Web 4.0: R U Ready?

Breakout session: Social media basics & core training

Serena Ehrlich, Social Programs/Viral Weaponry Leader at Startup Army

Serena’s interactive presentation style made this session of the PRSA-LA workshop on social media highly informative, but difficult to document. Thankfully, she uploaded her slides to docstoc.com, so you can see for yourself what she talked about.

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BOOK REVIEW

Marketing to the Social Web: How Digital Customer Communities Build Your Business.

By Larry Weber, 2009: John Wiley & Sons

IBSN: 978-0470-41097-4

Take Away Message:

The digital consumer is not content to be a passive receiver of marketing messages. Therefore, marketers need to think about ways to use social media tools to become aggregators of content that serves the immediate information needs of each digital consumer.

REVIEW

Unlike other books on the subject, this one is not saying that the professions of marketing and public relations are undergoing a radical transformation. No. Larry Weber’s objective in his book, Marketing to the Social Web, is to provide a sketch of a specific market segment: the digital consumer.

Marketing: The next generation

In fact, Weber illustrates how the principles that shaped traditional methods for reach potential consumers still hold. Effective marketing speaks directly to the needs of the consumer, solves their problems. Good public relations influences opinions and shapes conversations. The goals have not really changed for marketing or public relations professions.

The only difference is that mass marketing is no longer likely to lead to a sale. More than ever, it is essential for the marketer to understand not just their niche, but the exact position the product offering has taken in that niche.

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