Big Mouth Strikes - A Day In The Life Of A Social Media Conference

The Social Media World Forum, big name, big ambitions, big trouble. That's where I went the other day. A gathering of the clans of social media at Olympia in London. On checking out the agenda I decided to go on Day 2, primarly for the conference sessions. There were 4 or 5 sessions all with beautifully copywritten titles to whet the appetite. I got to the event a tad late as I had decided to walk from my 'conveniently located for Olympia' hotel - about 2 miles away as it turned out. Not to worry. The first peculiar thing on arrival at the venue was the only access to the halls was via a rather large lift that was 'manned' all day by a member of staff whose sole job was to 'push the 3rd floor button', not seen the like of that in a while I have to say.

First up was the conference Chairperson and then a keynote speech from someone I can't remember mainly because I missed both of these as I was trudging across West London at the time. I finally sneaked into the theatre style conference hall and settled down into my rather comfy cinema seat. I was awash with technology and vigrously set-up my netbook, iPod Touch and Blackberry in a race to see which would connect to the Wifi first. All set, here we go.

Good grief! I was stopped in my tracks as the sassy tones of Chairperson Penny Power wafted over the auditorium. I looked up from my abundant technology and saw a vision to match the voice and was a immediately jogged out of my morning malaise.

Session One: SOCIAL NETWORK ADVERTISING & MONITIZATION

Good presentation by a guy from COI on the RAF gunner recruitment campaign, where he nicely demonstrated the integration of various SM channels and how they had properly engaged with RAF crew in Afghanistan and the public back home. It was actually a very radical and I have to say brave approach, which was surprising in such a sensitive 'war' situation, for example they used video blogs from gunners in the front-line. Only thing missing was the results, they were trying to recruit 700 or so gunners, I'm not sure if they hit that target and if so how much could be attributed to the SM campaign.

Next up a nice fella whose company did some sort of integrated affiliate style stuff to allow bloggers and others to earn cash by linking from their blogs/twitter acccounts to e-commerce web sites. I presume they would get a small slice of the action for every sale from their link. My only thought was - Bloggers don't give up your day job.

Then a panel of 'experts' who took more time introducing themselves and their wares than most panels take discussing the subject. Penny got stuck into them basically saying 'get a move on' in not so many words. Then my first audible guffaw as one of them used the word 'Glocal' and I more or less sprayed a mouthful of coffee onto the person in front. They talked about something or perhaps it was nothing it was hard to see beyond the blandness. Unfortunately industry experts aren't necessarily good performers on a stage, not their fault.

Panel over, my mind turned back to the fragrant Penny and a rogue tweet slipped out.

Penny Power is a bit foxy I have say and doing a great job hosting the conference too. #smwf

I then think to myself 'it'd be a good idea to say Hi to Penny during the break' but she was much in demand so I didn't bother and got another coffee.

Session Two: SOCIAL MEDIA AND PR

A PR guy gets up and does his stuff which passed me by a bit, something about corporate crises and the Eurostar 'stuck in a tunnel' tweets thing. I think the main point was say your sorry quickly and keep people informed, cant argue with that.

Then comes a guy called Dirk who'd flown across 5 continents just to be there. Unfortunately his brain and mouth were still going at 300mph over Greenland as he machine-gunned stat after stat on the demise of the newspaper printing press. fucking hell Dirky boy SLOW DOWN my pen's melting!!.

There was then a panel discussion before which we were asked by some of Penny's helpers to write down on a piece of paper a question we'd like to ask the panel. I wrote 'How would you have dealt (real time) with the Jan Moir Twitterstorm?'. Now that is a perfect question for a panel but the buggers didn't ask it! I felt cheated.

Lunch break: This consisted of an egg banjo and bottle of water at a little mobile cafe consumed sat on one of those bendy plastic garden chairs £2.20 all-in, bargain.

Session Three: B2B SOCIAL NETWORKS: SOCIAL MEDIA IN BUSINESS & POLITICS

Now this was what I was really interested in a session on b2b marketing, my passion. But unfortunately it was just a panel discussion and sort of revolved around what Linkedin is and one or two other 'professional' networks and a few stats with lots of noughts on the end. I was beginning to get amped-up on coffee and my mind was drifting, so I got stuck into some pithy tweets requesting that someone should show us an end-to-end b2b case study with nice tables, charts, plenty of results metrics and insights.

Another rogue tweet slipped out.

I'd like to flirt with Penny Power, just flirt mind #smwf

Session 4: THE FUTURE OF SOCIAL MEDIA

Big subject, big ambitions, big success in my book. I guy called Adam did a great job detailing a cracking case study and clearly describing 10 trends to look out for getting me quite excited.

Then some strange goings on started to appear in my Twitterstream. I got this from someone in the conference hall.

RT @Adventurebaby: I'd like to flirt with Penny Power, just flirt mind #smwf I'm telling Thomas

Thomas, whose Thomas? I thought in mild panic as a caffeine overdose sped through my mind I put 2 and 2 together and tweeted back accordingly.

@RebeccaIntuit I'm going to hide now :-)

Then I got this tweet from Penny Power herself!

@Adventurebaby - can you say hi at the end of the day? would be interested to meet.

@pennypower of course

Then this from RebeccaIntuit.

@Adventurebaby he's here, I will show you ;)

Gulp.

AND THEN THIS FROM A CERTAIN @Thomaspower!!!!

@Adventurebaby my wife @pennypower is foxy?

And then my world collapsed, as a rather burly Thomas Power mounted the stage to take part in the final panel discussion chaired by the one and only Mrs Power.

Double gulp. My mind raced as I weighed up the options, all seemingly doomed from my point of view. There I was in second row, hemmed in far left of the stage, Penny Power at the podium and her husband on the panel and then suddenly I realised, I had a train to catch and had to leave the conference during the panel discussion.

I started to very quietly shut down the array of technology and devices I had. Just before I had sent a final couple of tweets in a desparate attempt to recover the situation.

@PennyPower BTW you've done a great job today, very entertaining. Thanks

@pennypower gotta get a train, you're on stage and Mr Power is after me ...eeek he looks handy :-) once again thanks

@thomaspower I'm sure you agree :-)

Now the problem was, how do I leave the conference theatre without drawing attention to myself, an embarassing enough situation in normal circumstances, I was obviously near to heart failure. Mr Power was speaking, Penny was speaking, I cant leave now! So just like I used to do when surfing waiting for a wave surge to jump into the water over some rocks I watched the discussion carefully, bag packed, the conversation ebbed, it moved onto another panel member, this was my moment. So very casually I got out of my seat and walked the full length of the stage, I almost whistled a nervous whistle. I got out of the exit and waited very anxiously for the lift to arrive to make good my escape.

Just to reassure you all, I got a DM from Penny later that evening and had a little e-mail exchange where I'm pretty sure I smoothed over the waters, to be fair I think Penny and Mr Power saw the funny side and took it all as a compliment. I certainly hope so.

Back to the conference. I think the take-away from these things is the seeing art of the possible, not the nuts and bolts mechanics of implementation. No-one will write your strategy and implement your SM campiagn for you. Just get on it with it, be courageous and go for it. Fortune favours the brave, and these are the people prepared to take the stage and present to an audience.

Bull Running For My Life

It’s not often in life you get an opportunity to experience the extremes of another nations’ culture. Think of an Italian at a 5 day test match, barmy army and all and you’ll get what I mean. But on my recent bog standard ‘Costa…’ holiday in Spain I took the opportunity to go bull running. Not without a great deal trepidation and hand-wringing. Firstly I had to persuade the family (wife, 3 kids) I would be careful, whatever that means at a bull run. Then I had to square my conscience, they don’t actually kill the bull by slow torture do they?, it’s part of their culture etc etc. Then I had to steel myself for a late night, it doesn’t start until 12.30am and finishes around 4.00am (way past my bedtime and I wanted to stay sober so it was a long evening). As we walked up to old town Calpe we decided there were no downsides, even getting gorged would in time become a scar and a terrific story you could dine out on for years, death – a rarity – would become a story for the wife and kids to relay.

The experience was absolutely mind-blowing. 3,000 people (pretty much all Spanish), small kids, mothers, grandmas and granddads, young Spanish lads trying to make a name for themselves and vetran bull runners with the scars to match. Non-existent Health and Safety, no police, marshalls or stewards, one ambulance…! The smallest village fete in the UK would have all this and more. Over 4 hours 6 bulls were let loose into one street, 150 yards long sort of fenced off either side with prison cell cages with bars just wide enough for a relatively slim man to slip through unhindered, and that’s about it. The whole audience just taunts, goads and generally try to wind-up each bull, even the little kids have their toys dangling from the end of poles trying to whack the bull as it goes past. Bottles, glasses, sticks are thrown at the bull, blokes hit them with long sticks and everyone dances about in front of the bull trying to get it to charge. When it does everyone rushes to the nearest cage and jumps through the bars to relative safety, the bull still butts the cage repeatedly (and they’ve got long horns), the bravest few never go into cages and dance around until it gives up and moves on to easier targets. We started of like wuss’s but by the end of the night high on adrenalin and a Spanish sized brandy we were going for it side by side with the locals (still with an eye on the cage of course). Oh by the way, the final bull was bought out and had fireworks attached to its’ horns, now that made it very very angry and me a little bit sick and ashamed for being there.

We saw a gorging and a few flippings which are unbelievable to witness live.

I’ve surfed some pretty big waves, walked about Moss Side at the wrong time of night, had some running battles with various football hooligans over the years, but the adrenalin rush, fear, excitement, disgust of your first bull run tops them all.

As an experience of culture there’s nothing so un-British.

Ice Cold In Whitby and Other Gloriousness-ness

We in Britain have just about had enough of the nagging cold we've been enduring for nigh on 3 months now. I know it's called Winter and a daytime temperature ranging from 0-4°C is nothing to write home about, but we really aren't comfortable as a nation with consistent weather over a sustained period of time - like a week. Sunshine, rain, wind, snow, ice, fog they are all equal imposters on the British pysche if they hang round long enough.

Joy abounded in the nation's hearts as we woke up this Sunday morning to a beautiful bright blue sky, early March sunshine with enough power to actually make it feel warm, even though a sharp frost greeted us to. Everybody I spoke to was alive with the possibilities of walks, lunches, outdoor games and trips out. Even the grumps who would spend such a day curtains drawn, curled up in bed watching telly or pulling up floorboards to throw on the fire recognised the gloriousness-ness of the day.

I then asked myself where would I most like to spend a day like today?. Well, one of the most beautiful, mesmerising and horrifying places I've ever had the pleasure to spend time in is Whitby, that chipped but still perfectly formed piece of coal perched on the North Yorkshire Coast.

I first came across Whitby whilst exploring the N. Yorks coastline in the hope of finding un-discovered surfbreaks, sleeping in the dead of winter 4 up in a Fiesta, breaking ice off our wetties and going for a Dawn Patrol at Sandsend, Staithes, Scarborough or Runswick. Whitby doesn't have it's own surfbreak, but it makes for a convenient break from the surf, which is how I discovered it. We'd often chug up the hill from Sandsend desparately trying to get some warmth into our near hypothermic bodies and stumble into town like a bunch of desparadoes from a Wild West film.

And Whitby has everything. From barnacled alleyways where you can still feel the breath of the Press Gangs on the back of your neck to a magnificently ruined 9th Century Abbey - a steep climb up 1,365 (this number is made-up) foot polished steps. Whitby is rammed full of ancient echoes, the Vikings had a few parties here, there's been hundreds of years of coal shipping and fishing marked by giant whale jawbones and the Captain Cook statue atop the north side of the Esk estuary. And more and more re-invention with a virtual Bram Stoker theme park weaved into the fabric of the place, plus a genuine working port that conjures up the possibilities of adventure beyond the horizon and foreign lands. And before you've finished it's also a 1950's English seaside resort with the accompanying fish, chips, arcades, candy floss, iffy characters and tat shops. A most perfect weekend away, any longer mind and you might end up stowing away on a steam packet back to you're own world.

You Can't Apologise - It's The Law

In my view today saw the restoration of some form of natural order following Man City's demolition of the Caligularian Citadel that is Chelsea FC. Not from any sporting perspective, although that was gratefully received, but from the obvious guilt-ridden burden John Terry and his team mates carried into the match that weighed so heavily on them as they imploded like weaklings in the face of a far mightier power.

Footballers are 'lads' at heart, I'm one too, and there are many unwritten laws that glue the society of male friends together. They vary from low-level misdameanours like not standing your round, or being flaky about arrangements made as a group, to severe. When I say severe, I mean so unforgivable that they break the invisible but powerful bond of male friendship. Getting off with you mate's current girlfriend is one that will get you exiled forever and everyone recognises that one. But more subtle, less obvious but equally punishable 'law-breaking' include going out with you mate's sister and/or going out with a girl one of your mates has had a proper relationship with, loved, been hurt by, had a child by. This is the 'crime' that John Terry committed, one that puts his position as a trusted friend and colleague in servere jeopardy with all his Chelsea and England team mates. Whilst the City team and fans rallied magnificently around Wayne Bridge it is evident that his Chelsea team mates and most of the right-minded Chelsea fans cannot bring themselves to do so.

No-one can lord it over their friends in this way and have the stupidity and temerity to expect everything to be alright whatever powerful alpha-male position they may think they have. The deep-seated understanding lads have about their relationships almost exclusively unsaid make that sort of behaviour destroy the moral code and therefore everything. Mates will go to the ends of the earth for each other, even lay their lives on the line but once law has been broken they can barely shake hands. I applaud Wayne Bridge for his stance even if John Terry grovels publicly and apologises for his unforgivable behaviour no British bloke will really let him off the hook because they can all put themselves in Bridge's boots and know exactly what they would do.

Egg Banjos and Other Exploding Myths

What is it about people who don’t do Twitter?. Unfortunately their knowledge and understanding is fuelled by a sceptical establishment media in freefall who can’t find the ripcord and the tedious celebrity tweeter, equally clueless for simply putting out and not giving a whole lot back. Non-Twitterers assume it’s all about [insert celebrity Twitdiot of your choice] and/or telling people ‘what you‘re having for breakfast’. Well, it might be for some of the people some of the time, but certainly not for all of the people all of the time.

I’ve spent just over a year on Twitter; including the first 4 months forgetting I’d actually signed-up, initially following footballer twitter accounts (they of course have since been all but closed down) and wondering why anyone would want to know what I had for breakfast. Then I had some sort of epiphany, nigh on blind panic, that in my job, it was my job to get onboard and actually learn and experience the sharp-end of social media. The first fumbling steps are but a dim and distant memory, but I’m more than certain that they were just that. The treacle we’ve all got to trudge through in the early days sucked at my legs drawing me ever deeper into the mire of ‘can’t be bothered’.

Then something started to happen after near enough 2 weeks of solid commitment. I had done the usual and followed like crazy in the hope that a beam of light might be reflected back whilst fearing I was too fragile to survive any knock-backs. I started to feel the cool, cynical and sassy ‘love’ that Twitter gives back. People didn’t really make allowances for my kindergarten skills, but by the same token re-span my plates just as they were in severe wobble mode. I would get paranoid if I didn’t get any @ replies for a few days and would think that someone who had @ replied me once then not again for a while actually thought I was a knob and regretted ever speaking to me. Of course the Holy Grail of a Re-Tweet was never even on the agenda.

I started to organize myself into little groups of chums aligned to different interests I had. Then started to find some unbelievably funny, peculiar and most of all creative people. Playing with Twitter, pushing the boundaries, turning it into something else that worked for them. Some amazing Twitter ‘brands’ started to emerge, true characters with burst mains pipe personalities gushing out of them. I’ve seen information, enlightenment, cause and effect all coming to the fore and most importantly the Twitter ‘touch’ - like a roadside telecomm box of a thousand coloured wires pulsing with connections.

So there you have it, not at all about fuckwit celebs or foodstuffs. Having said that, a frequently recurring question I get is ‘what is an Egg Banjo?’ as most Saturday mornings, my itinerary Tweet of the day often includes ‘..lunch (egg banjo)’. It’s actually a term me and my surfing mates used to use (although I’ve since found out it’s a well used phrase in British military circles) for a fried egg in a bap, baguette or sliced bread, often scoffed ravenously in the back of a Camper Van after a dawn patrol. The beauty of it is that when you first bite into it the yolk invariably bursts dripping under gravity onto your shirt which requires the banjo action of one hand to brush it away. Simple and fun really - why not give it a go.

Virgin’ On the Ridiculous – 39 Steps to Customer Service

After a rather good run of form with the Virgin Trains service from Macc to London; I do that trip maybe 8-12 times a year, I had a rather unfortunate experience last week.

I was due to take the 10.55am from Macc on Tuesday 9th February to get down to London in good time for a conference (The #Hashjacking of #BR140 in the blogroll). Only the previous day my Twitter stream informed me that all trains from Manchester to London had been cancelled due to ‘overhead cable problems’ at Milton Keynes. Being a dutiful traveller I checked with the official information online and it declared the trains would be running as normal from 10.00am. With that reassuring information in mind I made my way to Macc station. Being as I work with a super-efficient HR lady, my ticket had been booked well in advance (bargain) including a seat reservation.

So a bit like a giddy kid on a school trip to the British Museum I hopped onto platform 2 with 10 minutes spare. Only to realise that there was only me and one other bloke waiting. I inquired of the station announcer to ascertain the circumstances who advised the 10.55am had been cancelled. ‘When’s the next train’ I asked slightly concerned, ‘we think 11.55am, but can’t be sure’ was the helpful reply. I would still just about make it in time for the 2pm conference start, in fact, a good excuse to miss that very stressful British experience of ‘networking’ before an event. So I popped down the road for an espresso, made a couple of calls and tut-tutted about the state of Britain with my fellow Virgin traveller.

Anyway, the 11.55am arrived pretty much on time, although was as packed as a cup final football special. I found my way to the carriage with my reserved seat, it was occupied. Realising that most of these people were also suffering from the cancelled train I decided not to take up my allocated spot, but found a single seat in a draughty corner between two carriages. On doing so I realised that there was no plug socket for my laptop so I would struggle to get more than 1/2hour out of my battery.

So most unusually I decided to make further enquiries with the Train Manager in an effort to get ‘upgraded’ to First Class which I had noticed had enough room to swing several cats, a Leopard and probably an Arctic Tiger. I found the manager’s little office and described my plight as sympathetically as I could and asked what he could do for me in the way of an upgrade. I wasn’t coming on the ‘big I am’ although I did mention my company spends an awful lot of money with Virgin, I would like to think that whether I was Mrs Miggins or Lord Richard ‘effing’ Branson himself I’d be treated fairly and with some sympathy. He busily tip-tapped away in some sort of handheld device and declared quite unashamedly that it would be £150 for the pleasure. I again reiterated my situation with full-on puppy dog eyes and asked if he could do me a deal?.

‘Nah can’t do that’ he said,
‘Why not I said, you’re in charge of the train, you could run a herd of wildebeest through first class and know one would notice’.
Nervous blank look from Simon the Train Manager (I knew that cos he had a badge).
‘I want to speak to you’re boss’
‘You’ll have to speak to Customer Services’
‘I don’t want to speak to them I want to speak to your boss’
‘No, I can’t even get to speak to her’
‘What’s her name, email, or telephone number?’
‘Not telling’
‘Yer what… I want to complain about you and won’t tell me the name of your boss?’
‘Just send a letter in to customer service’
‘No I want to send an e-mail to your boss right now, why can’t you let me have her e-mail address’
‘Not allowed to… it’s the system’

Exasperated I walk off get a coffee and settle down in the seat in the draughty corner.

I wasn’t going to let this lie, so tweeted my displeasure using the #virgintrains hashtag in the hope that somebody might be bothered to respond. Nothing.

I whinged on about Virgin at the conference via Twitter. Still nothing. Then the next day I got a tweet from a Virgin train driver saying that @virgintrains were on Twitter and I should try my luck there. So I sent this tweet

‘@virgintrains I want to speak to Simon's (train manager 11.55am from Macc 9th Feb) boss, I want to discuss you're appalling customer service’

To date not a dicky bird. I really don’t know what I’m expecting now, not a lot really but if Virgin think I’m going to use their so-called customer service channels to make a complaint when I can use more convenient routes they’ve got another thing coming.

I’m beginning to think this is Branson’s revenge for getting his fingers burnt for buying the publishing rights for our songs for a tidy sum back in the day. If it is, it’s one of life’s real mash-ups.

The #HashJacking of #BR140

I had the great pleasure of attending the Brand Republic 'Winning Formulas To Maximise The Potential Of Twitter' workshop yesterday. They did a great pre-workshop job interacting with me and making sure I prepared for the day. The information booklet supplied was also very informative and I was particularly struck by the 'Participation and Interactivity' section which advised delegates Prepare; Be vocal!; Get chatting; and Let us know your thoughts.

Well here we go. The abiding memory for me apart from telling the guy from Kraft Foods to never, ever change the Cadbury's chocolate recipe was the hashjacking of the conference hashtag #BR140. I love these sort of hashtags, they allow you to connect with people on Twitter before an event and follow everyone's comments during and post an event. They also allow you to 'follow' the event on Twitter if you are not attending, enabling live updates from delegates, the event organisers and other people following. Some events, including this one, also have a live big screen 'Twitterfall' of all the tweets with the hashtag. Always very interesting and entertaining to see your own tweets on the big screen. Being an avid Twitterer I of course contributed to the hashtag with my own mix of pithy comment, useful insight and occassional drivel. For example, I was staggrered when the representative from the Labour Party referred to the 'right-wing Blogosphere' and tweeted accordingly.

Then the most amazing and I have to say hilarious thing happened after the mid-afternoon break, the #BR140 Twitter stream on the big screen started to be populated by hashjackers, with comments such as:-

#br140 Leave now and beat the queue for the urinal

I've dropped £20 somewhere around the 5th row, can anyone spot it? #br140

Let's forget all this boring Internet rubbish and just put our car keys in a big pot... #br140

Does anyone know if these Custard Creams are vegan-friendly? #br140

Can you help a brother out? I'm locked in the third cubicle of the gents with no paper. #br140

All this talk of SM is making me frisky, anyone for some S&M after hours? #br140

Check out the hashtag for the full stream. It was quite an experience, I was literally transfixed to my I-phone and the big screen as more and more jackers joined in and the comments got funnier and funnier. Eventually even pornbots started to contribute.

The switched on Twitterati amongst the audience could see this happening and were starting to chuckle and even the occasional belly laugh. I was literally doubled up in pain, eyes streaming close to cardiac arrest.

All the while a fairly low key panel discussion was taking place on stage, from the likes of Dell, a fashion shop, a taxi firm and the Dogs Trust (that's comedy gold in itself of course).

Then it struck me like a bolt of lightning, the hashjackers were social media and Twitter savvy way beyond the organisers and the panel. I was learning more from the jackers about the power, corruption and lies of Twitter than any of the panel could elucidate. To be fair to the organisers they handled the situation brilliantly, saw the funny side and counter tweeted to keep the delegates and followers of the hashtag onside.

BREvents: Thank you to all the speakers and delegates that attended #br140 & to the hackers for that stint of light entertainment!

So a few valuable lessons to be learned:

1. Moderate your #hashtag
2. Think carefully about having a Twitterfall
3. Make sure the event is truly engaging and interactive

We've all got a lot to learn about Twitter and Social Media, but it's here to stay, is irreverent, in your face and instant - brands need to be cognisant of this and will need a sense of humour to survive.

In a strange way the whole event reminded me of the original film of The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three