May 13th was the date of the Link Research Tools Certified Event 2015. This was my second Certified Event and the best one so far. One of the main improvements this year was the weather! Last year it rained heavily as soon as I arrived in Vienna, which is not usual for Vienna in May. This year the weather was beautifully sunny and warm, Vienna was looking great.
The event was held at the Link Research Tools offices which are now located on the 7th floor of Saturn Tower, a futuristic skyscraper at Donaustadt in the 22nd district of Vienna. This is an impressive part of the city which is very different from Vienna’s 1st district. The triple aspect view from Saturn Tower is stunning.
What I loved about this years event was meeting the entire LRT Team and having them with us for the whole day. I’d met many of the team when I was in Vienna in December 2014, but it was great to meet some of the new members such as Amer Mundzic, a very funny Bosnian guy!
The day began with Christoph talking about a new product that is still Top Secret. We all received access to the Alpha version of this product, which I will look forward to demonstrating when it is released. There’s also a new tool being introduced to the LRT Suite which is going to save a lot of time when link prospecting.
We were very well looked after with food and drink being served by a guy called Stephan who I remembered from last year. I remembered that Stephan had lived somewhere strange, but I couldn’t remembered where it was. After a few minutes I recalled our conversation I remembered where it was, Milton Keynes! Yes indeed Milton Keynes is one of the UK’s strangest places, famous for its concrete cows.
It was great to see Bartosz’s team from Elephate in Poland. Bartosz Góralewicz and Łukasz Kalus did presentations too. My favourite part was when Bartosz showed a slide with the word ‘Synergy’, he said something like, “I dunno what this means but it’s a good word to have in a presentation”. Hilarious. Geraldine Edel did a great presentation about PitchBox, which I personally have a love/hate relationship with. In the afternoon my friend Lorant Görgey spoke about how his company get links, or as he says, build relationships.
At the end of the afternoon went on a bus to the Prater Amusement Park where we all had a ride on the iconic Wien Reisenrad. This is the 70m high big wheel that featured in the 1949 Black and White film, The Third Man. The view from the Reisenrad is very cool.
Our evening meal was at Schweizerhaus which is rustic beer hall style restaurant. Their speciality is Stelze, a huge pork knuckle that comes in 1kg serving! Normally these get shared two ways, but we shared it three ways as it was huge. It comes served with ‘senf und kren’, mustard and horseradish and ‘krautsalat’, coleslaw. This was all washed down with gallons of beer.
Afterwards we went to Pratersauna, a very cool nightclub in the Prater Park. I’d loved to have stopped their all night, but I really had to leave at about 1pm.
The following day we all met up at Schwedenplatz where we went on a guided tour of Vienna. I had my family with me that day, so it was good for them to meet the LRT Team and my LRT Certified friends. We went to the Belvedere Palace and the Hundertwassehaus which are both very cool places.
If you need a reason to become LRT Certified, this is it. This event is an amazing event where you can meet wonderful people and experience Vienna with them. Thank you Christoph and the LRT Team. I’m looking forward to next year’s event already.
