More Takeaways from South By…

Below is a few things that stuck out to me from my second day of panels and presentations at South by Southwest. If you would like to check out my notes from Day One, click here.

I ate some incredible food. The culinary highlight was Enoteca’s Fried Risotto Balls. I never knew something could taste so good. But Torchy’s tacos and cheese dip were a CLOSE second. (Sorry, I couldn’t write about Austin without talking about food, now could I? You know me better than that!)

I had the rare opportunity to catch up with friends from high school and college. Sadly I often take for granted friends from seasons past who are scattered about and allow me to pick up right where I left off. I even got to hang out with a few new friends. (Conferences are great for that!)

AND I learned a lot of geeky stuff.

Here are the notes:

Panel: How to Personalize Without Being Creepy

Noah Weiss – foursquare
Vijay Ravindran
Washington Post
Mat Harris
– bizgreet
Jen King
– UC Berkley
Hugo Liu
– Hunch (simplify people’s ability for discovering things they like)

Why personalization?
Life is too short to see a static website.

But trust is fleeting. Only need to violate once.

Keys to Appropriate Personalization
1. Clear expectations.
2. Clear pathway to why and how.
3. Clear controls to turn-off.

The physical world hasn’t been opt in. Online has opportunity to lead in this space.

Panel: How to Value a Facebook Fan

Jascha Kaykas-Wolff – Involver
Josh Constine – Inside Facebook
Melissa Parrish – Forrester Research
Michael Scissons – Syncapse
Paul Ollinger – Facebook

4 variables in determining the value of a Facebook fan:
1. Potential profit per customer
2. Fan acquisition method and cost
3. Fans brand affinity: willingness to click and share
4. Influence of fan: online and offline reach

Approach Facebook fans as if their value is zero. Because it is UNTIL you activate them to do something. You need to have strategy for what you do with Facebook fans once you have them.

Influence is not just about numbers. It’s about the whole context of a person.

Correlation between additional $ spend and Facebook fan is not necessarily based on money spent after or because of fan interaction.

Use Facebook fan insights to learn more about your customers and products. Know what is leading to engagement.

Consider Facebook as an extension of your core digital assets.

Define your communications strategy, and be consistent.

Bottom line: To derive value from a fan you need to deliver value.

Keynote: Gary Vaynerchuk, author of Thank You Economy

On Context…
If content is king, context is God.
In a world where more content is being created than ever, context is more important than ever.

On What Really Matters…
Do you really have a grasp of the problem you are trying to solve?
Do you really care about the end consumer?

On Traditional Media...
Moms aren’t listening to the radio or looking at billboards, she’s talking on the phone..or texting.
I don’t dislike traditional media. It’s just overpriced.
Media has been all push for too long.

On Humanizing Things…
The outside dog (1950) is now the inside dog (2010). We humanize things. And we humanize brands.

On Email…
We ruined email. We hate it now. Even if it is a personalized deal, it still annoys us.
The problem is that we do all the talking. We hate people like that.

On What’s Appropriate in Social Media…
Don’t try to close the deal too fast.
It’s a cocktail party.

On Standing Out…
How do you breakthrough?
Care more.
People are going to start battling on the care front.

On Social Media Campaigns…
There is no such thing as a social media campaign. It’s a one night stand. Old Spice is perfect example of what not to do in the Thank You Economy.

On Tooting Your Own Horn…
When someone says something awesome about you and you RT, it’s bragging! Actually it’s worse than bragging.

All in all I had a great time in Austin. It is definitely up there with Southern California on my list of places I could live someday.

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Lindsey has a sincere love for her precious dogs Molly and Maisy, a good red wine and the Delta Sky Club.

Please note: I reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive or off-topic.