The first Like Minds social media conference took place just over a week ago. Many people got something out of it and some people left empty-handed questioning whether or not the event did exactly what it said on the tin. It was certainly a tall order to have the intention of answering the big ol’ ROI question when applied to Social Media and to do it in one afternoon. Olivier Blanchard got the closest to bringing some insight and cold hard examples as to why businesses should be using social media. His presentation was engaging and also available for further viewing online.
The big question for the conference is where does it go from here? There has been a backlash, there has been a whole wave of in-jokes and hashtag hijacking during and after the event and this is something that needs to be carefully addressed if the future event in February is to be as open and inclusive as the original event set out to be.
One aspect that struck me as shooting oneself in the foot (but with good honest intentions and using all the social media tools available) was the coverage of the event online. Of course, I was there and bringing live-blog coverage. The extent of this coverage was to bring the key sound-bites and to feed in questions from those who could not be there. It did not offer full coverage.
The foot shooting came in the form of the real-time stream of the entire conference online. Filming the event and broadcasting it live to 500 people (Organisers’ figures) is all well and good but if you had paid your ticket price first time round, you’re sat there as the announcement is being made that there is to be another conference in February, why would you pay to go to that one? Ticket price, travel, accommodation etc will not need to be found when you know it is likely to be streamed in its entirety for all to see and for free.
For me, the live video feed should have covered the keynotes but then when it came to the panel discussion where the real ideas and discussions came about, the cameras should have been switched off. This would have offered more added value for money to those who paid to be there and would have led to more buzz being created for the follow-up event.
Of course this may sound overly critical of an altogether fantastic and cleverly organised event (All tickets sold through social media), one that I am certainly keen to attend again and to take on a more active role ( A panel discussion about small business use of social media, anyone?)
So what was the ROI for me attending the event over those who saw it all on a screen from anywhere in the world? The connections made in the networking before and after the event, the traffic that blogging about the event has brought and the ideas of how to apply social media practices in a more meaningful way than I had previously done so.
Bring on February and Like Minds II but bring it all online? Perhaps not.
