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Blog World Expo 2009 Reviewed

vegas

I’m back from the panel presentation I blogged about last month and wanted to share my Vegas experience with you.

First and foremost, I talked a lot about word-of-click advertising. People are using “social media” to learn as much as they can about a company they are doing business with. It’s not new. Our neighborhoods have always done this: over the back fence, at the post office or the water cooler. And, now people use online tools to do the same thing.

What one attendee learned

Julie Gallaher attended my presentation and here is a little of what she reported back to her newsletter:

“Pierre Martell is a young Canadian home builder who is exclusively using social media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.) to market his business.  He said that people often ask him how much time he spends online marketing his business.  He said – “I spend a lot of time online, but it’s really paying off.”

I wanted to send huge thanks and congratulations to my fellow panelists. It was a great panel; with great action items for the audience. For my blog readers; here are a few of the big lessons we heard regularly at the conference.

Some big lessons reenforced at Blog World Expo:

  1. Small business need to be online; but they don’t have to be online everywhere. Use your skills: photographers use Flickr to great effect, and writers are natural bloggers
  2. Social media allows people to get to know you, like you and trust you before you meet them in real life
  3. Don’t engage without listening first; hear what your clients think, learn how the social media you choose operates and slowly engage

Las Vegas: an impressive city

I always like visiting Las Vegas. It’s a city that makes people smile at every turn. This was my fourth visit to Vegas and my biggest tip for people heading down to the casinos, those massive buildings are a lot farther apart that you think: comfortable footwear is a must.

Going to Blog World Expo

vegas-blog-world-martell-homes

I’m really pumped. In about a month I’m headed to Vegas! No, I’m not going for a bachelor party. Nice guess. I’m actually heading down for business.

I’ve been asked to be a panelist at an amazing web conference in Nevada, the Blog World Expo. One of the biggest web conferences in Vegas.

Jason Falls of Social Media Explorer put together this really great panel; in his note to the participants he called The Martell Experience “my favourite social media case study” (you can read more about what he has to say about our team here) and here is a bit of what he had to say about the people appearing with me on the stage:

Our moderator is going to be Arik Hanson – a fine social media and internet marketing mind and blogger who is principal of his own communications firm in Minneapolis. He is online at Arikhanson.com

Becky McCray – Brings two important perspectives to this panel as a small business owner but also the mastermind behind Smallbizsurvival.com – one of the best small biz resources for Web 2.0 thinking out there. She’s a veteran of the speaking circuit and knows here stuff.

Natasha Westcoat is one of the leading contemporary artists of our time and has leveraged social media successfully for a few years now to distribute, promote and sell her work, which is on display in many corporate and private collections around the country. Find her at Natashawescoat.com

Mack Collier is one of the leading social media thinkers out there. He’s the author of The Viral Garden and is a small business owner himself (http://mackcollier.com) as a social media consultant and mentor. His client work includes several small business success stories.

As Jason says, “The panel isn’t just case studies on small businesses leveraging social media and how they went about planning and doing it, but also giving small business owners some useful next steps.”

So, at 4:45 p.m Vegas time on Saturday, Oct. 17. I’ll be sharing the Martell Experience with these folks and the massive audience at Blog World Expo. But I’m blogging about it now so you can be part of the action!

What should I tell the Vegas crowd? Would any of our customers, staff or friends want me to mention anything specific?

Please leave a comment. My presentation for Blog World Expo will get better with your help.