I know that maintaining a developer blog and speaking in conferences buy you a lot of recognition. Is there an alternative way to gain that lime light?<p>Not many people are fond of speaking or are simply not designed to speak effectively, is there a hope for them (myself included)?<p>I had this really random idea to teach a small batch of people something new; once in a while, but I'm not really sure that it will help as much. What are your thoughts and experiences?
1. Do cool things.<p>2. Tell people about them.<p>There's a pretty big industry surrounding how to promote yourself effectively, but ultimately, most of those things are secondary concerns. You shouldn't <i>ignore</i> marketing advice - there's often useful insights on what appears impressive to other people - but you'll always get more bang for the buck by actually doing things that <i>are</i> impressive to people rather than trying to make what you're doing <i>appear</i> impressive to others. Actions speak louder than words.
In your case I would try and participate in a lot of online communities, then have a link to your twitter and blog for all posts. Make sure you provide quality content for your blog and twitter.Some times when you make a good comment on a post people will check you out if you have a link for them to follow.<p>That should help out a bit.
Since you are comfortable interacting with a small batch of people, attending barcamps/unconferences is a good way to network and promote yourself. If you live in an area with a startup scene there are probably multiple such events a week.