Social Media, Social Networks, Mobility and Cloud services are impacting all aspects of life today. While “social” has been driven by personal/consumer enthusiasm, it has carried over to business interactions – external (with customers and prospects) and internally (between colleagues across the organization and with trusted partners).

Topics covered include:

• Changing Corporate Culture to Win Over Customers and Employees in the Social Age
• Big Data and the Social Customer – How to Turn Information into Insights, Interactions and Long Customer Relationships
• The Subscription Economy: Using Clouds, Marketplaces and Social Strategies to Connect with Today’s Customer
• ROI: How to determine the value of Social Initiatives to the Organization – How to determine the Value of The Social Customer to the Organization
• Beyond Marketing and Promotion: How Social Initiatives Are Being Used In Overlooked Areas To Help Businesses Compete in Today’s Market
• The Collaborative Organization: Tools and Tactics for Interacting in a Multi-channel, Multi-device World

Speakers include:

1. Paul Greenberg, Author of CRM at the Speed of Light
2. Anita Campbell, Publisher, Small Business Trends
3. Jeff Nolan, VP of Product Marketing, Get Satisfaction
4. Jeanne Hopkins, VP of Marketing, HubSpot
5. Robin Carey, CEO of Social Media Today

A former corporate attorney and General Counsel, she went on to become the CEO of a technology subsidiary of Bell & Howell.  Happily running her own business for the last decade, she founded Small Business Trends in 2003, while looking for a simple way to publish newsletter articles.  The site quickly grew, and other sites focusing on the small business market were acquired along the way. Anita is widely regarded as an expert in small business issues.  She is the co-author of Visual Marketing: 99 Proven Ways for Small Businesses to Market with Images and Design (Wiley 2011). Anita has served on numerous Boards, including the Board of NEOSA (the technology network of COSE, Council of Smaller Enterprises); the Center for eBusiness and Information Technology at the University of Akron College of Business; and NorTech.  She has a B.A. degree from Duquesne University and a J.D. degree from the University of Akron School of Law.  Read more about Anita Campbell.

	@smallbiztrends
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Robin Carey, CEO, Social Media Today

In 2007, Robin Carey founded Social Media Today, LLC, one of the first companies to manage online B2B communities that connect large organizations with people they want to influence. A veteran of the big-book print media world that included Fortune, Newsweek and BusinessWeek, she had built her reputation on architecting powerful strategies that delivered to blue-chip corporate clients and their agencies ways to corral and connect with their customers, and equally importantly, their customers’ trusted influencers. As traditional media went digital, and the internet went social, Robin was one of the first to realize that the emerging social media platforms offered huge promise to corporations seeking to interact directly with, and learn from, their customers, their employees, and experts from the Ivy Towers, the Street and the Hill. SocialMediaToday.com was the first platform, and quickly became one of the leading communities for journalists and marketers looking to exchange information on this brave new world of social media. It was soon followed by theenergycollective.com, which has become a leading aggregator of international energy experts. Other platforms include MyVenturePad, TheSocialCustomer, SustainableCitiesCollective, TheCustomerCollective, GoverningPeople, and others. Online conversations are led by experts in their categories.

	@robincarey
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Graham Clark, Partner of Customer Results and TAG CRM Board Member

Graham Clark is an experienced sales executive, sales improvement consultant and recognized Customer Relationship Management (CRM) thought leader. As the founder and a Partner at Customer Results, dedicated to helping clients improve revenues through optimized Marketing, Sales and Service operations and technologies and to representing innovative small(er) technology providers capitalize on the markets of the Southern USA.

Graham helped launch Upward Wave (www.upwardwave.com), a social media services company providing Facebook, Twitter and Google+ posting services to small businesses. Graham is the Chair of Technology Association of Georgia’s (TAG) leadership team for 2011-2012, Chair of TAG CRM and a thought in the growth of virtual and social media based TAG initiatives currently service over 15000 technology professionals in the state.

	@gclark2712
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Ginger Conlon, Executive Editor, 1to1 Media

As editorial director of 1to1 Media, Ginger Conlon is responsible for the direction and day-to-day editorial operations of two award-winning publications: executive journal Customer Strategist and the online business publication 1to1 Magazine, its e-newsletter, blog, and other website content. Additionally, she serves on the board of the Customer Experience Professionals Association. Conlon has covered the industry for more than 25 years, regularly speaks at industry events, and has both contributed to and edited several books on customer strategy.

	@1to1Media

Bert Dumars, Vice President of Digital Marketing and Ecommerce, Newell Rubbermaid

Bert DuMars is Vice President Digital Marketing and Ecommerce for Newell Rubbermaid (NYSE: NWL) a global marketer of consumer and commercial products.  Mr. DuMars joined Newell Rubbermaid in 2007 and is responsible for leading and guiding Digital Marketing, Ecommerce, Mobile Marketing and Social Media Marketing initiatives for Newell Rubbermaid’s externally-facing online efforts.

Mr. DuMars is also the originator of the Social Media Atlanta and Digital Atlanta conferences and was the 2010 Association of Telecom Professionals (ATP) Enterprise Innovation Award winner.

Prior to Newell Rubbermaid, Mr. DuMars held executive and management roles at the Department of Treasury – Internal Revenue Service, Trend Micro, Intel, Dell and Southern California Edison.

	@bwdumars

Donna Ennis, Project Director, MBDA Business Center at Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation Institute

Donna Ennis is the project director for the MBDA Business Center – Atlanta located at Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation.  Funded by the Department of Commerce’s Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), the MBDA Business Center’s mission is to grow and strengthen Minority Business Enterprises (MBEs).

Donna is responsible for the strategic direction, marketing, outreach, and operations for the Center.  She also provides assistance to Center clients in strategic, business and market planning; private and public procurement, finance, operations and business process improvement. Under Donna’s leadership, the Center has assisted MBEs in generating over $400 million in contracts, financing, and sales and creating more than 3,200 jobs.

Art Hall, Director,  Alvarez & Marsal Business Consulting and President of the CRM Association, Atlanta Chapter

Art specializes in operational customer relationship management. His primary areas of concentration include: the strategy and execution of multichannel direct marketing & CRM delivery, contact center management, CRM vendor selection and social media go-to-market risk assessment.

In 2011, Mr. Hall was one of the Gartner & 1to1 CRM Excellence Awards judges for Enterprise Efficiency; he was recognized as a 2007 Customer Champion from 1to1 Magazine; awarded the most valuable thought leadership award by Frost & Sullivan; and named to the executive advisory boards of Frost & Sullivan and National Conference on Operations and Fulfillment.

As President of the Customer Relationship Management Association (CRMA), Atlanta Chapter, Mr. Hall works with the National CRMA and the greater CRM community to develop standards and best practices for CRM and Social CRM.

	@Art_Hall4
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Cory Hartlen, Product Marketing Manager, Radian6

Cory has over 10 years of experience in technology marketing and business development. He has the rare ability to be able to explain how technology translates to business opportunities and how data can be used to make informed business decisions.  As a result, Cory has worked closely with the world’s leading agencies and brands to help craft business strategies, build campaigns and communities and leverage social technologies to bring companies closer to their customers, prospects and employees.

	@coryhartlen

Jeanne Hopkins, Vice President of Marketing, HubSpot

A digital and traditional marketing “mash up” that spans a couple of decades, Jeanne Hopkins has a ton of fun feeding the hungry sales mouths @HubSpot with quality leads. Jeanne joined HubSpot in August 2009 to become the approximately the 100th employee (there are now over 300 HubSpotters).  As VP of Marketing for this marketing software company, Jeanne leads some awesome HubSpot teams (code name: TOFU for Top of Funnel and MOFU for Middle of the Funnel activities) that work to generate 45,000+ new leads each month via organic and paid demand gen programs. Jeanne holds an accounting degree from Western New England College (love those spreadsheets!) and an International MBA from the Sawyer School of Management at Suffolk University.   Most recently, Jeanne was named to the Top 10 List of Most Influential People in Sales Lead Management.  

	@jeannehopkins
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David Favero, Director of Sales, Shoutlet

David is a client focused sales executive with over 15 years of sales, marketing, and technical experience. As Sales Director for Shoutlet, he collaborates with prospects to achieve breakthrough results for their digital campaigns.

Shoutlet is a privately held software firm that specializes in streamlining brands’ social media execution processes by delivering one easy-to-use, multi-user SaaS application for publishing, engagement, and measurement.

David also sits on the Board of Directors for the Atlanta Interactive Marketing Association as the National Partnership chair and volunteers as a committee member on the Social Media Special Interest Group.

	@mdavidfavero
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 Adrienne is the CEO & Founder of Empower Me! Corporation

Adrienne is the CEO & Founder of Empower Me! Corporation (www.empowerme.org), a media, publishing and professional development organization, and CEO of Hues Consulting & Management Inc. (www.huesconsulting.com) a full service recruitment consulting firm. She is the voice behind Views From the Top Radio Show and the creator of Empower Me! Radio, Empower Me Institute, Empower Me! Magazine, Empowered Woman TV, and the Next Level Business Strategies. She has taken what started as a small professional network for women, and turned it into an international multi-media and networking power brand.

Adrienne is known as a Networking Power Broker who has mastered traditional and social networking. The author of four self-published books, she wrote THE BOOK on Fearless Networking and set the bar for how all women network in the 21st century. She has been featured in numerous publications, radio shows and blogs as a subject matter expert on careers, entrepreneurship and networking for Black Enterprise, Financial Times, Essence Magazine, Inc. Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine. She’s even been quoted by Dylan Ratigan on the Dylan Ratigan Show on MSNBC.

	@TalentDiva

Paul Greenberg, President of The 56 Group & Author of CRM at the Speed of Light

In addition to being the author of the best-selling CRM at the Speed of Light, now in 4 editions and 9 languages, Paul Greenberg is President of The 56 Group, LLC, a consulting firm, focused on CRM and Social CRM strategic services. He is a founding partner of BPT Partners, a training and consulting venture composed of a number of CRM luminaries. His book, CRM at the Speed of Light: Social CRM Strategy, Tools, and Techniques for Engaging Your Customers, now in its fourth edition, is in 9 languages and been called “the bible of the CRM industry”. It has been used by more than 70 universities as a primary text. Paul is the Executive Vice President of the CRM Association. He currently is the Chairman of the Board of Advisors of the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management CRM Centre of Excellence. He has been a Board of Advisors member of the Baylor University MBA Program for CRM majors, and the co-chairman of Rutgers University’s CRM Research Center.

	@pgreenbe
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Brent Leary, Partner, CRM Essentials

Brent Leary is a crm industry analyst, advisor, author, speaker and award winning blogger. He is co-founder and Partner of CRM Essentials LLC, an Atlanta based CRM advisory firm covering tools and strategies for improving business relationships. In 2009 he co-authored Barack 2.0: Social Media Lessons for Small Business. Recognized by InsideCRM as one of the 25 most influential industry leaders, Leary also is a past recipient of CRM Magazine’s Most Influential Leader Award.  He serves on the national board of the CRM Association, on the advisory board of the University of Toronto’s CRM Center of Excellence, and on the editorial advisory board for The Atlanta Tribune.  Leary writes regularly for Inc.com and MyCustomer.com, and serves as Blogger-in-Residence for TheSocialCustomer.com.  He hosts the “One on One” conversation series at SmallBizTrends.com, and teams up with Paul Greenberg on the CRM Playaz show.

	@BrentLeary

 Judy Mod, Principal of Social Gastronomy, Founder of the Social Executive Council

Judy Mod, Principal of Social Gastronomy, is an executive who is helping organizations transform from solution-centric to buyer-centric in their approach to their markets, their customers, and the operationalization within their companies.  Her specialties include Collaborative Buying, Buyer-Centric Marketing, Behavioral Target Marketing, Network Selling, and Customer Adoption.  Judy co-founded and is the president of the Social Executive Council, the premiere global group of senior executives who are collaborating on becoming cross-functional, enterprise-wide buyer-centric organizations.  Judy’s career spans over 28 years in B2B delivering top line revenue in a diversity of industries (chemical/petrochemical/O&G, process/manufacturing, environmental, microelectronics, high technology) and in various roles (global sales, business development, marketing, strategic alliances/channels/partnerships, consulting).  A recognized early adopter of innovation, she has the ability to merge the needs of organizations with the innovative solutions in the marketplace.  Judy is regular speaker and blogger on social market leadership, buyer-centric organizations and the social enterprise.

	@JudyMod

Adam Naide, Executive Director of Marketing for Social Media at Cox Communications

Adam Naide is Executive Director of Marketing for Social Media at Cox Communications, where he leads overall strategy and execution for all of the company’s social media activities. Today, over 275,000 Cox customers and fans can engage with content, campaigns, and get customer support on Facebook, Twitter and You Tube, (coming soon: Google Plus).

Prior to joining Cox, Naide served as senior director of audience experience at CNN Worldwide. In this role, Naide led network efforts to build engaged fan bases for CNN/HLN shows and talent on social media platforms. His efforts helped create two-way conversations with consumers, driving viewership for CNN/HLN TV, and growing the networks’ social media audience to millions of fans/followers.

	@AdamNaide
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Jeff Nolan, VP of Product Marketing, Get Satisfaction

Jeff is our VP of Product Marketing and is responsible for our product positioning and the promotional strategies to bring our platform to market.  Jeff’s experience as a venture capitalist, professional whistler, and an operational executive in a variety of roles is invaluable to Get Satisfaction as we grow and optimize our business.

	@jeffnolan

Larry Ritter, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Sage CRM Solutions

Larry Ritter is senior vice president and general manager with responsibility for Sage’s Contact Management Solutions, most notably Sage ACT!. Previously he led product strategy, product management, product marketing and user experience for the Sage CRM Solutions product family comprised of Sage ACT!, SageCRM, and Sage SalesLogix.

Mr. Ritter has 20 years of software industry experience and, prior to Sage, led product development efforts for Citrix Systems and Hewlett Packard. He joined Sage in 2004 and, as a senior executive within the company’s global CRM organization, has helped evolve the ACT! product line for use by corporate customers and specific industries, guide Sage CRM and Sage ERP front- and back-office integration, and led the re-architecture of the Sage SalesLogix platform.

	@ACTbySage

Michael Thomas, Customer Success Manager, Microsoft

Michael is a well-established authority on CRM and Social CRM strategies and best practices.  He has more than 20+ years of IT Solution Consulting experience working for companies like ADP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, CRM Essentials and Neighborhood America (now INgage Networks).  Michael served as the National President and National Board member of the CRM Association, and as a 2005-2008 Peppers and Rogers Group 1to1 Impact Awards Judge, and as a guest lecture on the subject of Social CRM at the prestigious Wharton School of Business.  He is a past recipient of  CRM Magazine’s Most Influential CRM Leaders Award, and was named one of the Rockstars of Social CRM by the Social Media Listening Platform vendor Radian6.

	@mwthomasSCRM

Matt Trifiro, SVP of Marketing, Assistly

Matt Trifiro is the SVP of Marketing at Assistly, a salesforce.com company. Assistly is the new social help desk for small and medium businesses, making it easy for teams and whole companies to provide customer support in the social era, seamlessly combining traditional and social channels. Prior to Assistly, he was a serial entrepreneur and an advisor to venture-backed technology startups. He was most recently co-founder and CEO of Bixbe and 1000 Markets, Inc. (sold to Bonanza), where he led teams that built simple and ubiquitous e-commerce platforms for individuals and small business. Formerly, he was co-founder and Vice President of Marketing of Wink Communications, Inc., one of the first publicly-traded interactive television companies. He was also Vice President of Interactive Television at Geoworks and was the founder of Saxifrage Ventures, Inc., an intellectual property holding company.

	@MatthewTrifiro
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Lauren Vargas, Community Management Strategist, Aetna

Lauren is a multi-faceted communications professional with ten years of experience in community relations, internal and external corporate communications, and government affairs. She assists organizations with building sound objectives and strategies for listening and measurement, and helps them engage with the communities they serve by fostering authentic relationships built on trust through conversations and participatory media.

	@vargasl

Emily Yellin, Author of Your Call Is (not that) Important To Us

Emily Yellin is a journalist, author and consultant. Her most recent book, Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us – Customer Service and What It Reveals About Our World and Our Lives, was published by Simon & Schuster. Emily currently is a consultant with Peppercom, a strategic communications firm in New York. She also regularly speaks at conferences and in the news media about customer service, marketing, social media and journalism, and is on the advisory board for TheSocialCustomer.com. Emily was a longtime contributor to The New York Times, and has written for Time, The Washington Post, The International Herald Tribune, Newsweek, Smithsonian Magazine, and other publications. She has lived in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, and London, but is currently based in Memphis.

	@EYellin

Using the term community relationship management as the “other CRM”, CRM Essentials is the creator of the CRM2 Index, a quarterly survey of women and minority owned businesses gauging CRM awareness and adoption. CRM Essentials also the founded the annual CRM2 Awards identifying women and minority business owners who have successfully implemented CRM strategies, as well as to honor members of the vendor community making meaningful contributions in the minority business community in terms CRM education, awareness and adoption.

Leary has over 15 years of IT and management consulting experience working on projects for PricewaterhouseCoopers, BellSouth, Compaq, the IMF and World Bank. Leary received CRM Magazine’s 2004 Most Influential Leader Award along with his business partner Michael Thomas. He serves on the national board of the Customer Relationship Management Association as Vice President of Technology, and as Programming Chair of the Technology Association of Georgia’s MTech Council special interest group. In addition to being the editor of Insights, the CRM Association newsletter, he writes a business solutions column for various publications, including The Network Journal and the Atlanta Tribune. His articles have also been featured in trade publications such as CRM Magazine, Direct Marketing News and Wealth & Retirement Planner. He is a sought after speaker on the subjects of CRM, CRM and small business, and technology for small business.

Leary earned a bachelor’s degree in Accounting from the University of Delaware and a MBA concentrating in MIS from Widener University.

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And while I think it’s a great time to have this kind of event, I know that is not reason enough for you to take time out of your busy schedules to come join us.  Even the fact that the event is free isn’t enough to get you here.  So I put together a few reasons I hope will help convince you to join us in discussing why it’s time to prepare for the new business as usual, and to Get Down to Social Business.

Too Many Companies Treat “Social” As A Gimmick and Not As Part of the Corporate Strategy

Most companies today understand how social sites, mobile devices and cloud computing are changing the way people interact with the world around them.  Not only has this combination changed customer behavior and activity, it has also raised their expectations on how they will be treated – and given them more control over the relationships they choose to enter into.  And as consumers grow more comfortable and adapt to the speed of technological innovation, the more important it is for companies to understand the impact this will have on interacting with them, and the importance of creating great customer experiences to extend the lifetime of the relationship.

We’re still early on in the lifecycle of the social customer, but as technological developments and consumer adoption accelerate, it’s critical for companies to plan for what they must do to be in lock step with changing behaviors, activities and expectations.  This goes beyond putting up a Facebook page and tossing a few tweets out. It calls for taking a good hard look to see if your company’s culture, strategy and technology platforms are able to keep up with the quickly evolving needs and demands coming from savvier, better informed customers.

Experts Sharing Their Knowledge on How to Align Business with Customer Expectations

For a topic like this, it really calls for people whose experiences, knowledge and unique perspectives cover a wide range of areas and expertise.  Fortunately for us we are able to put together a great lineup of industry thought leaders and experts  to participate in the day.

We are excited to have best-selling authors, industry experts, high level executives at large companies and leaders at some of today’s most important technology vendors coming from all over the country to share their knowledge and insights.

There are really too many great people to try and name them here – and I don’t want to leave any of them out – but they are all listed on our speaker page here. I really encourage you to take a good look at that list as I am sure you will find many familiar names of people trusted throughout the CRM/Social Business industry.  And a good number of them will be speaking in Atlanta for the first time.

Great Location, Great Venue with Free Parking in Midtown Atlanta!

Not only have we brought together a group of respected, trusted voices in social business, we’re bringing them to a really great venue – The Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) Conference Center located right off The Connector in Midtown Atlanta.  This is a state of the art facility where each seat in the auditorium comes with electrical outlets for you to plug in your devices.  It also will have free wifi throughout the venue so if you need to answer some emails in between tweets you’ll be able to do so.

The other nice thing about having the event at GTRI is that you can park for free…No, I’m not kidding – you can really park for free!

Free Eats

We have great sponsors (see the event homepage!) who realize that people need to eat at events like this.  So we’ll even throw in a little Chick-fil-a at lunchtime to folks who register online ahead of time.  But you’ll have to grab it before we run out of it.  We can’t promise that we’ll have enough for everybody…sorry.

Customers Will Not Wait Around for You to Get It…

Companies have to get in synch with how social/mobile is shaping customer behaviors and expectations in order to provide them with experiences that keep them around longer.  And it takes more than saying “Like Us” or “Follow Us” to create meaningful relationships in the Social Age.  It takes looking internally to see if your company is ready, willing and able to work together in order to engage customers who want to be valued for more than just a financial transaction.

By taking a quick look at the agenda you’ll see we will cover this from many different angles and perspectives – from sales, marketing, service, online communities and social media monitoring among others.  We’ll hear some case studies about how companies are making the transition from “using social media” to becoming a real social business able to successfully meet the growing expectations of today’s customer.  And we’ll have a stellar lineup of speakers to bring these messages home.

And thanks to our great sponsors – Microsoft, Radian6, Assistly, BPT Partners, Get Satisfaction and HubSpot – you get all of this for free if you register online in advance.  I hope the five reasons above are enough to convince you to come out and join us Friday February 3^rd, so we can get down to social business.

If you’re ready to join us click here to register for the event.  If you need a little more information, come back to this site as we’ll be providing updates on what’s going on with the event.  In either case we hope to see you there!

Here are a few organizational roles we feel with benefit greatly from attending Social Business Atlanta:

• Marketing
• Marketing Communications
• Customer relationship management
• CustomerRetention Specialists/Managers
• Customer Loyalty Managers
• Customer Acquisition Managers
• Customer Collaboration Planners
• Database marketing
• Market intelligence
• Digital/Social media marketing
• Branding, Sales
• Contact Centre Management
• Corporate & General Management