Yesterday (Tues) was another day at Shop.org and a very different set of impressions. Nothing contradicting yesterday's comments, just a different piece of the elephant.

First, this is my first shop.org and I have to say the crowd is impressive. The membership bias and high ticket, along with a virtual lock-out of vendors who aren’t exhibiting or speaking results in a crowd of serious ecommerce brands with the vast majority sporting well-known household names. Comparing the attendees here with those (on average) at shows like SES or AD-Tech is like comparing the audience at the symphony with the crowd at Wrestlemania.

Second, the keynotes were both very interesting and impressive (Kelly Mooney of Resource Interactive and Author Barry Schwartz) and today (Weds) was Seth Godin, (although I couldn’t make it today) so let’s just call that 3 for 3.

Third, the trade show booths were somehow more relevant and interesting than at either SES or Ad-Tech, although I can’t quite put my finger on why. Certain exhibitors clearly appear at all of these shows – like the analytics vendors and larger agencies and marketing shops – but the dozens of rather sleezy ad-network were replaced with a host of hosted commerce vendors and the increasing array of hosted component solutions (from opinion services like BazaarVoice to research firms like Forsee Results and others).

The sum of these three attributes – well chosen guests, intelligent ‘sponsored’ conversations, and a professional atmosphere – created an environment that really worked in terms of facilitating the kind of networking that shop.org is really meant to foster. At the many breaks and social events everyone is just plain eager to jump into rich and relevant discussions. This ‘offline social networking’ was productive here in a way you usually only experience as much smaller (and even more exclusive) events.

One more good thing: the show hosted extensive ‘birds of a feather’ sessions where three or four dozen topics were targeted at one round 10-12 person table each. I found that these produced very effective small group discussions which nicely bridged the ‘listen only’ format of the panels and the many one-on-one cocktail party conversations. In fact, with slightly more effort (on the part of the show organizers) I think an entire 3 hour session with the chance to change tables every 45 minutes would be much more effective than (yet another) afternoon of panel discussions. Sort of a slow-motion speed dating for online marketing conversations – or un-conference meets big-conference.

Tomorrow I’ll try to square yesterday's complaints with today's positive review.