I had the opportunity to attend the 3rd Annual Gravity Summit at the campus of UCLA yesterday with fellow members of Social Networking San Diego. In a nutshell, Gravity Summit is a day long event that brings together some of the best minds in social media from various industries. Speakers talk about social media trends, how to use social media tools, and present case studies on some unique social media applications.

Here is a brief recap and a couple of key points I took away:

The Summit started with opening remarks from Beverly Macy, CEO of Gravity Summit, and Teri Thompson, Creative Director of Gravity Summit, who spoke on the topic of “A Social Global Perspective”. One notable statistic I took from Teri’s presentation was that in the past year, there was a 90% increase in conversation on Twitter about companies and corporations. It makes you wonder, what are people saying about your company?

Gravity Summit Attendees

Simon Mainwaring from Fast Company took the stage for the opening keynote. He mentioned that two of consumers’ top concerns are honest and transparent business practices and dealing with companies they can trust. A way to address those concerns is to engage with your customers via social media.

Simon explained how social media is connecting us and accelerating change on multiple levels. He stated that companies need to build social capital as well as financial capital. Companies and brands cannot excel in a society that fails, therefore, it is critical for companies to contribute to social good.

“The best hope for business is the business of hope”

How is your company contributing to social good?

Brian Dresher from Mashable talked about sharing the personality behind your brand, show casing your company’s personality and why you should provide behind-the-scenes access to how your company operates. Sharing your brand’s “personality” is key to building trust with your customers, a point mentioned previously by Simon Mainwaring.

Panel Discussion (from left to right) Beverly Macy, Dr. Natalie Petouhoff, Patrick Srail (MySpace), Andrew Orci (ORCI Agency), Daphne Hart (American Red Cross)

There were speakers representing companies such as Access Hollywood,  American Red Cross, Domino’s Pizza, and Toyota, who talked about how they use social media or how the use of social media has been beneficial to their companies in a multitude of ways, from gaining competitive advantages, better customer engagement, building brand awareness and following, etc.

A memorable presentation was by Ramon De Leon, owner of six Domino’s Pizza restaurants in Chicago who shared how he uses social media to engage with his customers and deliver above and beyond customer satisfaction.

One of the highlights of the show was MC Hammer accepting an award from Gravity Summit for Social Media Marketer of the Year.

Social Networking San Diego CEO Justin French with MC Hammer

My experience at Gravity Summit overall was great. Check below for a full list of the speakers and a link to their Twitter page.

Wesley Quach

Complete list of 3rd Annual Gravity Summit Speakers:

Beverly Macy @beverlymacy
Rodney Rumford @rumford
Teri Thompson @terithompson1
Simon Mainwaring @simonmainwaring
Brian Dresher @bdresher
Ted Nguyen @tednguyen
Daphne Hart @daphnehart
Stewart Neff @stewartneff
Jeremy Blacklow @blacklow1
MC Hammer @mchammer
Ramon De Leon @ramon_deleon
Vishal Sapra @vishalsapra
Justin Goldsborough @jgoldsborough
Shira Lazar @shiralazar
Dr. Natalie Petouhoff @drnatalie
Patrick Srail @patricksrail
Denise Morrissey @denisemorrissey
Charles Miller @chasmiller
Nic Adler @nicadler
Kyra Reed @kyrareed

Are you looking for a social media manager? Is your small business actively using social media? Are you getting return on your time invested in this sometimes complicated marketing channel? I have been asked lately by many clients, students, colleagues, partners, small businesses, etc. exactly what makes a good social media manager Justin? So I wanted to share with you the Top 10 Qualities Of A Result Driven Social Media Manager that I have come to find while being active in the social media for business community over the past 2+ years. This is a job title that has been trending in the most recent months, BUT many people are still trying to wrap their heads around what specific characteristics do social media managers need to have? These are the same EXACT qualities & etiquette I teach people when participating, engaging, and conducting business development in the virtual world of social media:

1. You listen to the conversations first- then provide additional value add to it
2. You care about people
3. You are trustworthy, helpful, friendly, courteous, and kind to others
4. You have decent understanding of business, strategy, technology, and most importantly web 2.0 technologies
5. You understand marketing and know how to measure results
6. You practice what you preach
7. You add your insight when appropriate
8. You develop relationships first and sell second
9. You actively stay on the cutting edge of “whats new on the web” and have a burning obsession to stay on the pulse of social media
10. You have somewhat of an influence in the social media for business community

Any you would like to add?

Enjoy your week, hope these help shed some light- Justin

p.s. Looking for a result driven social media manager for your business ?

Call 760-576-4653 and mention this top 10 list for a FREE phone assessment!

1. He is living proof that if you CARE enough, engage, and work your face off you can become mainstream

Watch CBS News Videos Online

2. He is down to earth, completely honest & transparent

3. He is one of the most energetic hard working hustlers I know (besides myself)

4. He knows how to balance fun, work, and of course family life

5. I had the honor & privilege to meet Gary twice (Boston Gravity Summit and a Wine Meet-up in San Diego)

In summary- Gary Vee has been a great inspiration in my continued jounrey of internet entrepreneurship, social media consulting, and most of all following my passion.  Feel free to leave a comment if Gary Vee has had an impact on your life- I would love to hear your story.  Please leave a comment below.  Cheers

Justin “Results” French

I had the privilege to attend the 1 year anniversary of Gravity Summit at UCLA this past Monday and I must say that it was well worth staying up there the night before and not having to rush to the conference in the morning. It ended up being an eventful and relax-full weekend and an all around great conference. As we know, being involved with Social Media, it is always good habits to take it off-line once in a while and get in a room filled with like minded people and if you happen to be part of the social media conference, then you know the talent they were able to pull was of the highest caliber in the industry. Not to mention re-connecting with those that I had seen at Harvard at another previous Gravity Summit. I recorded an inspirational video the night before (talking about the Three H’s- Hustle, Heart, and Helpfulness) that can be seen here if you’d like http://www.socialnetworkingsandiego.com/social-networking/twas-the-night-before-gravity-summit-heart-hustle-and-helpfulness/

Social media for business is still the hot topic but after being involved in this trend for the last year and a half can sometimes be draining. But the gravity summit expo just happen to give me that re-energizing boost I needed to re-spark the deep passion I have for this topic.

The content provided during the event was exceptional, but there was one presentation early on that really had an impact on me- an ecstatic, passionate, and over-the-top presentation from Kodak’s CMO Jeffrey Hayzlett. Now I hadn’t heard of Jeff before, but I knew how involved Kodak has been in social media and the drastic changes they had made to their workforce so I was interested in hearing some of the behind the scenes strategies. Not only did I get insight to these practices and policies, but he even had me laughing out loud!! I shared one of the better video clips below, but if you’re interested in the entire highlighted clips from the Keynote you can view them here: Gravity Summit Keynote CMO of Kodak

Please re-tweet and bookmark this post so we can share this insightful and valuable content with the rest of the business community. Hope you enjoyed-

Justin R French

“Those who keep asking what is the ROI on social media- I say what is the cost of ignoring”- Kodak CMO Jeffrey Hayzlett

I happen to be using the new Flip Video (took my Samsung back because of some issues with zoom) so in case your wondering why i am endorsing flip video- its what i will be using from now on to provide you with quality video content. (full disclosure) cheers –
Justin

here is a good deal from Amazon on one: