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1105 Meet-Up: Sequestration & Government Events, Mobile & Government Workforce

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We participated in a great meeting with top notch leaders in the information technology community. With all the buzz around sequestration and  potential effects on events, we thought this was a timely piece. This guest post from GovEvents recaps the insights and discussions. The original posting of this blog can be found here.

 

1105 Meet-Up: Sequestration & Government Events, Mobile & Government Workforce

Vienna, VA—1105 Media Group, organizers of the FOSE and GovSec Conferences & Expos, hosted a FOSE 2013 Blogger & Speaker Meet-up Thursday, March 21 at 1105 Media Group offices in Vienna, VA. Invitation-only and held specifically for government technology influencers, the FOSE 2013 Blogger & Speaker Meet-up is the fifth in an ongoing series of high-level meetings, where FOSE speakers and bloggers are given an opportunity to discuss significant topics including sequestration and government events, mobile and the government workforce, cybersecurity and more.

This meet-up included influencers Brand Niemann, Ph.D., Director and Senior Enterprise Architect – Data Scientist at Semantic Community, Ghadi Ben-Yehuda,  Director of Innovation and Social Media for IBM Center for The Business of Government., Brad Barker, Director of Professional Services at Master Key Consulting and Young AFCEANs  National Capitol Region President , Ajay Budhraja, Chief Technology Officer, EOIR at the United States Department of Justice, and Nick Wakeman, Editor-in-Chief at Washington Technology. The meet-up was also attended by representatives from the Capital Area Food Bank and GovEvents.

 

After brief introductions, the topic of sequestration and government events was first to arise. Program Manager for GovEvents, Stacie Flynn, provided details on how the government events industry is currently being affected by sequestration. She noted that while sequestration will not help the already ailing events industry due to travel restrictions and continued backlash of conference overspending, only a few conferences have been cancelled since it actually took effect on March 1. Stacie also announced that GovEvents will soon be rolling out a new program aimed at assisting event organizers with delivering content through a virtual conferencing platform (keep an eye out for details!).

This announcement led into a discussion of virtual conferences and webcasts, praising them for their cost-cutting abilities, while also sharing the challenges of online events, such as lack of interaction and captivation of viewers. In brainstorming, the group came up with several ways webcasts and virtual conferences could be enhanced to create an extensive engagement span of viewers:

  • Create ways to multi-task within the webcast/virtual forum—many people will gravitate to email or other tasks while participating in a webcast.
  • Change the value proposition of what attendees expect to gain from the webcast/virtual forum.
  • Speakers–get right to the point! Too much ‘pipe-laying’ causes distraction to come easily to the viewer.

The topic of mobile and the government workforce was headed up by Ghadi Ben-Yehuda from IBM Center for The Business of Government, discussing the upside of mobile’s flexibility—allowing professionals to work virtually from anywhere, at any time. However, it was noted by others in the room that the flexibility mobile allows becomes a management priority when employees telework regularly. Proper training and management of both managers and employees was deemed the ultimate key to a sound teleworking staff.

Be sure to stop by GovEvents booth at FOSE 2013, May 14-16 in DC!

GovEvents is the premier web portal for all Government & Military events worldwide.

MAM Summit Recap: Facebook IS Losing Its Cool

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This blog post is written by guest blogger Laura Harders

Since I’m a blogger & social media consultant, I really gleaned a lot from the social media geared sessions at the Mid-Atlantic Marketing Summit in Baltimore. Directly following lunch, I had the pleasure on sitting in on the session “Is Facebook Losing Its Cool” with Moderator Rob Pegoraro, and speakers: Mitch Arnowitz, Managing Director of Tuvel Communications; Geoff Livingston, author & marketing strategist; Cary Lawrence, VP of Business Development at Social Code; and Kari Mitchell, Director of Digital Marketing at HZDG.

My takeaways from the session included:

1. Facebook IS losing its cool (almost unanimous amongst the panel of speakers).

2. Facebook is still an important social network and place where the largest audience is.

Some of the “issues” with Facebook that were discussed deal with the privacy perception and continual changes. I know for many bloggers and marketers, the change in reach of your message has been frustrating. Just because you have fans, doesn’t mean they will see your content. You now have to “pay to play”, in other words, you need to pay for Facebook post promotion and advertising in order for your fans to see your content in their news feed.

Some other takeaways for me:

  • Facebook usage has declined among young people.
  • Facebook has become more “noisy.”
  • Younger users are more likely to “like” a brand than older users.
  • Older users are more likely to click thru ads than younger users.
  • Facebook advertising is now an opportunity to amplify your message.
  • Facebook’s Timeline feature allows ongoing conversations with a readable thread, unlike other social platforms.
  • Out of all four panel members, only one “friends” their clients on Facebook. The majority of the speakers felt that their personal FB account was reserved for family & close friends, a smaller network.
  • Key to Facebook marketing is to gain “shares” as social validation for your brand & message.

Is Facebook losing its cool? Yes it is– for both users & brands. And while it’s still one of the predominant social media platforms, the importance of targeting other niche networks is critical, as well as creating custom approaches & goals on a variety of social media platforms.

Now its your turn! Do you agree with the panel conclusion that Facebook’s loosing its mojo? Please let us know in the comments below.

Laura Harders is a blogger and social media consultant living in the Washington DC metropolitan area. Besides working with small businesses to develop their social media marketing strategy and content, she also runs a popular, local deal blog, Beltway Bargain Mom, and teaches Coupon Classes.

HOW TO: Effectively Use Pinterest for Events

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Hi, I’m Kari, and I’m a Pinterest addict.

Pinterest for EventsI was wary about it at first (“Ugh, not another social network!”), but after using it for a few months, I totally see what the attraction is and why it’s driving more traffic than Google+, YouTube and LinkedIn combined. People love pictures, and Pinterest capitalizes on that.

Brands are slowly beginning to pick up on this popularity and leveraging it as part of their social media marketing efforts. And events are no different. They have a unique opportunity to further engage attendees and convey information through a more visual medium. A picture paints a thousand words, and events can tell an engaging story on Pinterest.

Here are 5 tips to help you get started on Pinterest to promote your event:

Make your pins visually compelling. On Pinterest, visual rules the day. This is what makes Pinterest so popular – images that compel users to learn more. Take an inventory of photos you have that will be of visual appeal, such as speaker photos, venue photos, infographics, and even videos (yep, you can pin those too!).

Create well-organized & relevant boards. Because Pinterest gives users the option to follow a person (and all of their boards) or just individual boards created by a person, it’s important to plan your boards to appeal to different interests your attendees will have. For example, if you offer several tracks of conference sessions, consider creating a board for each track that includes photos of speakers. Have photos from last year’s show? Create a special board to share them.

Categorize your boards properly. Apart from just browsing through the pins of the people they’re following, Pinterest users like to browse through Pinterest categories to find new things from people they don’t follow, so make sure you categorize your boards appropriately. You can only add a board to one category, so make it count! Think about where your attendees would go to find the information you’re providing, depending on what kind of content your event offers.

Include descriptions with keywords. As I started using Pinterest more, I quickly realized that simply pinning a photo with a description like “Love this!” or “Yum!” wouldn’t give it proper context or exposure. The description not only tells others what they’re looking at and why you pinned it, but helps your pins to get found. If someone searches for a specific keyword on Pinterest, pins containing that keyword come up in results – so you don’t want to miss that opportunity! Think of it like SEO for Pinterest.

Mix it up, don’t just broadcast. The same rules of social media engagement apply here as they do on any other social network. Don’t just broadcast your own content on Pinterest, but mix it up with relevant content from other sources. Look for what others are pinning related to your event or event topics. One idea is to create a Speakers board and pin articles or posts from your speakers about what they’ll be talking about at your event (that include an image). Note: there has been some recent controversy regarding whether content shared by users on Pinterest violates copyright (there are lots of articles out there about this, but here are a few). While there hasn’t been a definitive ruling on this yet, it’s best to remain on the safe side and pin content that you either own, or have permission to pin (i.e. you’ve been given direct permission, such as from your speakers or partners, or the website clearly allows anyone to pin their content on Pinterest).

Have you used Pinterest for an event like a conference or tradeshow? What tips would you offer?