#SoFresh #StL

I’m a bit of a dork. I wear thick glasses. I’m more than a little bit social. I’m a marketer. I’m volunteering today at Social Fresh marketing conference at the St. Louis Millennium Hotel. I attend a lot of social media and marketing conferences and events, and this is one of the better events I’ve attended since relocating to the great St. Louis area in 2009.

I just left a session on “sustainable, tools-agnostic social media strategy” lead by Jay Baer of ConvinceandConvert.com. Throughout the conference today, there are two sessions at each time slot, meaning that attendees can essentially attend half of the day’s sessions at best. In talking with a colleague who’d attended the opposite session as me at 9 a.m., I decided it may be worth sharing some of my notes today for attendees who miss the sessions I attend.

Jay Baer spoke on a topic I’m passionate about in my professional life; strategy. I can’t count the number of times I’ve sat in “social media” workshops and heard “social media experts” spend their time speaking on specific tools and specific applications. With tools that are constantly changing, the value of the content of those sessions has a limited shelf life. I believe that the real social media experts understand marketing, voice, brand management, and how to be social. Apparently Jay Baer does, too.

Jay outlined a 7 step process on being social:

1. Build an Ark

2. Listen – to what your audiences and competitors are saying and pay attention to where they’re saying it

3. What’s the Point? – i.e why is your company using social media; to build awareness, to make sales, or to increase loyalty?

4. Analyze your Audience – Who is your audience and where are they online? What kind of information do they want and are they ready for? Know what kind of content your audience wants and is ready for (based on their level of engagement with your company/product/brand, but also based on their “social technographic“)

5. Find Your “One Thing” – Decide what the thing is that makes people feel the soul of your organization or company, because that’s the thing that people will connect with. Your business should be about more than a logo or product attributes. Find the soul of your business.

6. Select an Outpost – Figure out where your audiences lie and meet them there. Don’t build a presence via a certain social media presence and expect your audience to follow it if they’re not already using that platform.

7. Measure Impact – match your metrics to your goals (see point #3; are you building awareness, making sales, or encouraging loyalty?)

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The next session I’ll be attending is at 11:30 a.m. and is called “Branding within Social Media”. The session description says, “messaging, visual branding, personal brands and more”. Panelists are Matt Browne (Lending Tree), Steve Parker (Levelwing Media), Kelly Doria (Scottrade), Stephen Linn (CMT/MTV Networks), Thesesa Beffa (Conversations.net).

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Finally, if you’re attending #sofresh today, please #sayhitothefunk. I’m on twitter as @milligfunk, and I’m one of the green-shirted volunteers today at the event. Social media is about being social, and real life interactions add real value to the blogosphere, the twitterverse and this small town girl’s guide to life in rural Missouri.