At first, I though I wasn't gonna post about that.I mean, this is a fashion blog. People expect to see skirts and dresses, not men in costumes talking about ROI and 360° campaigns. But, blogs are social media and some of us fashion ones did get mentioned on stage, so here is my fashion and blogger oriented report on yesterday's Social Media Conference organised by Boussias.
"Demystifying Blogs and Blogger Relations"
Eleni Giannakaki of Hill & Knowlton Digital PR focused on explaining what blogs are, classifying them into categories and explaining how PRs should choose which bloggers to "work" with.
I was rather silly flattered that my blog was mentioned on the slide showing Greek specific theme blogs as the fashion blog example, along with mommy blog Eimai Mama, cooking blog Love Cooking and, well, tech blog TechBlog.Sorry there's no link for the company, as I usually provide. I tried googling them and I couldn't find anything. After some help from my fellow twitterers, all I found for the Athens branch of Hill & Knowlton Digital PR was their address and phone number, four clicks into the international site. Certainly not good enough if your trade is the internet.
"GOD & Social Media"
Eleni Konstantinidi, CEO of GODigital and founder of myworld.gr kicked off her presentation by showing the rather old, christmas-y viral video The Digital Story of Nativity, a choice that didn't leave nice impressions with an audience that knows how fast-moving the world of internet is, and most importantly, how not forgiving to those who are left behind. Plus, she literally used the phrase "we took the risk of inviting some bloggers to an event" which left us bloggers thinking PR and marketing people must really be considering us as a dangerous and threatening species. Can you hear me roar as I type?Moving on to the third fashion-related speech of the day:
"Buldoza digs & digs & digs into Social Media: What have we found…"
Panayiotis Gezerlis, CEO and co-founder of buldoza.gr certainly left good impressions with everyone in the room by simply showing a great example of how an e-tail company can successfully use all social media, right from the start and in-house. And I'm not saying that just because he was the one who invited me to the conference.You see, even before its launch, Buldoza has been active on twitter by replying to mentions right away and getting into conversation with people, keeping a very active page on facebook, uploading pics on flickr from the backstage of its photoshots, keeping a company blog powered by wordpress where they share insights of the way they work as well as fun trivia, and also having a very active presence on youtube with a series of videos titled making of buldoza.gr on how the company started, product reviews and the buldoza x-mas flash mob that went viral.
And that's not all. Panayiotis also gave some great examples on how a fashion e-tail business can crowdsource product suggestions from its clients on-line via twitter or use it to attract them from competition.
Examples?
In the photo above you can see the slide showing the twitter suggestions of fashion bloggers @FashAlgorithms, @Athenouka and @skinny_flavored on how @buldoza_gr should start stocking Jeffrey Campbell shoes in Greece.
And here you see a tweet by @_LFoF_ asking @ASOS whether she should be worried that her order is late, and @buldoza_gr grabbing the chance by answering back that she should order from them instead, as they offer next day delivery for 47,6% of all clothes, shoes and accessories they offer.Simple yet fucking impressive.
And last but not least:
"Being Agile: How Social is transforming Marketing as we know it"
Main conference speaker Leo Rayman of DDB UK easily gets the "most stylish social media speaker" award for his outfit of black jeans, checkered shirt and red belt topped with a great grey jacket for that sharp business feel.
Extra brownie points for the red socks.
And for mentioning that his jacket was by Zara...
...while presenting the Zara business model, where super-quick feedback from the customers in the form of a well-tuned ERP system is crucial for being in front of trends and, oh well, selling as many clothes as possible to us.That's it.
I know that's only four speakers out of 22 and there's a lot more that could be said on the fails and wins we witnessed yesterday, but as I mentioned in the start, this is a fashion blog. I try to keep things fashion-relevant. If you are still interested to learn more and you can read Greek, then head over to Dimitris Kalogeropoulos' blog and read this amazing report. Seriously, it's exactly what I would write if I wasn't a fashion blog. Or simply lazy.
That's all from let's hope things improve till next time.
[please note that this post was edited from the first draft published, as I had accidentally merged 2 reports in one, hence making one person appear to say things said by another]
5 comments:
I was taken aback as well when I heard Konstantinidi telling she "took the risk of inviting bloggers", but I believe she clarified that they were afraid that no blogger would show up, since it was their first contact with them, and they only had a name and an email.
Other than that, it's funny how the strategy director of DDB UK (whose salary is certainly MUCH bigger than those of greek executives) took pride of his Zara jacket, when Burberry trench coats seem to be a kind of uniform for all the "usual" attendants of greek conferences.
Panagiotis' presentation was excellent as always; I believe he was the only one who showed what a company can do in social media, without investing lots in above the line advertising.
And, it was nice to see you again yesterday :-)
lopi, i really love your "more serious" posts in this blog..
Thanks for the report lopi, sounds all so interesting. I wish I had been there...
''the strategy director of DDB UK (whose salary is certainly MUCH bigger than those of greek executives) took pride of his Zara jacket, when Burberry trench coats seem to be a kind of uniform for all the "usual" attendants of greek conferences.''
ok the english are known for their self-depreciation but so what? it still looks awful on him. :)
I think your post, Lopi, is VERY interesting. i also read the link and thanks for posting it. you may think I am a technophobe, but I wanted to make the following points:
1. you mentioned how buldoza grabs competition (asos/lfof example). Ok it may sound pro-active, but as a customer, don't you find it just a bit aggressive? Isn't it a bit relentless? I think that rubs off the brand in a negative way. I mean I was reading the other day a a blog and some idiot posted a comment promoting his products (barclays bank that is). I don;t know I find it a bit annyoing and it puts me off personally. it makes the brand look too desperate. for that matter I wanna terminate my account with Barclays
2. By utilising social media, and being very active on twitter and facebook etc etc, what % of the market can a brand/etailer really grab? In this case, doesn't buldoza limit itself to a very specific limited audience? those who are very able and active with the net/facebook/twitter etc? but how many are they (like u and lfof) who are so confident and active with it? I was also wondering whether there is a connection with social media and age. I don't think a 35++ year old woman will be that active on twitter or facebook checking tweets posts etc etc. I mean judging by myself: i have a twitter account (which I don;t even use), was on facebook (boring), am on linkedin (but not really using it cause nothing good ever came out of it). So I think these campaigns, this focus on social media as preached by those ad men and how influential they are for your company, are they really? or they are but for 25 year olds. Which I also think it is strange as a target group: young people (including those 35 year olds) have no buying power. they are probably jobless right now. i d love to hear in any case whether anyone mentioned anything on using social media to poach the older man.
i dont usually visit blogs for this kind of conference reporting but when you do it lopi, i end up reading the whole thing because you make it so interesting.
i love the 'serious' reports, they contrast nicely with the silly-faces-in-bathrooms posts haha (that was so fun!) x
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