1. Department of Communication Social Media Forum “Hey, What’s Your Hashtag?” March 31, 2011 Live Twitter Feeds During Event at #commforum

2. Steve Cody- Peppercom  “Forget about getting jobs if you don’t have social media skills.”  Social media proficiency today: “table stakes” (minimum skills, got to have!)  If your organization is attacked in social media, Cody says to openly acknowledge the negative criticism (Maytag example- two million tweets and the story was picked up by national media)  Say that you are sorry, ask critic to detail the problem, say you are sorry there’s a problem and ask “let’s take this off line.”

3. Jeannie Bunton- VP, External Relations, International Center for Research on Women  Described social media as “the Wild West”  Used some catchy terms: COPE- create once, publish everywhere  Avoid the “spray and pray” news release distribution approach  Social media have helped her organization in “friendraising” (as well as fundraising)  Careful targeting and planning of events and initiatives have increased ICRA’s following in measurable ways (event attendance, Twitter and FB followers) and has reduced its “bounce rate”  It’s all about “storytelling, planning and measurement” in her estimation

4. Keith Lindenburg- National PR Director, Deloitte accounting  Young people HAVE to be Linkedin  He says his company uses this online business network for researching and recruiting new employees  Facebook “is for family and friends”  Linkedin is a recruiting tool  You are your own BRAND– manage it carefully and skillfully!

5. Hashtag  Still wondering what a “hashtag” is?  A hashtag is a tag used to categorize posts on Twitter (called tweets) according to topics  To add a hashtag to a tweet, you just preface the relevant term with the hash symbol (the pound sign: #)  That will allow people who follow that topic to find your tweet and perhaps follow and join in the discussion (definitions from Whatis?com)  Hashtag example: #commforum  Your individual Twitter name is called your “handle”  Example: @cccougar is my handle