Explore Social Networking at SLOCAMA

*UPDATE*
The links and presentation from last night are available at : www.smsrd.com/slocama.html

Tomorrow I am going to be speaking at the San Luis Obispo Creative and Marketing Alliance's (SLOCAMA) monthly meeting about Social Networking. SLOCAMA is pretty cool for a trade group, the people are a lot of fun, and the meetings are always a good time. This month's meeting is at Aspect Studios, 755 Fiero Lane, Suite 110, San Luis Obsipo and the in-person networking starts at 5:30.

I am going to be covering Social Networking first at a high level to make sure everybody understands the basic concepts, and then a little more in depth on a few of the larger networks (Myspace, Facebook, and LinkedIn).

If you're a SLOCAMA member I have set up some places for us to congregate online that I encourage you to join.

• SLOCAMA Myspace Page
  
• SLOCAMA Facebook Group
  
• SLOCAMA LinkedIn Group
  

If you have the chance to come out I hope to see you tomorrow night!

Ask SMS Your Questions at the Softec Marketing Experts Panel

Softec, the Central Coast's Technology consortium, has invited me along with 3 other local marketing experts to speak on a panel about the challenges of marketing and how to develop more business. Bring your questions with you because this is set up as a Q and A panel!

The event is at Pelican Point Restaurant in Pismo Beach on Wednesday, January 23rd 2008 from 6:00 to 8:30PM. Cost is $30 for those that pre-register and $35 after the pre-registration deadline or at the door.

For more information on Softec and the presenters go to softec.org. You can also sign up for the Softec newsletter if you want to keep up to date with the group.

EVC Business Webinar...

Not to be outdone, Rob is the man behind the scenes of the upcoming San Luis Obispo Economic Vitality Corporation Webinar titled "Starting or Buying a Business - Practical & Legal Considerations" and it will be presented by June McIvor of SJLM.

The webinar is scheduled for January 17th from 6:00 to 7:30 and is provided for free.

Register for the EVC Webinar!

Join SMS's CEO in the Santa Ynez Valley!

As we've mentioned before on the blog we keep active in the community and do a fair amount of public speaking on topics like Internet Marketing and Google Adwords. Last month Rob and I spoke to a marketing class at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, and this month I will be speaking in Santa Ynez.

The Santa Ynez Valley Visitors Association has invited me to talk about Google Adwords and how they can positively impact your business. The meeting is next Wednesday, January 9th at 8:30 a.m. at the Santa Ynez Valley Marriot Hotel (555 McMurray Road, Buellton). The SYVVA is a nonprofit group focused on the promotion of the entire Santa Ynez valley as a year round tourist destination. Admission to this event is free and open to the public, so I encourage you to come out and join us if you are in the area.

For more information, you can see the full press release at syv-online.com

Brown Bag Business Dialog in SLO

Good afternoon everybody,

Rob and I just got back from our presentation at the San Luis Obispo Mission Community Services Corporation's Brown Bag Business Dialog event and I think it went really well. We ran out of chairs and had a lot of good questions from the audience!

The talk today was about Search Engine Marketing (SEM) in general, and Google Adwords in depth. We hope you all learned a lot, and we look forward to working some more with the MCSC in the future.

We've already had some requests for the PowerPoint presentation used in the class and we've made it available as a .pdf at www.smsrd.com/mcsc.pdf

Thanks again for coming out to see us and we hope you learned something that you can apply to your growing businesses!