Get Plugged Into Social Networking – Review

From time to time, I will be posting reviews of the various “Meeting Industry” events I attend.  Here is my first review.

Last week The METS Center in Northern Kentucky hosted “Get Plugged Into Social Networking” presented by Kendra Ramirez of SaleKonnect.com and followed up by a panel discussion.

I considered the even to be a huge success.  First and foremost it was a great example of using “Social Media” to promote an event.  I am not aware of all the approaches which The METS Center used to promote this event but it appears LinkedIn Events was the primary source.  I found out about the event via my weekly LinkedIn Status Updates when a connection of mines status included that they would be attending the seminar.  This is the viral aspect so many of us our looking for in our marketing.  The METS Center must be very pleased with their efforts of probably 5-10 minutes posting the LinkedIn Event which led to an overwhelming response and over 150 attendees.

Kendra Ramirez is a text book example of how powerful social networking can be for your business.  There is hardly a day that passes that I do not see Ramirez’’s name being listed as the keynote speaker or tweets about her speaking live coming across my Twitter stream.  Ramirez’s talk was informational and entertaining.

What I liked most about Ramirez’s talk was her first step to Social Networking, “Identify your audience and your goals!” So many people skip this step when it comes to Social Networking.   It would be kind of like getting in your car and getting on 75 North heading towards Dayton, OH and realizing your goal was to go to Lexington, KY (assuming you are in Greater Cincinnati) you probably won’t make it.  The better you know your audience and goals the easier to set your direction.

Ramirez shared some statistics about the various networking sites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.  The one that stands out the most is LinkedIn with over 30 million professional users in the United States.  You can dig into her statistics by watching the complete presentation on The METS Center website, click here, which is another great example of Social Networking by posting the video and slides.

Ramirez offered up some common pitfalls for Social Networking, the one I like most is the belief that by signing up for a service like Twitter or LinkedIn people will flock to you.  I think we have all been tainted by the “Field of Dreams” mantra, “Build it and they will come!”  The truth is Social Networking is just an extension of quality content, products or services.  Think of Social Networking like an investment, investments require capital (your product or service), time (socializing and developing contacts) and the right investment platform (Formerly Mutual Funds and Real Estate).  So invest your time wisely.

Ramirez finished her talk with a panel discussion including the areas top Social Networkers, Debba Haupert - Girlfriendology.com, Michelle Lentz – Write-Tech.com, Suzanne LaChapelle – LaChapelle Design, Rod Martin – NavigateTommorow.com, Dave Hatter – LibertasTechnologies.com.  This panel has a wide variety of experience and had some great advice on topics ranging from blogging to Twitter tips.   Watch the video online.  Click Here.

If you are interested in seeing Kendra Ramirez in person she will be speaking July 22nd at the InnerCircles Women’s Networking event hosted by InnerWorks LLC.com Click Here for details.

A useful tool for following the online event chatter is Twitter Search. The #METSCenter tag was used for this event. You can check out the discussion by clicking here.

For those of you reading who attending the event you may have met a few people that you want to follow on Twitter. I parsed the Twitter Search pages and I believe most of these people were in attendance.

@bobgarrett
@TimDeRosett
@Curtisinc
@jwestwood
@JaneVCI
@writetechnology
@coachbriany
@jwestwood
@AnnLightfoot
@CarrieCMoore
@cjvenneman
@OakleyAftrHours
@JudiCogen
@JoeKikta
@XUBlueBlob
@DaveHatter
@ParsonsC
@CinWomenBlogger