Social Media Strategies – San Francisco Web Guild

I’m at the Social Media Strategies conference today. We’ve had the introduction and I’ve frankly been experimenting with QIK. I recorded most of the first session by propping my iphone against the open screen of my laptop. The video is here. I’m also tweeting along in the background.

I’m fascinated by the approach and comments that are already emerging here re Social Media. I’m pleased to be hearing comments on customers, and on improving the bottom line. That’s an interesting contrast to the KM community discussion that I participated in more recently.

One element I can’t help covering. I’m always interested in who uses what. This room is fairly full. I’d love to see some inventories. Eg who uses which tools.You know papers around the room that get people to sign up or provide details on their activities. Table discussions, a wiki etc. I’m looking to get audience stories and problems. I see lots of round tables – the format base is there. One day I will get to create a really interactive social conference. That includes making sure upfront we know the tags, the video uplinks, the blogs etc. I’m not sure where to find these.

I don’t know why we don’t build conferences like this differently. Socially!  I sit here and want to hear how others use Twitter. I want to see people using it on cellphones. I want to see the Qik team doing stuff. I want it to be clear to everyone how and where we can create content. I won’t profess to knowing how to use all these tools better than someone else. I know many use Facebook better than I do. Other have great frontline stories or are implementing new programs.

We need to move beyond the blog mistakes and the legal issues. I believe there are large issues in how organizations adopt these tools. What we are failing to do is train the attendees on how to take it back into their organizations. That begins with getting them familiar and confident using the tools. We are failing in the immersion element.

I’d like to offer a five day mobile social media immersion program. Or even a week! It will be hands on. It will be discovery. It would have some provocative experts inserted from time to time. Its would be limited to less than 100 people. It would be intense and it wouldn’t just focus on PC or mobile Skills. It would certainly start by listening to each other. That’s something we keep forgetting. The first rule of social media is to start learning to listen. It would be primarily focused on giving the individuals the skills stories and personal materials that lets them loose.

Tagged as: conference, immersion, Networks, Knowledge and Social Media, social media strategies