By Trish McFarlane originally posted on MonsterThinking.com
This Friday I planned to cover theTalent Net Live (#TNL) conference atRackspace in San Antonio for you.  Unfortunately, business needs necessitated my being in St. Louis this week.  This does offer me the opportunity to share how to attend a conference virtually using several social media platforms.
The following are some of the ways I plan to stay connected on Friday with the great content being shared and discussed at TNL:
Twitter: The most important thing to do is search “TNL” either via Twitter or on another Twitter-based platform such as Hootsuite orTweetdeck.  By creating this search, you will see all that is being shared including quotes from sessions, video links, book mentions and more.

Recently I shared my really cool experience consulting with the Zappos recruiting team.  It was truly one of the best and most unique client experiences of my career.  That whole process started when I met with Christa Foley (aka @Electra), Recruiting Manager at Zappos.com, about an NBC news story that featured both of our Twitter profiles.
Now in this exclusive exposé, Christa reveals Zappos secrets of talent selection and great candidate experience.  Okay, maybe its not much of a secret since Zappos is one of the most documented brands in social media for its awesome culture and "WOW" customer service.  But Christa was game to answer a couple of questions for us.

July 29th in San Antonio - Join us for a TNL Social Recruiting Unconference in the Alamo city.

The second of three TNL conference events that we are hosting in Texas this year will be held at Employment Brand leader, Rackspace.
What can you expect from TNL San Antonio? Those who have attended TNL events in DFW in 2009 & 2010, or this years TNL Austin at SXSW, know that this is no ordinary conference.  This unconference will show you powerful strategies and the latest tools to help you and your team:

• Search and source better,
• Attract more targeted talent and prospects
• Build a better brand online!

On my list of unique experiences, SHRM's 2011 National Conference is way up there.  It was my first SHRM conference.  And to say I was made to feel welcome is a huge understatement. 
As a member of the social recruiting community, I have, at times, been led to believe that SHRM actually stood for "So Hate Recruiters Majority", or something like that.  But it wasn't like that at all.  Granted, my official capacity at this conference was as "press", more specifically "blogger".  And my current main gig is more on the vendor side of things.  But as a long-time 3rd party recruiter, my role has always been on the vendor side.