Avoiding bad conference abstracts

#2 - No recognizable goal

I've repeatedly seen abstracts that did not address any goal. So sad! Maybe the topic could have been pretty interesting. It is not enough, if you just describe a couple of facts or some characteristics of something, even if they are true. For example, imagine something like this:

The xyz is a well known car. It is pretty modern and comes with an electric motor and has got 250HP. The color can be blue, grey or black. If you drive economically, you can manage around 400km. The cockpit is really cool and the manufacturer integrated an autopilot in the on-board computer.

... and so on ...

This might be a totally great and very true description of the car xyz. But what is the goal of the session? What will the attendees learn from you in this talk? They want to know what they will get out of the session.

For example:

• What exactly are you going to talk about or which particular feature will be the focus?
• Or do you want to show the audience a hidden gem, like "it is a car, but in this session, I will show you how to make it fly!"
• Or maybe "I will explain what exactly economically driving means and how you will manage 400km and more"

Try to give the reader a clear picture about what you are going to talk about and what they can expect, when they decide to join your session. If you do not point out the goal of your session, probably no one will be interested in joining you. And this may be the reason why your abstract was not selected. :-)

#3 – Miss the topic

Sometimes, things must not be explained in detail.

For example: If you want to present on a C# .net conference, do not submit a "Java is great" - abstract. :-)

But sometimes it is a bit more tricky. It can happen that you would like to talk about something which does not match the main topic of the conference directly, but can be very useful in relation to the main topic. In that case, the abstract should address this relation. For example, in our case we are talking about an APEX conference. If the jury cannot find any connection to APEX or to the Oracle Database or even to any other APEX-related technology, your abstract may be rejected.

Please point out the relation of your session to any of the relevant conference topics. This will dramatically increase the chance to get selected!

#4 - To much marketing!

Of course, as a speaker we want to present our knowledge, our thoughts and our ideas. Or we would like to present a solution in order to get feedback or perhaps to find interested people to discuss with. This is also a kind of (self-)marketing and may be totally ok. And sometimes we want to present a product. That's the point where we potentially have a conflict. Our conferences are all about to share knowledge, but not about selling a product. It might be ok to talk about a product, if the main focus of the session is about knowledge. For example, how to make APEX run in the AWS cloud or how to use a product to extend the functionality of APEX or stuff like that.

If you only want to sell a product without bringing any knowledge to the community, come with a conference booth. Or go to marketing events. :-)

The problem I found in some abstracts was that they looked like marketing. The wording looked like marketing people had written some buzzwords and some typical marketing sentences. But in fact, they weren't marketing talks. I don't know, how other conference jurys vote. But at APEX Connect, the voting is 100% anonymous in the first step.

(For more information about the abstract selection process at APEX Connect, read this article from Niels: nielsdebr.blogspot.com/2019/01/abstract-selection-process-for-apex.html)

So, what will happen with an abstract which sounds like marketing, when the voters cannot see the person or the company? They probably will recognize it as marketing, even if it is no marketing in fact!

If you want to bring interesting content to a conference, I advise you not to write like marketing people do. This could be misunderstood. :-)

#5 - Submit multiple similar abstracts

First of all, it is good to submit multiple abstracts! This will usually increase the chance to be selected as a speaker. Mostly. If you submit multiple abstracts, they should definitely be different talks and different topics or at least with different focus. Sometimes we have two or three abstracts which look almost the same. For example, they just differ a little bit in the title. Or only some sentences are different or maybe just a few words.

You must know, even if you read one or two hundred abstracts, you will remember what you have read a couple of hours ago. And even if the abstracts are presented anonymous to the voters, they will probably have a good feeling to identify similar writing styles. And the more similarity you have, the easier to identify.

The question is: Why do people submit multiple abstracts, if they are probably intended to describe the same talk? Is it because they could not decide whether title A or title B is better? Or the same with wording in sentence X and sentence Y? But only the submitter knows what exactly he/she is going to present in the session. The submitter should know which headline or text describes the talk best. How can the jury rely on the quality of a presentation, if the submitter isn't even able to decide which abstract describes the topic best?

Please just invest a bit more time and make your decision. Do not let the jury do it for you. They will probably tend to vote all of them bad.

And if you submit really different talks but with similar topic (for example with different focus or different point of view), please make sure to point out the difference in the abstract!