Girls In Tech

The Social Online Conference, the blogging conference you can attend from the comfort of your home, is a 3-day live event hosted by TheArtofSocialMedia and features some of social media’s top experts. Learn how to take your blogging to the next level, earning money from your blog, becoming the next blogging superstar, and more.

How is the Social Online Conference different?

●      All session are held via a live video stream. You are able to attend live sessions from your computer or smart phone, and talk with the other attendees and speaker via the connecting chat room.

●      Perfect for any budget! Not only in the Social Online Conference affordable, but we also offer payment plans! Contact email@theartofsocialmediablog.com if you need assistance paying your your registration.

●      You have access to our exclusive conference forum site for life! Network with attendees, ask the speakers questions, and participate in roundtable discussion.

●      All sessions are recorded and packaged just for you! Going to miss a session, a day, or all 3 days? You can still register! You will always have access to all recordings!

Here’s how the conference will work:

After registering, you will receive an email with a link to our exclusive online conference community site, where you can start networking with other attendees, getting questions ready to ask the speakers, and register for the different panels we will have.

This is how the sessions will go:

●      Before each session, hop on to the conference forum site and share questions you’d like the speaker to answer during the session and get your schedule for the sessions you will be attending (you can attend all, some, or none of the sessions – recordings will be provided after the conference).

●      After you register and get access to the conference forum site, there you’ll see the information for each speaker’s session. Each speaker’s session will be done via an online live video. You’ll be able to view the presenter live, as well as communicate with other attendees and the speaker in an attached chat room!

●      After the planned portion of each session, there will be a Q&A time. Each attendee logged in, will be able to type in questions for the speaker. If you’re unable to attend a session, make sure to post your question on the session’s specific message board ahead of time – that way your question will be answered and recorded, and you can hear it on the session recording you will be provided with (all sessions will be recorded).

And don’t forget that you’re also getting:

●      Access to all session recordings and speaker slides and handouts.

●      Access to all session transcripts – in case you prefer to read the information instead of listen or watch it.

●      Entry into all the virtual giveaways and swag bags!

Registration is only open to 200 participants. Register now!

Tags: Adriana Gascoigne, blogging, conference, girls in tech, marketing, Monetization, social media, The Art of Social Media, The Social Online Conference, women in tech
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Next weekend, the tech community in Santa Cruz will be hosting TechRaising, a first-of-it’s-kind event, where entrepreneurs (big thinkers, developers, designers, business men and women, marketers, etc.) can get together to actually build and execute on the very ideas they have been stewing on for months, years or even just weeks.

This event is about collaboration, execution, accomplishment and showing what you’ve done.

Participants will gather on the evening of May 20 at Cruzio (downtown Santa Cruz) and have 90 seconds to pitch their idea for a product, service, or company to the group.  After pitches have been completed, everyone will have a chance to dialog with each other and form teams to build the the idea over the course of the weekend.

Scott McNealy, an industry icon and co-founder of Sun Microsystems, will be keynoting the event on Saturday morning.

Early bird tickets are $29.00 (if purchased by May 13th) and $49.00 after that and can be purchased at http://techraising.eventbrite.com. For more information please visit TechRaising.com.

So let’s get together and build something. How awesome would it be if this is where your startup was born?

Tags: designers, Developers, entrepreneurs, event, girls in tech, marketers, marketing, santa cruz, Silicon Valley, techraising, women in tech
Posted in San Francisco, santa cruz, Silicon Valley | No Comments »

If you ever planted super berries on Farmville for a quick profit or downloaded a Katy Perry song via Tap Tap Revenge on your mobile device, you experienced the convergence of social media, mobile gaming, virtual goods, and an innovative business model.

Every day, a growing number of people around the globe connect to social media for networking and entertainment, and many of them are doing so on their mobile devices.  Entrepreneurs, business leaders and practitioners are coming up with new and original ways to capitalize on this growing trend and to make money through social media.

Learn how industry leaders in online marketing, digital media and mobile gaming are creating and executing these business strategies at Socialize: Monetizing Social Media, a two-day conference presented by Mediabistro, SocialTimes & AllFacebook. Diverse perspectives will be represented at discussions focused on four core themes:

• Gamify. Social games keep getting hotter: the virtual goods market will surpass $2 billion in 2011
• Mobilize. The social web has gone mobile: lessons for social sharing, search, browsing, and networking
• Optimize. Learn how to effectively track and measure social media campaigns
• Monetize. At the root of all these topics, uncover key revenue drivers: content, apps, and more

The conference will be held from Thursday, March 31 to Friday, April 1, 2011 at The New Yorker Hotel in New York City.

Click here to register for the event.  At checkout, Girls in Tech members can use this 15% discount code: SZGIT.

Tags: conference, entrepreneurs, event, facebook, gaming, iphone, marketing, MediaBistro, New York City, social media, tech
Posted in All Chapters, Events, Girls In Tech, New York | No Comments »

During a panel discussion at the Western Foodservice and Hospitality Expo in Los Angeles this past weekend, a Los Angeles chef brought up the topic of Yelp reviews.  While this chef was in mid-sentence, Yelp’s Business Outreach Manager Luther Lowe happened to be walking by and stepped into the room to join the conversation.

An interesting discussion ensued, focusing on issues related to negative reviews by Yelpers with no restaurant or culinary training and the increasing need for chefs (and other local business owners) to join the Yelp conversation.  

With over 12 million user reviews and approximately 33 million views per month,* the power of Yelp’s word of mouth loud speaker is having a significant impact on local restaurants.  Yelp has given millions of users the power to review restaurants’ chefs, menu items, wine lists, drink specialties, service, and ambiance and publish to an audience of millions of viewers – a power that was once reserved only for professional food and wine writers working for traditional publications.

As a result, Yelp is changing the way restaurateurs and chefs interact with their customers, as well as the way they must handle both their formal and informal public relations and marketing efforts.

On the positive side, Yelp is making the world of restaurant reviews a more democratic process rather than an elitist one.  This process allows local restaurants which might not have received attention from traditional print or online food writers to receive a new type of media attention that can be a powerful force in generating new customers.   In addition, Yelp allows restaurateurs, chefs, and front-of-the-house managers to receive real-time customer feedback that they can use to quickly evaluate and adjust everything from their menu choices to hiring choices.

On the negative side, for many chefs and restaurateurs who have amassed years of training in the culinary arts and whose restaurants are the result of considerable blood, sweat, and tears, Yelp’s democratic force in the world of reviews means that reviewers with no understanding of or training in the restaurant industry or the culinary arts can slam a chef for one off night or because they don’t understand what a particular dish is supposed to taste like.

Also problematic is the fact that the democratic masses of reviewers are not part of the traditional institution of journalism, which carries with it principles of responsible reporting (in theory at least…).  An average Yelp reviewer is not likely to research the chef, his or her past experience, or the background of a particular menu’s cuisine influences before writing a good or bad review as would a traditional food critic.

The power of Yelp, however, is a reality that restaurants and other local businesses must now take into account in their business practices.  As Yelp’s Lowe emphasized, businesses have an important voice on Yelp.  Yelp provides businesses with the ability to take ownership of their listings by unlocking them on the site, allowing businesses to put information out there for the Yelp audience.  Yelp also provides businesses with the ability to respond to reviews both publicly and privately, giving them an equal voice in the conversation and a means to reach out to customers who had negative experiences.

Lowe also emphasized Yelp’s efforts to maintain the integrity of the site’s reviews.  As he explained in a follow-up conversation, Yelp employs a filtering technology to help ensure (to the best of its ability) that only trustworthy reviews end up on businesses’ pages. **

While it can be overwhelming for chefs, restaurateurs, and other business owners to have an endless parade of critics to contend with, social media outlets such as Yelp are here to stay and will continue to play an important role in influencing consumer decision-making.  Only restaurants and other businesses that take a proactive approach to social media, incorporating this new force into their marketing plans, will be able to take advantage of its benefits.

* See http://www.yelp.com/about

** For more information about Yelp’s filter system, watch this: Yelp\’s Review Filter

Meredith D. Williams is on the executive board of Girls in Tech LA and writes for girlsintech.net on topics ranging from wine technology to the intersection of law and technology. In her day job, Meredith is a partner at Miller | Williams LLP, an employment litigation and counseling law firm.  She helps businesses handle employment issues, including legal compliance, hiring, discipline, terminations, sexual harassment, workplace policies, disability accommodations, medical and pregnancy leave, and wage and hour, counseling them on a day-to-day or situation-by-situation basis and defending them against employee lawsuits. Follow Meredith: @MerEsqLA and caemployersresources.com

Tags: Chefs, food critics, girls in tech, Los Angeles, Luther Lowe, marketing, Meredith D Williams, public relations, real-time customer feedback, restaurants, social media, traditional journalism, user reviews, Yelp
Posted in All Chapters, Los Angeles | 5 Comments »

Mayor Sam Adams gave a closing speech at OSCON this year – “Great beer selections, no sales tax; come to Portland, move your family and start your business here”. I’ve had the liberty to sit down with Mayor Sam Adams to chat about tech scene, start ups and a great lifestyle by living in Portland, Ore

Sam Adams – Mayor, City of Portland, Oregon.

Mayor Sam Adams of Portland, Oregon was elected Mayor of Portland in May 2008. Prior to being elected Mayor, Adams served as a Commissioner on the City Council for four years earning a reputation as a “policy-driven” advocate for sustainability, public transit, transportation planning, the arts, and gay rights. As a City Commissioner, Adams was Commissioner in Charge of Portland’s Office of Transportation and the Bureau of Environmental Services, and council liaison to, among others, the Regional Arts & Culture Council, the Association of Portland Neighborhood Business Districts, and Worksystems, Incorporated. In his role as Mayor, Adams is the lead Council member on Economic Development, Planning and Sustainability, Education, Arts and Culture, and Transportation.

During his first year as Mayor, Adams has launched a number of initiatives designed to showcase and provide support to Portland’s open source software community. Notably, Mayor Adams and City Council approved the nation’s first open source and open data resolution, which places open source software on equal footing with commercial software for purposes of City contracts. Also, Portland recently launched Civic Apps for Greater Portland, which is the nation’s first regional open data and open source app contest. Mayor Adams brings renewed focus to developing and implementing plans that will not only keep Portland livable, vibrant, and economically healthy, but will also increase Portland’s status as a national leader. He is proud of Portland’s open source software community, and he wants to do his part to ensure Portland maintains its reputation as an international hub for open source innovation.

Q&A

Exciting how the city of Portland is hosting OSCON again this year! How’s OSCON in Portland this year?

Portland, Oregon is the perfect host city for the open source convention. As a city, we have a wide breadth of un-matched talent; proprietary and open source software development, digital media firms, programming, coding and creative skill-sets. As a city, we are faster, cheaper and more creative. We have to be to compete with the other cities.  We have the quality and value – all in one city.

How has the tech scene evolved over the last several years?. What’s next? Where do we grow?

The Portland technology community has been able to take collaborative and open source philosophies to the next level. We’ve done some creative stuff; from digital development through productization.

Take Civicapps for example; CivicApps is an open data / open source project sponsored by several Portland-area government agencies to promote innovation in the public and private sectors. Currently over 120 civic data sets are available, including geographic, 911, transit, streets, and parks data. The aim is social change. The path is regional collaboration. The focus is local. A cool transportation app that displays arrival times for public transport in Portland, Oregon –PDX Bus—was developed using these public datasets, and it is available on a number of platforms including iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad

Technology products and services developed in Portland are most appealing to end-users because from the underlying software to the user experience we really figure them out to the fullest–we have high expectations. In the future, we need to focus on delivering value, quality and creativity in the most competitive ways. Portland has the potential be the most creative technology community in the world. We have so much opportunity here!

What’s your thought about expanding the women/girls presence in technology in Portland?

I think a mentoring approach is the way to go. We’ve had success with Rock and Roll Camp for Girls, which is a summer program that helps girls build confidence as musicians and learn about the music industry. That model could be used to help girls learn about other industries –like tech.

What current device/technology could you not live without? iPhone. It’s the one source that I rely on to get all of my news, connect with constituents. I tweet a lot, and I rely on a couple of applications for tweeting, including tweet deck. Beyond that I’m a news junky.  I use fluent news, incorporate, dig, and other apps.

Favorite apps? Pdxreporter.

What do you want people outside of Portland to learn about one of the most dynamic cities in the US?

Besides our worldclass beer and no sales tax?  We are a very open city that rewards creative thinking and values innovation.

We seek to be the best place to have both a fulfilling career and a balanced personal life. You really can have it all.

Also, this is a welcoming place and one of opportunity for people who want to make a difference. I am an example—I grew up poor, worked hard in public service, and now I have the honor of serving as Mayor.

To learn more about the city go to http://www.portlandonline.com/mayor/index.cfm

and be sure to follow @mayorsamadams

Be sure to join Girls in Tech Portland Chapter at OSCON 2010 this year at Portland Oregon. Girls in tech Portland is sponsored and powered by 24Notion

For More info for our local Portland chapter, go to our facebook page. If you are interested in being a guest speaker and/or panelist for our workshops and lectures, pls feel free to drop me an email: ivo@girlsintech.net

tweet @mssonicflare @oscon @24notion @gitweet #oscon #portland #opensource

photo by David Snyder

Tags: 24notion, business, creative, designer, Developer, girls in tech portland, gitpdx, innovation, ivo, ivolukas, marketing, mobile apps, mssonicflare, open source, oregon, OSCON, Portland, PR, programmers, startups, technology, user experience, VC, women in technology
Posted in All Chapters, Portland | No Comments »

ReverbNation.com is a remarkable marketing and promotional tool for indie artists that want to manage their careers the way professionals do.

They offer turn-key solutions for online marketing, digital distribution, fan-relationship management and assessment, e-commerce, and more.

ARTISTS CAN MAKE MONEY ON REVERBNATION

1.   Digital Distribution – For under $60/year, artists can distribute their music to most major online music retailers.  This includes iTunes, iTunes International, Amazon, Zune, Last.fm, Spotify, Rhapsody, Wal-Mart, and many others.  Artists get paid for downloads and streams, keep the rights to their music and 100% of their royalties.  With this service, artists also get access to free trending reports to determine a return on investment and monitor how sales are performing.

2.    Electronic Press Kits – Press kits are a like resumes.  Managers, booking agents, and record labels ask for press kits when they want to review or pitch a band.  ReverbNation’s press kits are professional, easy-to-use, and inexpensive.

3.    Sell Merchandise Online – ReverbNation’s store operates like an on-demand merchandise store (similar to Zazzle and CafePress).  This means artists can sell t-shirts, hoodies, and other products without any upfront costs.

4.    Song Licensing – Like the sound of securing long-term royalties?  With ReverbNation, musicians can submit their music for an opportunity to get sync’d in TV shows, film, commercials, video games, and there’s no submission fee.  Currently, this program is only being offered to a select group of artists.

Full list of money-making opportunities for artists on ReverbNation can be found here:

http://www.reverbnation.com/main/overview_artist?feature=store#/main/overview_artist?feature=landingpage

ADDITIONAL FEATURES

1.    ReverbNation is Facebook-friendly – ReverbNation offers the MyBand application, which is the #1 musician app on Facebook.  Place music, songs, a mailing list sign-up form, show calendar, and photos right into any Facebook Fan Page.  The application also has viral marketing features so users can share content with fans and friends anywhere on the web.  Music can also be placed right into Facebook’s news feeds and fans can listen/stream music without leaving Facebook.

2.    Variety of Widgets – Create music players for any website or blog, embeddable tour schedules, YouTube video galleries, mailing list sign-up forms, and customize them all to fit any style.  All widgets have a built-in tracking system and measures impressions, placements, and click through rates.

3.    Statistics – Stats on ReverbNation are automatically generated when using their promotional tools.  Find out how many fans you have, know their age, location, and discover which fans are listening and promoting your music.

4.    Gig Finder – ReverbNation’s GigFinder is a directory of music venues with more than 100,000 listings.  Find venues using their search form and filters to find the perfect venue for gigging.

5.   Street Teams – Gather fans and reward them for completing missions.  This is the best way to activate grass-roots and word-of-mouth marketing online and offline.

Full Feature List Available Here:
http://www.reverbnation.com/#/main/overview_artist

ReverbNation.com offers a convenient way to manage fans, a mailing list, street team, earn money, track statistics, book gigs, promote a tour, manage online presence and run web promotions all from one website.

It’s an excellent resource to take a career in music to the next level without the help of a record label or manager.

Dimple Thakkar
Owner & Impresario at SYNHERGY ENTERTAINMENT
www.synhergyentertainment.com
@dimplethakkar

Tags: artists, bands, digital distribution, entertainment, iTunes, marketing, music business, music industry, music marketing, music promotion, musicians, ReverbNation, technology, WalMart
Posted in All Chapters, Los Angeles | 12 Comments »

When it comes to today’s PR world, it’s all about the buzz. That particularly viral kind of word of mouth marketing that means big brand recognition and even bigger sales.

But, how do you build that buzz? How do you keep it going? How do you transition a PR campaign from traditional media to new media? And, how do you convince clients that all this tweeting and texting and typing is totally worth it? These are just a few of the topics we’ll be covering at our latest Girls in Tech LA panel — The Buzz: PR & Marketing 3.0.

The panel kicks off at 7, followed by cocktails and plenty of time to enjoy them. There will also be a full bar menu. And, we’re very excited to be hosting it at Hollywood hot spot H.Wood.

According to Citysearch, “this small, plush hideout has a loungey vibe with brown leather couches and low-lit vintage chandeliers. Inside the 1920s-esque bar and lounge, the see and be seen and celeb crowd plays chess on boards strewn on tables, shakes their hips on the upstairs dance floor, and snacks on upscale comfort food.”

Tickets are $10, and supplies are limited, so grab yours before we sell out.

Speakers include:

Rynda Laurel (moderator)- Rynda is currently managing International Strategy for AF83 (Paris/San Francisco), Bearstech (Paris) and Hackable:Devices (Paris). She is involved in coordinating and participating in numerous events and panels including: French by South West, Twestival, Social Media Club, TedxSoma, Musi2K, Digital LA, Girls In Tech and FAIRfund. She also is developing a socially conscious marketing and consulting agency which is a manifestation of her deep-seated devotion to the environment and sustainability.

Nicole Jordan – one of the premier PR/Marketing names in the LA area, she has worked as a social media expert on the Rubicon Project and as director of PR and Communications for Clearstone Venture Partners. She has also worked with This Next, Inc., Brenthaven, Buongiorno USA, David Lynch, Edelman, and Ogilvy, just to name a few.

Heather Meeker – Director of PR & Marketing at Whrrl.

Babette Pepaj – founder/CEO of BakeSpace.com, the Web’s first food-themed social network and 2009 Webby Nominee for “Best Social Network.” She is also the founder of TECHmunch and publisher of The Daily Bite. Brands she’s worked with include KitchenAid, ABC, Sara Lee, Kodak, McCormick, Reynolds, Universal, Sony Pictures and FOX Searchlight and has a unique knack for spinning traditional ad campaigns into unique PR opportunities. Also find us @BakeSpace.

Amanda Coolong – Executive producer for Tech Zulu & ThisWeekin.com, Principal and Founder of Beta PR.

Andrea Scott – Manager of Interactive Marketing for POM Wonderful

Christine Kirk – Social Media Marketing Consultant/Founder at Social Muse Communications and PR Manager at Girls in Tech LA. Previous work includes Online Communications Director at Murphy O’Brien, Senior Account Executive at Murphy O’Brien, Account Executive at Zeno Group and more.

Sponsored by: Mashable

Tags: Events, marketing, mixer, networking, PR, social media
Posted in Events, Los Angeles | No Comments »

Girls in Tech Portland chapter(GIT PDX) hosted an event for inspirational speaker, Katherine Durham, Vice President of Marketing, Imaging & Printing Group, Americas, Hewlett-Packard. The event started off with social networking among women with backgrounds in technology who reside in Oregon. We had a great mix that included engineers, developers, social media specialists, marketing and PR professionals, entrepreneurs and others. The evening ended with a great presentation and Q&A during which Katherine shared her passion for the HP business and connecting with end users.

Katherine started off by sharing her background and then quickly dived in to how to shift the digital marketing and technology mindset to harness the power of an integrated approach. With constantly emerging digital trends and a new media-mix landscape, how does HP harness these trends and measure success?

Effective marketing has remained the same for years: connect the right customers with the right message at the right time and in the right place. What’s changed is that consumers are spending more and more time connecting through social networking, video and mobile.

In fact, consumers are now devoting more time online than to any other media, averaging a total of 14 hours/week or more. This amounts to more than 40% of their free time. In the last year, microblogging and social media sites such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Wikipedia, Blogger, Baidu and more have exploded in popularity. Video and mobile technology trends all continue to point up. There is huge opportunity if you look at total media consumption vis-a-vis the total U.S. advertising spend.

HP concentrates on maximizing the cross-channel shopping opportunities online, in-store and via advertising. This creates a synergy that delivers results.

Take “Pioneer Woman,” one case study in success. The campaign features Pioneer Woman, a blogger with a growing following. HP reached out to her niche audience by having Pioneer Woman show how she incorporates HP solutions into her life. By leveraging this already-existing social community, they were able to bring more credibility to the message, in that the audience is not being told what to do, but is having information shared with them.

One key takeaway from the HP social networking presentation was how important and effective it can be to find ways for your brand or business to share and collaborate in the social media space.

Katherine closed with a few takeaways:

• Digital AND social media are the future…how do they work with and impact other assets?
• Use the data AND trust your gut if you have a good compass (or get someone who does)
• Leave enough room for innovation AND experimentation
• Traditional AND emerging measurement are both important

Thanks to 24Notion for the event sponsored. As well as for everyone who attended the lecture. For more info about Girls in Tech Portland, check out our Facebook group

Tags: 24notion, digital, girls in tech, HP, Ivo Lukas, marketing, media, Portland, social media, technology
Posted in All Chapters, Portland | No Comments »

A hot topic in the current online media community as well as the business/legal arena has been the topic of regulating advertising and affiliate marketing. Advertising historically has consisted of traditional mediums such as television, radio, print, outdoor collateral and product placement, just to name a few. In the last decade, additional avenues such as the web, branded entertainment, viral videos and blogs have changed the direction of advertising and marketing dramatically. This has begged the question of whether regulation on a new level was necessary and to what degree the Federal Trade Commission should require mandatory disclosure of advertising. (see http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/tech/tec09.shtm)

The first step is defining advertising in broad terms. Advertising is almost any communication with consumers. Because of the breadth of this definition advertisers and markets are held to high standards both statewide and federally. The FTC has prohibited advertising and marketing that is deemed to be “unfair or deceptive”. This is further defined as any advertising that is likely to materially mislead the average reasonable consumer.

But what does that mean to us as consumers? The FTC has recognized the evolving challenges presented by new media advertising and marketing and has created mandatory “clear and conspicuous” disclosure rules. Under the FTC standards, any disclosures must be easily accessible, in a large enough print and understandable by the average consumer. The line is drawn at whether the disclosure is considered “unfair” to consumers. This includes any advertising which is contradictory, in “mouse type” or disclosures made after the fact.

To advertisers and marketers this means additional challenges and uncertainty in promoting their product or message to targeted consumers. One way around the challenges is to promote user-generated content, to make advertising more integrated as a conversation then as obvious as a banner ad or flier. This also allows for a dialog on a topic which can generate ongoing viral exposure on multiple media properties simultaneously. Not only does this advertising “conversation” adhere to the FTC standards, but it minimizes in many ways the previously required budget necessary to reach the same number of consumers.

The takeaway here for business owners is this: Advertizing and marketing is evolving into new hybrids. The recognition of multiple new outlets for all things marketing and advertising is not only suggested but almost required in this day and age. And why not jump on the bandwagon. If “new media” simultaneously helps you bottom line and minimizes potential liabilities, I’m all for it.

Laurel Kaufman, Esq.
Co-Founder, AK Consulting Group
www.ak-cg.com
follow me on twitter @LaurelKaufman
facebook: Laurel Kaufman
818.263.6213 p
818.301.2068 f

Tags: advertising, busines, FTC, legal, marketing, media, regulation
Posted in Los Angeles | 2 Comments »

Tags: digital, marketing, social media, technology
Posted in All Chapters, Events, Portland | No Comments »