03/23/2009
One of my joys is helping marketers understand how to use social media to build brand value. In the workshops and speeches I give one of the most Frequently Asked Questions goes like this: "When it comes to social media marketing all I seem to see is consumer products and programs that target moms. Can social media be used in a business-to-business environment? And How?!"
That question always brings a smile since the business roots (versus the personal application) of social media began with the tech blogs and than were adopted by small business owners .. many in the B2B space. Yes, Virginia social media is quite definitely a strategy that can be
successfully used to help market products and services whose target audience is other businesses.
For my money, one of the most effective tactics is using social media to position VIPs in your company as industry thought leaders. The heart of this initiative is built around sharing knowledge. Nothing new here. Businesses have been employing white papers for eons to set this in motion.
However, add social media tools such as blogs, live podcasts, social networks and even Twitter, to the mix and you go beyond what could be a white paper yawn. You have the opportunity for Exchanging Knowledge with your VIP as the leader of the discussion. Powerful way to enhance brand value and equity.
Recently my friend Ron Strauss, president of Brandzone and co-author of "Value Creation: The Power of Brand Equity" wrote an interesting post on an AMA listserve that dovetails with this concept. Ron agreed to share his ideas with us.
The Difference Between the Expert Based Approach and the Knowledge Sharing Approach
- TRUST. LEARNING. BUY-IN. PULL VS. PUSH.
TRUST. By sharing knowledge, the company demonstrates expertise and the confidence to 'give' this power to their client.
- Since knowledge is power, sharing knowledge shares power - to everyone's benefit. Trust is an intangible attribute and is one of the core values of every brand - essential to building and/or preserving brand equity.
LEARNING. By helping clients understand the implications of the knowledge they shared with them, and its application, companies are teaching how to apply these ideas within the context of the firm.
And the context of the firm is described by its processes, organization, business model, how it chooses its customers, etc. Thus, organizations are teaching clients how to 'fit' the knowledge to their company's values in a way that created effective outcomes for their served clients. So, the company must understand how to apply the knowledge in a way that aligned with their customers' values and needs.
BUY-IN. Sharing knowledge in a way that encourages the learner to take responsibility for its application and for the outcomes of those applications, creates 'buy-in' from Day 1.
There's no need to 'sell' the organization on the program, the process of acquiring the knowledge and applying it does that. They sell themselves as they use the knowledge to overcome barriers and issues.
PULL VS. PUSH. Sharing knowledge and its applications in a manner that's consistent with the Brand Promise creates a 'pull' force field through out the organization.
In today's flatter, less hierarchical organizational structures this is necessary to quickly adapt to change, and to meet clients ever-changing requirements in a timely, fashion while remaining profitable. Employees need to be empowered to do what it takes to deliver on the Brand Promise, to create the kind of experiences that create loyal customers.
Interested in learning more about social media marketing for business-to-business? I'm honored to be a guest speaker at the webinar Using Social Media & Networking in Client Conversations sponsored by References Online. I join Umang Shah of Cubed Consulting, Duncan Egan of Taleo Corporation and Lisa Hoesel, References Online. Date: Wednesday 3/25 Time: Eastern: 12noon - 1p Central: 11a- 12noon Mountain: 10a-11a Pacific 9a-10a Registration
One more .. catch the recent article about social media in the Atlanta Business Chronicle - Executives using social media to brand themselves as well as their companies. Guess who was quoted in her local business rag .. yup me!
01/09/2009
Today I noticed an article in the Wall Street Journal title, "When Bad Times Make Good Movies" and thought that is exactly what is occurring today in the marketing community. Bad times are making us better marketers.
It's back to marketing basics but with new strategies in our tool box that may sound strange like wiki and blog and twitter. In addition we are told that what was once for family fun like videos and photos can be leveraged to give your brand a competitive advantage. I ask you girlfriend, has the world gone mad?
Perhaps. But then again, perhaps not. If bad times are making us good marketers .. the question that begs to be asked is was there something during the good times that made us bad marketers? So what is marketing anyway? Many years ago I heard someone ask that question to Philip Kotler. His response put so simply and elegantly -
Marketing is meeting the needs of your customers at a profit. Philip Kotler
When I listen to marketers, especially those in the c-suite, talk about their concerns regarding consumer generated media and rationalize why social media is inappropriate for their organization, I can't help but think of that quote from Philip Kotler and wonder .. how can you meet the needs of your customers if you don't know what they are?
Traditional research provides answers to many of your questions but why would you discount the answers you might hear to the questions you have not asked? Did we become complacent and loose touch with our customers and is that the reason we are now fearful to hear their unfiltered conversations?
Yes, the world is changing. Through the funny sounding tactics like wikis, blogs, twitter and social networks our customers are talking to us. All the time. What is as amazing is people in those companies (not the brand or the company but people) are taking brave steps to talk with their customers. Sure it can be messy. It certainly can be scary. It takes courage to develop trusted relationships .. especially in public. But that was how business began and from my perspective it is certainly nice to see people once again building corner grocery store relationships.
My friends at the American Marketing Association call this the New Marketsphere.
"Whether you like it or not, we are all part of it. It's a borderless planet of seismic changes occurring at warp speed, throwing a dizzying array of challenges at marketers." Mplantet website
To help us maneuver in this mad mad mad marketing world they have created Mplanet the marketing conference that will help us make sense of it all. The conference is build around four themes. I think I just addressed #2 Connecting with empowered consumers.
1. Brand Building in a digital world
2. Connecting with empowered consumers
3. Marketing mix in a fragmented world
4. Global marketing on a borderless planet
I'm honored to be speaking at the Digital Marketing Lab pre-conference along with: Stephanie Diamond, Digital Media Works, Julie Fleischer, DIGITAS, Brian Johnson, Microsoft, Russell Buckley, Mobile Marketing Association, Jim Novo, The Drilling Down Project, Jim Sterne, Web Analytics Association and Greg Verdino, crayon.
C.B. Whittemore, Flooring the Consumer, had a terrific recap of posts from around the blogosphere about the conference themes.
What-When-Where- Diva Marketing Discount Details
AMA Mplanet Conference. /January 26-28, 09. /Orlando, FL. As a speaker AMA has extended a courtesy discount to me to pass along to my closest friends and relatives you among them. shh.. don't tell anyone .. $995 from $1,995 - non member // $1,495 - member; DM me for details or drop a comment.
Starting where we began .. at the movies .. In Joe Morganstein's WSJ article film director Andrew Stanton told him, "In times like these you really understand the benefit of moviegoing, of sitting in a large dark room with strangers and feeling the collective reaction to the truths of life presented to you via humor, observation and the thrill of action. Movie going is not a panacea, but it's a hell of a multivitamin. Whatever the movies do should be geared toward bringing people together. Don't let them stew in their private darkness."
Put into marketing terms - Marketing can no longer simply sprout
meaningless messages that people ignore. Marketing must bring customers together with products and services that meet their needs at a proft. Don't let your marketing strategies die in your private darkness of the fears because you refused to acknowledge this new wonderful mad mad mad marketing world!
12/01/2008
This week Dana VanDen Heuvel, Bill Flitter and I will be on the road to Seattle for the last stop of our mini road trip for the American Marketing Association Hot Topic Workshop - Digital-Centered Marketing.
It seems like kismet to me, for you see, it was almost 4-years to the day that Dana, Bill and I we were in Seattle for the very first national program on how marketers could use blogs - which was also sponsored by AMA. At that session we were joined by Robert Scoble, Ben McConnell and Dave Williams. Almost all of the speakers had met through some aspect of social media/blogs and most had never met in-person. It was a program build on digital relationships about digital relationships.
We learned a lot from those early days when social media, Facebook, Twitter and social networks were not even part of the vernacular. We were taught our first lessons in blogger relations by TDavid. What begin as a rather sticky situation ended up in a better program and a new friend. I'm thrilled that TDavid will be joining us on Friday. Lessons Learned from TDavid
One blogger can be the snowflake that can start an avalanche. There is risk and reward in a blogged economy. - TDavid
>Bloggers are people who want to connect. They want to know that they are being heard. Bloggers care.
>With the easy use of blogs, micro blogs, podcasts, vlogs and other social media tools marketers can not control how customers will reposition a carefully crafted message.
>You can not control customers’ conversations. The secret is you never could. However, you can manage those conversations by listening, participating, and caring.
Which has me thinking more about the challenges of building trusted digital relationships using social media. It seems there are two aspects: the digital/web-based and the personal.
Although developed for traditional websites Stanford's Guidelines for Web Credibility provides some guidance on the first.
1. Make it easy to verify the accuracy of the information on your site.
You can build web site credibility by providing third-party support (citations, references, source material) for information you present, especially if you link to this evidence. Even if people don't follow these links, you've shown confidence in your material.
2. Show that there's a real organization behind your site.
Showing that your web site is for a legitimate organization will boost the site's credibility. The easiest way to do this is by listing a physical address. Other features can also help, such as posting a photo of your offices or listing a membership with the chamber of commerce.
3. Highlight the expertise in your organization and in the content and services you provide.
Do you have experts on your team? Are your contributors or service providers authorities? Be sure to give their credentials. Are you affiliated with a respected organization? Make that clear. Conversely, don't link to outside sites that are not credible. Your site becomes less credible by association.
4. Show that honest and trustworthy people stand behind your site.
The first part of this guideline is to show there are real people behind the site and in the organization. Next, find a way to convey their trustworthiness through images or text. For example, some sites post employee bios that tell about family or hobbies.
5. Make it easy to contact you.
A simple way to boost your site's credibility is by making your contact information clear: phone number, physical address, and email address.
6. Design your site so it looks professional (or is appropriate for your purpose).
We find that people quickly evaluate a site by visual design alone. When designing your site, pay attention to layout, typography, images, consistency issues, and more. Of course, not all sites gain credibility by looking like IBM.com. The visual design should match the site's purpose.
7. Make your site easy to use -- and useful.
We're squeezing two guidelines into one here. Our research shows that sites win credibility points by being both easy to use and useful. Some site operators forget about users when they cater to their own company's ego or try to show the dazzling things they can do with web technology.
8. Update your site's content often (at least show it's been reviewed recently).
People assign more credibility to sites that show they have been recently updated or reviewed.
9. Use restraint with any promotional content (e.g., ads, offers).
If possible, avoid having ads on your site. If you must have ads, clearly distinguish the sponsored content from your own. Avoid pop-up ads, unless you don't mind annoying users and losing credibility. As for writing style, try to be clear, direct, and sincere.
10. Avoid errors of all types, no matter how small they seem.
Typographical errors and broken links hurt a site's credibility more than most people imagine. It's also important to keep your site up and running.
Person-to-person. - Need your help .. let's build this one together. Please share your One Secret on how you build trusted digital relationships using social media. I've set a brief survey in Survey Monkey to collect responses. I'll let it run for about a week .. analyze the responses and post to Diva Marketing. Click Here to take survey
11/06/2008
Social media - It's all about the conversation. Who knows conversation better than those that making their living selling thoughts and words. The Big A-L profession -- attorney/lawyer -- comes to mind. Solo attorneys, like other small business owners, are exploring how to use their words not only as a "product" but as a marketing strategy to build digital relationships.
Needless to say the value in social media conversations are are not necessarily in the number of "billable" words; but rather in the generosity of ideas. Could an attorney build a practice using only only 140 characters at-a-time out reach a la Twitter? Will a 2.1 minute video strategically place on consumer generated video sites like YouTube "work" better than a 4 color brochure? Can participating in social network communities where your clients hang out result in more new business than Chamber of Commerce networking meeting?
These are the issues that I'll be discussing at Solo Practice University. SPU is a the new, innovative learning online concept developed by Susan Cartier Liebel. Ironically Susan explained her vision of an online university, that supports lawyers who have a solo practice, during a coffee chat just before at my niece's college graduation ceremony. My first thoughts were .. this will change online learning. The second was .. I'd love to play a role.
Today, I am honored to join prestigious colleagues from many different disciplines as we explore one more way to use social media and technology to help people do business smarter.
09/24/2008
Networking on iPhones and Blackberries. Networking in-person. Tweets on screens. Tweets on cells. Parties and People. An industry finding its way. New companies. New technology. New bloggers. Conference Word: Vulnerability
Last week I joined social media friends and colleagues at the se
cond Blog World Expo conference. Lots of thoughts swirling through my mind.
One is that this industry continues to grow. Susan Getgood reminds us in her BWE post that challenges often accompany. My hopes are that the newly formed International Blogger and New Media Association (I'm on the board) will bring direction, cohesion, credibility .. and ease a bit of the pain that Susan identified.
Friday night Elisa Camahort, BlogHer, and Jen Openshaw, WeSeed, coordinated a girlfriends in Las Vegas dinner. What a great way to kick of the weekend. And what a treat to be among amazing women who are pioneers in social media. Girlfriend, I've the perfect excuse for you to visit Hawaii -- Hawaii Podcamp .. the diva making this one happen is Roxanne Darling, Beach Walks With Rox.
Last year some of my greatest learnings came from sessions outside of my comfort zone - military and sports blogging. This year I sat in on a God Blog session and listened intently to the Andrew Jones, Tall Skinny Kiwi, tell his story about faith blogs. He begin with a light hearted joke .. You might be a faith blogger if .. My favorite .. You're a faith blogger if your prayers are 140 characters or less because that's all Twitter allows.
My big take away from Andrew's talk (slides) was ~
A blog should not be a well. It should be a spring. ~
Although Andrew put it into a religious context, his concept makes perfect sense to me not only for blogs but for social media in general. Think about it .. a well contains stagnant waters. Stagnation occurs when there is no new flow of water. Blogs, social networks, wikis and all the other tools/tactics allow for and encourage fresh water or new ideas to flow.
Sidebar: I often say that the blogopshere/social media is comprised of many, many villages. There is the business blog village where Diva Marketing resides and then the mommy blog, golf blog, healthcare blog, beauty blog, race horse blog "villages" and more. The God blog/faith blog village is one of the most active. Skip over to the interview I did with Lead Pastor of the National Community Church - David Mark Batterson - for some insights into this most interesting "village."
Caught the end of a session based on enterprise case studies. Rohit Bhargava, Influential Marketing Blog, offered lessons learned from the Ogilvy Ford Taurus blogger outreach program.
1. Know your product. 2. Tap into something they (bloggers/customers) know they can do. 3. Search visibility is a valid KPT 4. Provides valid opinions from real people
It was Anne Plese's great story about how she turned a team of Cisco engineers into blogging rock stars and went from a focus on tradition marketing to social marketing that caught my interest. Goals were to grow wallet share and relevancy for a new product. The bloggers were positioned as "assets." Wow! the light bulb went on. Although I have thought of bloggers as a value-add component to a marketing strategy, I never went as far as to use the term "asset." Brilliant.
In addition to writing their own posts the bloggers continued to actively participated in relevant conversations. Actually that's how they initially began as commenters on other people's blogs. It was Anne's vision to give them a platform (their own blogs) where they could also move the discussion into Cisco's world. In addition, the blogger relations program bloggers were given direct access to the engineers who built the product. Results - at least $250,000 in cost savings. Watch for an in depth interview with Anne on Diva Marketing coming soon!
Jennifer Openshaw, WeSeed, and Spike Jones, Brains on Fire, spoke about reaching and connecting with women by building long-term movements not short-term campaigns. Jen and Spike reminded the (mostly women) audience that credibility comes from being vulnerable. Spike shared the case behind the successful Fisk-A-Teers ..or how an orange pair of scissors created a community of crafters. Jen reinforced that the way to a women's heart is: to make life easier, your product relevant, the experience fun. Looking forward to the innovative investment site she's about to launch targeted to women which includes her tips: easy, relevant, fun. Lesson Learned: A person with passion can be more "influential" than an "influencer."
Toss a pink boa to Becky Carroll, Customers Rock and Des Walsh, Thinking Home Business who invited me to share the stage with them and the talented people on their panels. Tweets of Becky's panel - Creating Customer Loyalty with Social Media (with Brian Solis, and "brand tweeters": Frank Eliason, Comcast, Tony Hsieh, Zappos)- from @pblackshaw, @dbrazeal, @beckylicious721. Tweets of Des' panel - Getting Customer Buy-in & Managing Client Relationships (with Rich Brooks and Robyn Tippins)- from @trishussey, @dbrazeal, @waderockett. Be sure to catch Becky's blog series on Customers Rock about using social media for customer service.
More pink boa tosses .. Average Jane for walking the trade show floor with me. Smiles from Glenda Watson Hyatt, whose thumbs .. right and left .. are in amazingly great shape. Dinner with Paul Chaney and his diva wife Aime while watch Las Vegas from the skies. Jay Berkowitz's "quiet" dinner which was a great chance to actually sit down & hear people talk. Geoff Livingston for including me in his video series with uber cool peeps. Finally! meeting James Andrews and Ellen Marden who is picture perfect. Liz Strauss (slides from her presentation), David Berkowitz (great A-Z wrap post of the event!) Tish Grier, Tris Hussey, Nicole Simon and Matt Dickman and well you know who you are .. but more important I do too. Thanks for a great weekend.
Oh .. the next time you see me walking through an airport I'll be reading on my new 
Kindle I won from Newstex. Sweet!
Thanks to Mike Elgan for the Kindle image.
05/09/2008
Welcome PRSA Georgia Chapter's Annual Conference People!
Yesterday I had the most fun teaming with two amazing divos - Dan Greenfield. media consultant Bernaise Sauce (former vp Earthlink) and Michael Pranikoff (del.icio.us) director Emerging Media PR Newswire. We were Conversation Guides for a session on social media for a great group of folks. The convo went from micro blogging to how to develop a strategy to the difference between an audio file and a podcast. Answer: RSS
As promised, we're happy to share the deck. For those who didn't attend the session there are some great resources including Twitter search engines complements of Michael and an easy to follow 10 Step Social Media how-to get started Process from Dan. Enjoy! Download the_social_media_10_step_process.pdf
From the lunch key note panel .. a few snippets
- To celebrate GM's 100th anniversary an employees wiki has been established. As employees add their memories a unique view of the company's history will be created. For Mary Heinge, APR communications director, GM Corp., the added benefits include a viral element, a way to involve many people and no book printing costs.
- Debra Neuman, svp external relations for Care told the group that social media gives people the ability to respond immediately and especially for a non profit ".. your content better be right."
- Question: Who owns social media? Debra Neuman - "No one and everyone." Love that one.
Most controversial statement was from Jack Leslie. When the panel was asked about the skills they were looking for in new hires, Jack told us he leans toward people half his age when considering employees with social media skills since .. young people have this built into their DNA. Now perhaps Jack was trying to be funny but the buzz in the ladies loo (Girlfriend you know exactly what I mean.) was outrage that only the Millenniums are perceived to "get it." As one women said to me - Anyone can learn how to put together a MySpace or Facebook page but it takes experience to understand how to incorporate social media into a PR plan or campaign.
I would be delighted to introduce Jack to Shel Israel and Jane Genova and Yvonne DiVita and Marianne Richmond and Rick Short and Elana Centor and Anita Campbell and Merrill Dubrow and Wayne Hurlbert and Michele Miller and Jack Yan and Jeff Jarvis and KD Paine and Dr. Lasky and BL Ochman and Liz Strauss and Dan Greenfield .. well you get the picture. Update: and Paul Chaney!
Sidebar: Thanks to Seth for the graphic of Facebook for Old People.
11/15/2007
As promised here are my random notes from Blog World. Or at least those note I could read. I apologize for the quotes that I have not a clue who said what.
Web 2.0 does not equal community. Paul Dunay
"It's an old media concept that your audience should come to you."
Internal wikis are a great way to: share opinions, create spontaneous work groups, develop a knowledge management system.
Maggie Fox generously shared lessons learned from a MySpace campaign for Harlequin (books) that quite didn't make it. Don't treat MySpace like an ad. Authors should have actively participated in the community.
Social media networking communities don't work if you control the content. Credibility can't build from only content you put up. Think about how to create trust online. Relevancy is key.
The Dell Story was told at least 5 million times.
How much longer can Apple afford not to get social?
How do you get marketers to get it?
1. Point to success examples.
2. Show examples that their brand / industry is in the conversation .. with or with them.
3. Try it internally first. Create an internal blog, wiki, podcast, etc.
4. Coach them through the process.
Responding to negative comments on a blog can create greater credibility.
Notes from Mil blog session. Military bloggers were amazing.
Christian Lowe Bill Riggio Uncle Jimbo Eric England Steve Schippert
- No one can dictate the message of what is happening in the field anymore.
- No one owns the flow of information any more.
- Gives the troops a voice; the great equalizer.
- Military blogs often more accurate than main stream media. Lines between MSM and bloggers are blurring.
- How does one determine the truth? By reading multiple blogs. Trust = facts. Mil bloggers frequently check each other's facts. Posts are passed along to confirm the details. Or the community self corrects in comments.
- Military bloggers are morphing into hobby bloggers or new media correspondences.
- As with any community conversation and relationships are also built off-blog.
- Mil bloggers are creating change within the military from the outside.
- Mil blogs are read by senior staffers, generals and policy makers. Many use blogs as a source for their research.
- When it comes down to brass tacks, the community of mil bloggers is much the same as the community of business bloggers. We both struggle with similar issues from comments to posting frequency to content direction. A defense contractor raised his hand and asked, "How do I get in front of your readers?" The response was, "Build relationship with us." Sound familiar? That's what the biz bloggers call Blogger Relations.
- "The power of blogs is found from their communication at near real time." Christian Lowe.
Notes From Sports Blogging Session: How To Build Traffic
Will Leitch, Larry Borowsky, Matt Cerrone, Adam Morris, Tyler Bleszinski
- Post regularly.
- Be predictable. Post at the same time every day/day of the week.
- Friend other bloggers. In other words develop relationships and participate in the community conversations.
- Post a series of Q&A on a specific topic.
- Be the Go To person for a specific topic.
- Develop your blog like a TV series with posts on specific topics at specific times.
- Write well. It reinforces your credibility.
- What emotionally connects with your readers?
- Be honest.
- Be yourself. Your blog is an extension of your personality.
- Credit bloggers when you post an idea from another blog.
- There is a difference between traffic and readers.
Sidebar: I was one of 4 women in a session of about 35 guys.
11/12/2007
Part 1 -- Last week was over the top bloggy Las Vegas style. I spoke at Blog World and then presenting at an AMA Hot Topic Workshop on social media .. nice complement. Big Take Away from Blog World .. there is no doubt social media is an industry! Perhaps a bebe one but still an industry.
I have lots to share with you about the first social media convention. First, toss of a pink boa to Dave Taylor and Chris Rick Calvert (oops. thanks for the catch Jim) for their vision and dedication in bring this first show off so well. The Blog World staff was amazing .. thank you Patti for the 'luggage help.'
I had the pleasure of sharing the spot light day one with Marc Danziger. We tag teamed the session - The Importance of Blogging and New Media In Your Organization's Strategic Marketing. For your viewing pleasure - Download blogworld_2007v7.pdf the deck. On Wednesday Amy Grahan invited me to be part of an important panel discussion on ethics. Jeremy Pepper live blogged the session. Amy's notes are extensive and include the links mentioned.
My favorite part of Blog World .. catching up with friends in the same room!Jim Turner, Patti and Denise from the Blog Squad, Wendy Piersell, Rich
Brooks, Des Walsh, Maggie Fox, Rich Brooks, Marshall Kirpatrick, Debbie Weil, Cynthia Trevino, Eric Olsen, Blog Critics who was so kind to a wannabe blogger and Jeremy Wright who is still sweet and humble even with the fast success of b2media. And more!
It was a treat to spend time with Tris Hussey, who has been my IT savior from afar; and Liz Strauss, who after talking with her for 2.5 seconds I so got why she is the Diva of Comments. I finally met Andy Wibble who once upon a time invited me to do my very first podcast with him. Andy's posted a few recaps of the event. Larry Benet .. thanks for the chocolate surprise. Shel video interviewed Liz and me. Note to self: change eye make when video taping. Stephan Spencer, H.L. DeVore and I played find the best blog url not taken at the fabulous party at the fabulous Wynn. Giving Glenda Watson Hyatt a hug was a special moment .. she lights up a room! I read her biography, I'll Do It Myself, on the flight back to Hot'lanta. Hint: The story of Glenda's life travels and inspirational accomplishments would make a wonderful holiday present.
One of my favorite lines came from Jory Des Jardins
"Social media is like a puppy .. it can't take care of itself."
Update: oops! going thru my note I found that it was not Diva Jory but Diva Maggie Fox who came up with this creative line.
Part 2 -- notes, random thoughts and learnings.
10/21/2007
Several people have asked me where to find workshops/conferences on blogs/social media. If you have extra budget money for 2007 that is burning a hole in your pocket or are planning Q1 2008 and need a few ideas take a look. Please add to the list.
20007
October
Houston - October 25 - DFW Interactive Marketing Association HiMA: Interactive Strategies '07
Boston - October 26-28 - Podcamp Boston
Chicago - October 26 - AMA Hot Topic Beyond Marketing 2.0: Harnessing the Power of Social Media for Marketing Campaign Results*
November
Austin - November 6 - Social Media Club
Las Vegas - November 7 - 9 - BlogWorld*
Las Vegs - November 8-9 GodblogCon
Las Vegas - November 9 - AMA Hot Topic Beyond Marketing 2.0: Harnessing the Power of Social Media for Marketing Campaign Results*
Atlanta - November 13 - Atlanta Social Media Mixer - hosted by David Berkowitz (See Facebook Event) All welcome! Venue: TBD. Time: 6p -9p*
Las Vegas - November 14 -15 WOMMA
December
Washington DC - December 3-6 - Social Media For Government
Boston - December 5 -6 Society For New Communications Research
2008
January
Miami- January 11- AMA Hot Topic Beyond Marketing 2.0: Harnessing the Power of Social Media for Marketing Campaign Results*
Miami - January 24-25 - The Woman's Congress*
Miami - January 31 - February 1 - Social Media Conference
February
San Diego - February 22 - AMA Hot Topic Beyond Marketing 2.0: Harnessing the Power of Social Media for Marketing Campaign Results*
March
March 28th -Chicago - AMA Hot Topic Beyond Marketing 2.0: Harnessing the Power of Social Media for Marketing Campaign Results*
March 31-April 3 - Seattle - International Conference on Weblogs and Social Media
Update: Speaking at a conference and need a topic? Chris Brogan has 100 suggestions! Also a great list to use if your creativity goes on the slump for blog post topics.
Sidebar: Shameless plug the * are where you can find me.
Note to Ina: Got your message but you left a wrong phone number. Please try again.
10/11/2007
A heads up from David Armano - Critical Mass has a coool live web-cam , along with a live chat, pointing to the Forrester's Consumer Forum 2007. (October 11-12 9a -5p)
Im finding the audio a little hard to understand but it could be my computer. Sure gives a new meaning to live blogging!
