Sunday, February 28, 2010

Two Posts - Three Bs: Brogan, Buzz and Beer

Here's a quick snippet from Chris Brogan during his keynote at the recent Kansas City IABC's conference and another local company's, Johnny's Tavern's, social story.

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Chris Brogan - Going from Gee Whiz to Oh Crap!

Chris Brogan (@chrisbrogan) aka "No I Don't Sleep" Brogan spoke at the recent Kansas City IABC's Business Communicator's Summit. Here's two minutes worthy of a listen. Chris talks about moving from toe in the water trying social media out initiatives to the need for a more holistic company wide social media roadmap.

Johnny's Tavern: Keeping the Online Conversation Going Offline - A Local Restaurant's Social Story



Continuing with the IABC's Business Communicators' Summit, this post is focused on a Kansas City smallbiz example of using social media to continue the conversation with customers in between their in-store (in this case "in-restaurant") visits.

Alexis Ceule (@alexisceule) presentation on a small local business @JohnnysTavernPV's social media pilot program.

I think the key to Alexis' social site strategy for Johnny's is the focus on instant “in the moment” conversations. She pushed the organization to meet the customer at the point of need with relevant content and to build relationships.



In fact, 85% of Johnny's social site conversations are not branded. Also, their tie social site promotions with having their friends, fans and customers meet up at Johnny's to shift the online conversation to "live and in person" get togethers. So Johnny's has become the favored place for "social site friends" to gather for catching up face-to-face.

Straying a bit from my re-hash of our panel, next up will be a brief post on Chris Brogan's KC/IABC keynote.

Friday, February 19, 2010

CFCA: Connecting Online - A Non-profit Social Story

Judy-Anne Goldman(@lacajag) is the public relations lead at the Kansas City-based international non-profit Christian Foundation for Family and Aging (@CFCA). I was lucky enough to speak on a panel at the KCIABC Business Communicator's Summit with Judy-Anne, Alexis Ceule (@alexisceule) with @JohnnysTavernPV and Jason Gertzen (@jginkc) with @Sprint.

In this first post of my four part series covering our panel's topics, I'm going to highlight Judy-Anne's presentation.

A little bit of background on CFCA. Simply put, CFCA helps families in developing countries put food on the table and send their children to school. One of CFCA's main initiatives is linking up sponsoring families with families in need. As a sponsor you provide monthly support for your sponsored child and exchange letters with them. CFCA believes in the potential of the poor to effect change in their own lives and in our world.(Full disclosure: Our family has sponsored Angelica, a Guatemalan 14 year old for 12 years through CFCA. Our family has grown up with Angelica and loves keeping in touch with her through letters. - Yep, snail mail - it's wonderful.)

Judy-Anne took us through CFCA's social story which focuses on listening, serving and sharing:
<div style="width:425px;text-align:left" id="__ss_3089118">CFCA:Connecting online<div style="font-size:11px;font-family:tahoma,arial;height:26px;padding-top:2px;">View more presentations from CFCA.</div></div>

The key to CFCA's social success is integrated web messaging. They utilize all their online properties to help connect sponsors with their sponsored children and provide updates on all their non-profit initiatives. The CFCA team posts breaking news on their various twitter accounts @CFCA, @Walk2gether and @Zamboanga. They provide more than 140 character updates on their Facebook fan page. CFCA follows up with an in-depth blog post and continues conversation through twitter and blog comments. CFCA converses, engages and connects with sponsors and prospects where they are online.

Next up is Alexis Ceule's (@alexisceule) presentation on a small local business @JohnnysTavernPV's social media pilot program.

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Thursday, February 18, 2010

Way Too Final For Me

So this week I can't shake the yearning to call my sister, Annette. I just want to hear her voice...wow, do I miss her. It's been about 3 months since her death. Since we only talked every now and then via the phone or a quick email, I think it's finally settling in that she's really gone. No more "now and then."

Way too final for me.

Call your siblings and send them some love, won't ya?

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Thursday, February 11, 2010

Marketing Stories Podcast with Shelly Kramer

What the heck have I been up to? Well, definitely not writing posts here ;).

A few things have been keeping me busy. I joined H&R Block (@HRBlock) in mid-January. I'll write a post about my new adventure as H&R Block's Social Media Director soon, promise.

My next few posts are going to be focused on social media and engaging customers.

Matthew Ray Scott (@MatthewRayScott) creator of The Strategic Incubator asked me to co-host his Marketing Stories Podcast with Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer).

We cover a lot of social web ground in this hour podcast. Good discussions on living out loud on social sites, being helpful, becoming a "threaded connector", what brands are doing right, what to stay away from...so if you have a long commute, download this sucker and get after it.

If you have about 10 minutes, start listening around 17:00 to pick up tips from Shelly and Matthew on evergreen social media "rules". If you have only 5 minutes and want to know how conversational engagement (not shout out monologue selling) works in social media, start around 26:00. If you have 2 minutes and want to hear a few case studies and hear Matthew's Arkansas accent, start at 31:00. If you want a really specific social listening case study and remember to close the loop, begin around 33:30.

I'd love to hear if you give the podcast a thumbs up or down and why.

Next post up, Christian Foundation for Family and Aging's (@CFCA)social web case study.

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