck yeah free sunglasses and/or breakfast tacos” tweets, you would find that you were not alone in your loneliness.

Here are our 20 favorite tweets from people who weren’t at South by Southwest this year.

“I’m not going to SXSW” is the new “I have a job and can’t justify being inebriated during the workday”

— Aaron Levie (@levie) March 7, 2012

I’ll be hosting the panel “Drinking Alone in the Dark While All Your Cooler Friends Are Out of Town or Something”#nxne

— brian braiker (@slarkpope) March 10, 2012

I thought I’d be more disappointed about not going to SXSW, but I really only miss the BBQ.

— Jennifer Beese (@bottlethecrazy) March 8, 2012

Update: I’m still not at #sxswi. But, I had authentic Mexican food, tons of margaritas and played on my phone this weekend.

— Chris Moody (@cnmoody) March 12, 2012

I just unlocked the “I’m sick of your fucking #SXSWi live tweets” badge on @boresquare!

— Mike Rushing (@mcrushing) March 12, 2012

Just knowing Austin is having an affair with someone else right now pains me. #notatSXSW

— Ben Kunz (@benkunz) March 10, 2012

I’m weirdly okay with not going to #sxsw this year. I can almost hear the clown music all the way across the pond.

— Joen (@altjoen) March 9, 2012

I am already so SICK of reading all those tweets about #sxsw. Twitter, we need to be able to filter out keywords!!

— Ilan Abehassera (@ilan) March 9, 2012

Already sick of the #SXSWi tweets. #wantobethere

— Chrissy Chrzan (@chrissychrzan) March 8, 2012

I just put my newborn (and reason I am not at #sxswi ) down for a nap and #ijustplantedatree

— Blair Poloskey (@poloskey) March 12, 2012

Since I’m not at #sxsw I think I need to disconnect from FB, Twitter, and Foursquare this wk. %*#@ is blowing up.

— James Loomstein (@jloomstein) March 10, 2012

Missing #SXSWi to attend #ICANN43 … Feeling morally superior, but also very #lame

— graychynoweth (@graychy) March 10, 2012

Am I the only one NOT at #SXSW?

— Annie Teng (@annieteng) March 10, 2012

Okay, as of tonight I’m officially jealous/sick of #sxsw tweets. Mostly jealous. Someday…

— Taylor Edwards (@taylorredwards) March 15, 2012

While I’m not at #sxswi this year, I have an awesome panel idea for 2013.

— Jennison Asuncion (@Jennison) March 9, 2012

I’m still in denial that I’m unable to geek out at SXSW this weekend #SUCKS

— Steven Skip Crowell (@yoskip) March 9, 2012

I’m so bummed I’m not going to #SXSW that I may have to cry in my coffee. Ugh.

— Andrea Richard (@Ondrea954) March 9, 2012

Wahhh wish I was able to go to #sxsw. Once again, being an adult sucks sometimes. Plus, just need to move south finally!

— Ms. Krazzle Dazzle (@meechellik) March 9, 2012

hands up if you are NOT at #sxswi and still enjoying it

— Mike Trow (@mike_trow) March 9, 2012

wish I was at #SXSWi

— Darren Rowse (@problogger) March 13, 2012

Once again, the ad world has come to SXSW Interactive — over 1800 strong by our count. In addition to the networking and learning opportunities that abound in Austin, several agencies are using the trip to showcase some of their creative talent on the web.

Here are six awesome sites that allow you to meet up with, stalk or live vicariously through agency folks on the ground in Austin.

1. Saatchi & Saatchi LA in SXSW

Saatchi & Saatchi pulls in the Foursquare and Instagram feeds of its crew of 29, and updates its lovely site in real-time as they see new things and go new places. You can also see a grid of who made the trip from LA, and learn more about their mind-blowing panels.

2 & 3. GSD&M – SXSurrogates and SXSurvival

Couldn’t make it to SXSW this year? No problem, Austin-based GSD&M is here. With SXSurrogates, you can pick your team of SXSW ambassadors who will attend panels and tweet from Texas for you.

And if you are in Austin this year, but aren’t sure where to eat or what cool stuff to check out while you’re here, GSD&M has also put together a Pinterest-based site, SXSurvival, which pulls together a few of their favorite things for you to enjoy.

4. Ogilvy Notes

Fan of visual notetaking? Or maybe you just like really good drawings. In any case, Ogilvy has returned to SXSW with an “army of artists” to take visual notes from a select number of Film and Interactive panels. You can even pick up limited edition prints at their space in the Convention Center.

We’re easy to stalk – Ogilvy Day Stage all day plus these panels: blog.ogilvynotes.com/post/191770503… @Blogads

— Ogilvy Notes (@ogilvynotes) March 12, 2012

5. Huge Inc

Brooklyn’s HUGE is back at SXSW with a brand new, classically provocative tote bag. They’ve got a simple and elegant site that makes it easy for you to get in touch with HUGE folks in Texas, see them speak at a panel and, hey, maybe ask for a tote bag.

6. The Barbarian Group – I Know a Place

A nice mix of slick UX and useful information makes the Barbarian Group’s SXSW site a must-use for first-timers at SXSW, or those who haven’t dared to stray too far from the Convention Center.

After a record year for PR agency attendance at SXSW in 2011, we’re seeing another big year in 2012. Our number crunchers have found a 31% increase in the number of people PR agencies have sent to Austin.

Four of the top five, including Hill and Knowlton and Fleishman Hillard brought more folks to this year’s conference. Last year’s PR King, Edelman upped the ante with an additional 10 people on the ground in Texas.

But that wasn’t enough to keep the crown. This year, with a giant crew of 61, Weber Shandwick takes the crown.

Don’t see your name on our list? Is your PR firm send walk-ups in the rain? Are you the real PR King of SXSWi? Let us know, and we’ll update the data.

Like stats like these? Check out the Ad and Marketing King of SXSW. Yee haw!

After gargantuan growth into 2011, attendance at SXSW by advertising agency staff finally leveled off in 2012. Whew.

This year Digitas wins the King of SXSW prize, followed closely by Ogilvy and Razorfish. Last year’s King, Leo Burnett, fell to #9 in the SXSW agency list.

To get the fairest results possible, we took the same BBQ-style approach to number crunching as last year. We mixed together all of the agencies that share a name (i.e. Ogilvy, Leo Burnett, BBDO), chopped and sorted by attendance and added a little sauce to get our list of 192 agencies.

After chronicling last year’s 10X advertising agency growth, this year Blogads research staff compared this registration data of 110 agencies as accessed through SXSW’s site. The overall attendance numbers were steady since last year, after a huge increase from 2010 to 2011.

When you look at the numbers on an agency-by-agency level, you’ll see a few agencies cut back for this year’s festival. Agencies like Sapient, Mr Youth and Possible Worldwide registered only a fraction of the numbers they sent last year. Austin’s own GSD&M only has five people registered, compared to 55 in 2011. 

UPDATE 3/10: Thanks to the folks from GSD&M who have given us their updated registration number this year of 64. Phew! Glad you made it! Strangely, their registrants individually visible in the search database, but not when searching for “GSD&M.” Anyone else out there want to update the numbers?

Razorfish and Digitas have significantly beefed up their presence, and Rosetta wins the “most improved” award, sending 17 folks compared to just one last year.

Don’t see your name on our list? Is your agency sending some walk-up registrants to Texas? Are you the real King of SXSWi? Let us know, and we’ll update our data.

Oh, and don’t worry PR folks, your report card is coming out next.

See y’all in Austin, pardners!

Deeplocal’s LikeBelt in action

You’ve probably heard this question a dozen times in the last year: “Should an agency act like a startup?” Essentially, agencies share key ingredients of agile software companies, like designers, programmers and project managers, but do they have the patience to iterate and persist throughout a profitable product’s lifespan? And is coding products in-house just a great exercise, or is a viable new business model emerging?

Google’s Allison Mooney and Ben Malbon tackled the subject with a panel of agency innovators at last year’s SXSW. Industry pubs like AdWeek, AdPulp and Fast Company pondered the question from all angles, and by June, the question had been asked so many times that Edelman’s David Armano reversed course and suggested that agencies act more like blue chips.

So is this the year that agencies start to answer the question? Digiday’s Brian Morrissey dug into the topic at Social Media Week with agency innovators who aren’t just talking shit, they’re making shit. The panel, called “AgencyWare: Agency as Maker,” featured folks from independent agencies Deeplocal and Breakfast, as well as bigger houses that support their own innovation groups, Weber Shandwick, BBH Labs and Mr. Youth.

Andrew Zolty of Breakfast, the agency behind Conan O’Brien’s check-in-able Blimp, said the key to the startup approach for agencies is experimentation. “The path to innovation is not linear,” he said, “it’s really messy.”

BBH Labs, an innovation unit of a larger agency, takes the same, agile approach to “getting shit done.” The most successful groups are able to “learn from failure on your own dime,” said BBH Lab’s Tim Nolan, “Not at the expense of the clients.”

To stay profitable and productive between client projects, these agencies pump out their own successful products. See Breakfast’s Instaprint, an Instagram-based printer whose Kickstarter has already raised $30k in 4 days. And profit isn’t the only motivator for the maker-agency. Said Mr. Youth’s Matt Britton, “Build your own cool shit to retain talent and keep your people stimulated.”

Other agency innovations represented at the panel were:

• Weber Shandwick’s FireBell, a social media crisis simulator for PR firms
• Deeplocal’s Chalkbot, a twitter-driven robot that printed encouraging messages alongside the roads of the Tour De France
• CrowdTap, a marketing platform that was started at Mr. Youth and has since spun-off into its own company

If you’re interested in this topic, and you’re headed to SXSW, be sure to catch these panels:

• Why Ad Agencies Should Act More Like Tech Startups
• We Made This, and It’s Not an Ad
• It’s Alive: Interactive Machines That Captivate

Is your agency making its own cool shit? Give us a shout.

South by Southwest Interactive, the Woodstock for geeks, kicks off next week. As the geeks at Blogads HQ combed the schedule of events, some keyword trends in panel titles emerged.

Looking for tips for your startup? See you Saturday! Is your startup pursuing a video strategy? Saturday’s a big day for you as well. Good luck fitting all of those panels in!

Interestingly, Monday is not only the most popular day for sexy panels, it’s the buzz-word-iest day of the entire festival.

Ranking conspicuously low on the Blogads Buzz-O-Meter were Facebook and Twitter, with five and three panels, respectively, and the Internet darling Pinterest, whose name appears in only one panel.

CLICHE BUSTERS

We give the “Cliche Buster” award to the following panels, whose clever titles transcend the buzzwords within them:

• Viral is a Dirty Word: Strategic Video Success
• Social Media Is a Bubble and SXSW Is a Fad
• (Not Just) Shit Startups Say: Anatomy of a Rockstar Product Cycle
• Big Ol’ Babies: Why Baby Boomers=Public Media FAIL
• Brands with Benefits: Hooking Up with Good Deals

EGREGIOUS BUZZWORDERY

The “Buzzword Three-peat” award, for using the same buzzword three times in one title goes to:

• Social Change, Social Media & Social Filmmaking

The “Rose-Colored Google Goggles” award goes to these panels, who optimistically see brands as something more than a buzzword:

• Entertain or Fail: Brands As the New Publishers
• Brands As Patterns
• Brand As API: Connect Differently

And finally, the “Buzzword Threesome” award, for the three panels that need to get a room… with data…

• Data Is Sexier Than Sex… And I’ll Prove It
• Sexy Data Solutions for Public Transit Systems
• Beautiful Data? No, That Data is a Sex Machine

See you in Austin!

photo by Doug Shick

One sure way to stand out from the 3200 proposals in SXSWi 2012’s Panel Picker is with a catchy title. With so many bold, provocative and timely titles vying for the votes of their peers, there are bound to be recurring memes. For March’s Interactive conference, 14 panels are proclaiming something to be dead. Either that is a very popular turn of phrase, or a lot of technology trends died this year (long live these technology trends).

1. Big media is dead. Why niche websites will rule.
2. TV is Dead. Video Advertising is Alive & Well
3. Television is Dead. Long Live Television.
4. Crowdsourcing is dead —> Enter Friendsourcing
5. The Creative team is dead. Casting the right team
6. The Landline is Dead. Long Live the Landline!
7. Blogging is Dead – 2012 Edition
8. Friending is Dead: Now what?
9. Banner is Dead: How Brands Can Innovate Online
10. Data Vis is Dead, Long Live Data Vis!
11. Your Social Media Job is Dead. Now What?
12. Journalism is dead. Long live journalism!
13. Social Gaming Is Dead, Long Live Social Gaming
14. The web is dead, long live the web

photo by Dave Delaney

The bloggers in our network are an active and impassioned bunch. It was no surprise to us that several of them have proposed panels for South by Southwest 2012.

It goes without saying that we highly recommend voting for these panels:

1. Monetizing Mommy

Featured blogger: Catherine Connors, Her Bad Mother

From the description: “Turns out, mommy’s become something of a cash cow these days. From bestselling books to six figure brand partnership deals, she’s raking it in – and she’s worked hard to deserve it.”

Best question to be answered: “Are Mom Blogs really viable career opportunities for passionate women?”

photo by katie allison granju

2. Servers & Amps: How Indie music powers start-ups

Featured blogger: Craig “Dodge” Lile, My Old Kentucky Blog

From the description:“[I]s it possible that all the startup kids care about is their Rock n’ Roll? This panel will explore whether an active Indie rock scene is an essential ingredient to incubating a vibrant start-up scene as well as what role local government and businesses should have, if any, in fostering a local music scene.”

Best question to be answered: What are the parallels between a great music town and a great start-up town?

photo by John Vanderslice

3. How to Raise Awareness through Blogger Outreach

Featured blogger: Debbie Bookstaber, Mamanista

From the description: “Emotion drives action. This session will address how bloggers can lend their voices to raise awareness about a cause, help with fundraising or spread the word about a campaign.”

Best question to be answered: “What drives awareness, participation or conversion?”

4. MUSIC DISCOVERY: MAN VS. MACHINE

Featured blogger: Heather Browne, I AM FUEL, YOU ARE FRIENDS

From the description: “In the age of machines, is the human dead? Are machines and algorithms destined to be our guides for music discovery or is there still a need for the knowledgable, passionate, quirky but unpredictable human?”

Best question to be answered: Can human curated content survive and scale?

photo by Lori W

5. HOW TO: Turd Polish Your VOB & Make it Amazeballs

Featured blogger: John Accarino, HOW TO: Turd Polish Your VOB & Make it Amazeballs

From the description: “There’s a fine line between using a fire hose to spray corporate marketing messages all over the socialsphere and developing an authentic two-way dialog with your community across multiple platforms. ”

Best question to be answered: How effective is your social VOB (voice of brand)?

MethodShop Blogger Jon Accarrino

Bonus: Don’t forget to check out the panels my colleagues are pitching! Megan Mitzel has a panel of book publishers, marketers, and journalists chomping at the bit to talk about the corralation between e-readers and the bankrupcy of Borders. Just check out the comments section of “Did e-readers cause Borders’ demise?” Blogads boss Henry Copeland wants to read your mind, and he’ll teach you how to do it in his panel “Learning to Read Minds.” That’s not a metaphor, folks. He’s talking about actual mind-reading.

Voting ends September 2.

It’s that time of year again! The SXSW 2012 Panel Picker is open for voting. We’ll be heading back to Austin this year for SXSW Interactive, and here are the panels we’d like see when we get there.

1. 2 Girls, 1 Cup and Your Brand

Rob Blatt

Maybe it’s because of the catchy title, or maybe it’s because we like to curse, damn it, but this panel is the office favorite at Blogads HQ. Rob Blatt and Gavin St. Ours want you and your brand to feel free to curse on the Internet, but they want you to do it right.

From the description: “If you bleep out a word, you might evade the lords at Apple, but do you think your show is still family friendly? Stop holding yourself back, this is the internet!”

Best question to be answered: “How can accepting the darker side of the internet help your brand?”

2. How to Profit in the Digital World of Politics

Political advertising budgets get bigger and bigger with every cycle. At Blogads, we’ve already seen ads from local candidates running this year, as well President Obama’s 2012 campaign. Smart Media‘s J.B. Britten, who has managed digital campaigns for Meg Whitman, among other candidates, will teach digital entrepreneurs how to make a profit on political spending.

From the description: “Many top digital marketers, advertisers, and web-development gurus may not even realize the vast opportunities hidden in each election. We aim to reveal the opportunities, unseen pitfalls and strange stories of the digital political campaign.”

3. Banner is Dead: How Brands Can Innovate Online

With our variety of blog-friendly ad units, we’re long-time proponents of thinking “outside the banner.” This panel of ad mavens, including Digiday’s Mike Shields, Flite’s Will Price, L’Oreal’s Marc Speichert and McCann’s Lori Schwartz, will deconstruct the new ads built to grab the eyes of the banner-blind.

From the description: “While the old, static banner ads that you’ve seen since ’94 that beckon you to click through to the advertiser’s website still persist, those ads are little more than an image, a tagline and a call to action, and we’ve been conditioned to ignore them.”

4.  Learning to Place Little Bets

For a recent Blogads book chat, we read and discussed Peter Sims’s guide to innovation, Little Bets. The book stresses the connection between experimentation and innovation, with case studies from innovators as diverse as Pixar and Chris Rock. In this panel, Sims will join Gareth Kay and Iain Tait to explore how experimentation in advertising is more effective in than planning.

Best question to be answered: “How do you unlearn the ponderous creative process that generates ‘big’ ideas and create a culture that releases a continuous stream of little bets?”

5.  I May “Like” You, But I’m Not in Like With You

Has your brand become a slave to the Facebook “like” button? Likes are good, but what you do with them is more important. R/GA‘s VP of Interaction Design Chloe Gottlieb and Managing Director of Planning Andrea Ring will show you strategies for cultivating deeper relationships between your brand and your customers.

From the description: “[Brands] give away valuable stuff in return for a passive thumbs-ups, never realizing that this behavior could actually be cheapening their customer relationships. ‘Likes’ come easy, but real relationships come with real exchange and sacrifice.”

6. Brands that believe in sex after marriage

To the delight of the ADD set, SXSWi is bringing back the Future15 format for 2012. These fast-paced solo talks cover a lot of information fast, and we think this provocatively titled talk will be one of the best. Crispin Porter+Bogusky’s experience director Noel Franus will show you how to keep things exciting after the honeymoon period with your customer is over.

Best question to be answered: “Why is ‘retention’ a dirty word among creatives?”

7. 4 Chief Innovation Officers Defend Their Titles

It’s the rematch the Internet has been waiting for. There’s been a lot of talk about the people who are most responsible when everyone is responsible. Head Google strategist Ben Malbon got the ball rolling in April with a post that questioned the need for the Chief Innovation Officer. In the piece, he called out Mullen CIO Edward Boches and BBH Head of Innovation Saneel Radia. If this panel is picked, these Internet stars will face off in person. Anders Sjostedt, managing director of Hyper Island, will referee the panel of innovators and skeptics.

From the description: “Ladies and gentlemen, let’s get ready to rumble.”

8. Purveyors of Cool: Art, Culture and Brands

In our country, the line between brand and cultural icon is sometimes blurry. Just think about Coke, Levi’s, Wal-Mart, and what they mean to us culturally. But how are brands going beyond traditional ad work to shed new light on up-and-coming art and culture? GSD&M SVP John McGrath will lead a panel of promotors and artists to learn how “bigger entities are stepping it up to give them the exposure they deserve.”

Best question to be answered: “As an artist, how do you balance exposure vs. selling out?”

9. x

No, that’s not a typo. At least, we hope not. We’re voting for IgniteNYC director Tikva Morowati’s panel, even though we have no idea what it’s about. Bold? Reckless? Undescribed? We hope to find out in Austin.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t implore you to give some voting and commenting love to the panels my colleagues are pitching. Megan Mitzel has a panel of book publishers, marketers, and journalists chomping at the bit to talk about the corralation between e-readers and the bankrupcy of Borders. Just check out the comments section of “Did e-readers cause Borders’ demise?” Blogads boss Henry Copeland wants to read your mind, and he’ll teach you how to do it in his panel “Learning to Read Minds.” That’s not a metaphor, folks. He’s talking about actual mind-reading.

Several of our bloggers have panels nominated as well. Check ’em out and vote!

See you in Austin!