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Hey gang, places for the Intranets and Social Media Workshops for Communicators, taking place at UNSW’s CBD Campus, Sydney on 28, 29 & 30 October 2008 are filling fast.

You need to call 02 8249 8352 to reserve yours.

Each workshop is one full day and with classes limited to 20 participants you are sure to get the one-on-one help you need, in the area that is most relevant for you. You can attend just one workshop, or multiple workshops at discounted rates.

PRICES:
$995 + GST for one workshop
$1795 + GST for two workshops
$2395 + GST for three workshops

WORKSHOP DETAILS:
28 October - Workshop One: Intranet Strategies (places almost sold out)

29 October - Workshop Two: Social Media 101 (places almost sold out)

30 October - Workshop Three: Social Media Strategy (places almost sold out)

DOWNLOAD THE BROCHURE HERE

These are the only workshops in Australia designed especially for communicators. You’ll walk away with new tools and ideas to immediately improve your current communication strategy.

Please see below for the full workshop outlines and agendas. If you have any questions or you would like to register, please call the Melcrum team on 02 8249 8352 or .

Workshop One: Intranet Strategies

Almost every organisation has an intranet and, increasingly, comms teams are taking charge of these vital sites. Yet there’s more to the intranet than just news, the challenge is to deliver a site that benefits everyone. This practical and interactive event will give participants an opportunity to share challenges and successes, as well as providing proven methodologies for planning and improving corporate intranets.

Agenda:

Understanding intranets
• The six phases of intranet evolution, explaining the current state of intranets and where to go next
• The four purposes of an intranet: content, communication, collaboration and activity
• What would the ideal intranet be like?
• Where does your intranet sit against the four fundamental purposes?

Innovative intranets
• Examples from the 2007 and 2008 winners of the global Intranet Innovation Awards, focusing on the communication and collaboration aspects of intranets

Understanding staff needs
• Why do staff come to an intranet?
• What does this mean for the intranet as a communications channel?
• Understanding staff needs using structured research techniques, such as one-on-one interviews, workplace observation and contextual inquiry

Delivering a successful intranet
• Introducing the “6×2 methodology” for planning intranet improvements
• Identifying the most effective activities to conduct in a 6-12 month plan
• Working with constraints such as staff and budget (plus many more!)
• Providing a practical approach for managing stakeholder expectations and

Your intranet questions answered
• An open Q&A session to cover the key challenges confronting you today
• Facilitated discussions to provide an opportunity to share ideas and insights
• Learn what has worked in other organisations, and what hasn’t

Workshop Two: Social Media 101 (delivered by me!)

Odds are your employees and clients are already using social media such as blogs, podcasts, social networking sites and other web 2.0 technologies - here’s your chance to bring your comms strategy up to speed with the most effective tools for truly engaging your audience. Melcrum’s Social Media 101 is a one-day training course designed specifically for communicators who want to learn more about the amazing developments of online communications.

Agenda:

What is social media?
• Get a grasp of the fundamental elements of social media, chart its rapid evolution, and see how it’s relevant for your organisation
The latest tools
• Learn about the latest social media tools from Facebook to Friendfeed and Twitter to Brightkite

The social media ethos
• Why social media is about being social, why Generations Y & Z don’t trust you, why ghost blogging is a big no-no and more ethical guidelines you must accept social media
• Blogs, micro blogging, wikis, video messaging, podcasts - learn how these tools can be used to increase dialogue and humanise a faceless corporation

Technology tips and tricks
• Discover the latest ways to create social media including video and audio editing tools, blog software, RSS feed creators and readers, and more

What’s next?
• See case study examples of organisations who have made social media work for them, derived from Melcrum’s own research and the best the Web has to offer
• Prepare for the next steps, including the mobile web explosion, 3D virtual environments, and 100% networked and connected employees

Workshop Three: Social Media Strategy (again, delivered by me!)

So you know what a social network is, you even contribute to a blog, but how can you actually start using any of these tools in your organisation. Furthermore, should you even try? Melcrum’s Social Media Strategy is a one-day training course designed specifically for communicators who want to start implementing social media in their organisation. Work through case studies and live exercises and take away endless ideas, concepts and inspiration to give your team a head start.

Agenda:

Outlining your organisation’s communication needs
• Who are you communicating with?
• Why do they need to hear from you (and why do you need to hear from them?)?
• Work through exercises and scenarios to see how social media can be employed to help improve organisational communication

Do it for yourself
• Explore a communication “crisis” and map out how the various interested publics can and should be catered for
• Consider the impact that “instant publishers” - be they external bloggers or employees- can have on your company’s reputation.
• Learn about blogstorms and how you can minimise the damage and recover quickly

The “ROI” question
• Discover some examples of how others have “sold” social media initiatives to their senior management (especially the super-skeptical “bean counters”), then formulate your own responses for your own company culture

“Building Rome in a Day”
• How to roll out social media initiatives so that you bring staff along with you, rather than alienate them and risk them undermining your project

Key resources
• Come away with websites to visit, software applications to try and experiment with, key books to pass on to colleagues and senior managers, and research and examples that provide the information you need to get started

—————– DO THIS NOW! —————

• DOWNLOAD THE BROCHURE
• Call and book your place now: 02 8249 8352
• and book your place now

Filed under: marketing, public speaking, tools
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• 5 marketing tips for tackling Twitter - iMediaConnection.com
  A very useful article on Twitter and how it can be used as a marketing platform, including case studies.

  Says the author, "Twitter is becoming an increasingly important platform for online communication and conversation. Numbers are hard to come by, but TechCrunch reports that Twitter has more than 1 million users (200,000 of which are active every week), and about 3 million messages are posted every day. These are still relatively small numbers, but the activity comes from an early-adopter segment that can be hard to reach using traditional marketing channels.

  Where there's an emerging communications channel, there are always marketers fearlessly jumping in, and the same is true of Twitter. Who's doing it well? How can you use Twitter for marketing your products or services? What are effective ways of engaging in this emerging dialogue without turning people off?"

  (tags: web2.0 socialmedia tools marketing twitter tips howto social media trends advertising article microblogging brand)
• Is email marketing still the most profitable way of doing business?
  BigResponse.com is an aussie company, currently advertising on facebook. Nothing they sell is new, and indeed AWeber and others have been doing this same stuff for a decade or more. But their ad copy on facebook is intriguing: "Email marketing is cheaper than direct mail, drives more traffic than Google AdWords and is more profitable period." I have no argument with their first point, nothing of importance to add to their second (I think the jury is still out on that one) but am intrigued by BigResponse's third claim - that email marketing is more profitable than AdWords. Does anyone else have any thoughts on this? What place does email marketing have (if any) in the age of 2.0?
  (tags: web2.0 marketing email software autoresponder adwords google advertising)

Filed under: clippings
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• To kill your computer at night or just put it to sleep
  The eco-implications of leaving your computer on at night but putting it into 'sleep' mode. Great idea from one of the commenters about adjusting your bios to have it auto-start before you turn up for work in the morning.
  (tags: green eco abc bios)

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• Free info kit that explains Enterprise2.0
  Courtesy of SocialText.com is a zip file and some archived webinars. As they say, "In this complimentary kit, gain access to industry analysts' perspectives on the market, hear from customers about how they are using Enterprise 2.0 technologies today, plus learn more about the technologies that comprise Enterprise 2.0, such as wikis, blogs and RSS". Includes chapter 9 of 'Wikinomics'and an October 2007 Gartner report on Team collaboration and social software. Note: the Gartner report cannot be printed or copied, but the other pdfs are all good to print and copy.
  (tags: web2.0 collaboration 2.0 webinar wiki)

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• Ning may be where Twitter ends and social groups start
  The divine Miss M [ @heidimiller ] adds more meat to the bones about how Ning has stolen a march on Twitter. Funny, because I've used Ning a few times and I'm not a great fan of its interface… Then again, I really like the new Facebook, so maybe I'm weird or something (no smart comments from you in the back row!)
  (tags: socialmedia socialnetworking twitter ning heidimiller facebook techcrunch web2.0)
• Twittermoms Shows Why Twitter Needs Groups
  A tip of the Akubra to @HeidiMiller - TechCrunch on how Ning is using its platform to enable groups of twitterers to interact
  (tags: twitter ning socialmedia socialnetworking socialnetworks heidimiller techcrunch web2.0 microblogging microblog social)

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“I love deadlines,” said the late great Douglas Adams, “I love the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.”

Which is my way of saying that I need to take two-three weeks off and get 50,000 words written for the Ark Group report on Social Media I’ve been commissioned to write.

If something really grabs me by the Rundle Malls I’ll post it, otherwise all will be quiet on the BetterComms front.

Enjoy the break!

Filed under: customer service, housekeeping
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Better Communication Results - 26 Sept 2008

Filed under: customer service, miscellaneous
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Over the last few of the talks I’ve given quite a few of the attendees have come up afterwards and asked me what books and publications I would recommend to ‘get up to speed’ with this new ‘Social Media’ thingy.

In order to make it easier for those who are curious, here are my top recommendations (in no particular order):

"Social Media, or how we stopped worrying and learnt to love communication: Your organisation and web2.0"

My and Trevor Cook’s respected and free report, now in its Third Edition.

Download now, for free.

Oh, did I mention it’s free?

Melcrum: How to use social media to engage employees
(disclaimer: I contributed to this report)

Melcrum: How to get started with podcasting in your organisation
(disclaimer: I wrote this report for Melcrum)

Ark Group: Making Knowledge Work - the arrival of Web 2.0
(disclaimer: I am writing a report on Social Media for Ark Group, currently with the working title Social Media and Social Networking: the new business communication landscape that swallows dinosaurs, due out Jan 2009)

Livingston Communications - White Paper No. 34: The Socialprise 

Also available as a free pdf download from his own site

Forrester Research: Web3D: The Next Major Internet Wave

The Gilbane Report: Volume 12, Number 10

Blogs & Wikis: Technologies for Enterprise Applications?

Note: these are publications that I have personally read; I am sure that there are hundreds of other books and publications equally or more worthy. This is my list — your mileage may differ…

Feel free to add to this list by leaving comments to this post.

Filed under: book review, customer service, miscellaneous, tools
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