Dave Barger and Emily Joyner might have been thinking the very same thing when they threw LunaWeb’s hat into the wring to host the inaugural SMB Memphis at the University of Memphis Holiday Inn last Wednesday. But I have a hunch that much like our breakfast series in Boston, SMB Memphis is going to catch fire in a big way.

I particularly liked Dave and Emily’s adaptation of the personal social-networking toolkit, originally conceived by Jeff Pulver, another guy who likes bringing people together for breakfast.

Have a look and listen to toolkit that Dave and Emily gave to all of the SMB Memphis participants:

Pretty cool, huh?

And if you want to start a Social Media Breakfast series in your city or town, please drop me a line.

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Geoff Livingston, author of the new book Now is Gone: A Primer on New Media for Executives and Entrepreneurs, will be flying up from Washington, D.C. to speak a passionate group of Boston-area social media professionals and enthusiasts that I hope will include you!

To register for the event, please RSVP on our Eventbrite page.

Big thanks go out to Kyle Flaherty, Lisa Azizian, and everyone at the Horn Group for their generous sponsorship of the breakfast.

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast, SMB4, Geoff Livingston, Now is Gone

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Here are the details:

• Event: Social Media Breakfast 3
• Date: Saturday, October 27, 2007
• Time: 7:30 – 8:30am
• Location: Starbucks Cafe at the Westin Boston Waterfront Hotel, 425 Summer St., Boston, MA 02210
• Public transportation: Take the Red Line to South Station. Transfer to the Silver Line and follow it to the World Trade Center stop.
• Cost: Free — until the sponsorship funds are exhausted (probably just after 8:00). Then, it’s pay your own way.
• What happens afterward: You head up the escalator to the BCEC and sign in for PodCamp Boston 2. You have registered, right?

Social Media Breakfast 3 is sponsored by CM Access (disclosure: the company is both my former employer and a former client).

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast, SMB3, PodCamp Boston, PodCamp

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If you’re from Boston, then what I’m about to tell you won’t come as an earth-shattering revelation: Beantowners are hungry for social media.

And as the packed-house crowds at monthly Social Media Club gatherings, blogger dinners, PodCamps, and impromptu Tweetups routinely indicate, the socialness of social media doesn’t just happen online. We really dig the face-to-face conversations, too.

The latest example: This past Wednesday’s Social Media Breakfast 2, which brought together more than 50 Boston-area marketers, PR pros, entrepreneurs, and new-media enthusiasts.

Our formal program, which included a presentation from Larry Weber, was set to end at 9:30, but well over half the attendees stuck around until close to 11:00, many of them taking part in a breakout session on social media business models that David Cutler facilitated. (Thanks to Julia Roy, the session was Ustreamed, too. You can watch by clicking below).

A big thanks goes out to the Digital Influence Group, which hosted and sponsored the breakfast.

Looking for more online coverage of SMB2? Check out these links:

• Purpose-built del.icio.us page with SMB links
• Flickr photos

And what of Social Media Breakfast 3? Expect an announcement in this space soon.

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast, Boston

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I’ve got the topic of “meeting people” on my mind. After all, Social Media Breakfast 2 is taking place tomorrow morning in Waltham, Massachusetts (Are you going? There’s still time to register), and I’m looking forward to spending time with friends and colleagues, both old and new.

Chris Brogan (the guy on the left) is thinking about meeting people, too. In fact, he’s just written up a nice post about things to do and things to avoid when making the rounds at face-to-face gatherings.

Incidentally, in that photo above, Chris is chatting with David Cutler, who will also be a big part of tomorrow’s breakfast. David will be facilitating our optional break-out session on building successful business models for social media.

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast, SMB2, Chris Brogan, David Cutler

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The inaugural breakfast last month was a runaway success, and I expect SMB2 to be bigger and better. Please help spread the word by telling three friends/colleagues.

Details on the event are below.

*************************************
Please RSVP through Eventbrite.
*************************************

The Social Media Breakfast is a free almost-monthly Boston-area breakfast organized by Bryan Person, where social media experts and newbies alike come together to eat, meet, share, and learn.

Marketers, PR pros, entrepreneurs, bloggers, podcasters, new media fanatics, and online social networkers are all welcome to attend.

Social Media Breakfast 2 is being hosted and sponsored by the Digital Influence Group, a social media marketing agency in Waltham, Massachusetts. (see driving directions )

Agenda:

8:00 Registration, reception, and plenty of mingling

8:25 Welcome from Bryan Person

8:30 Breakfast presentation on social media (topic TBA) from Larry Weber, chairman of the Digital Influence Group and author of the new book Marketing to the Social Web

8:45 Q&A and discussion with Larry

8:55 Option I – Break-out group (topic(s) TBA)
8:55 Option II – More mingling!

9:25 Event wrap-up

Resources:

* Join the Social Media Breakfast Google Group
* Recap of first Social Media Breakfast
* Flickr photos, tagged Social Media Breakfast
* Twitter mentions of the Social Media Breakfast

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast

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I like David Cutler’s takeaways from the first Social Media Breakfast, held this past Wednesday in Boston:

1. The tools and reach of online technology enable us to set up meaningful in-person meetups.
2. Practice “netweaving.”

What is netweaving? Here’s what David writes:

NetWeaving events put a spin on the traditional networking process. “What can I do for you?” rather than “What can you do for me?” The results are fantastic. People spend hours trying to involve themselves in others’ needs. To give of themselves first. In traditional networking, you show up to work the room and try to make a few contacts. At a NetWeaving event, all the people in the room are trying to make connections for each other.

NetWeaving is connecting people, and positioning yourself as a resource to others — often on a totally gratuitous basis — just with the belief to know that “what goes around, comes around.” This attitude shift makes you aware of the needs of others and at the same time challenges you to draw on your full range of resource – interest, intelligence, and contacts.

Technorati Tags: David Cutler, Social Media Breakfast, netweaving

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Twenty-five participants. Dozens of great conversations. New connections. Delicious — and free — food.

Yes, the inaugural Social Media Breakfast held Wednesday morning at The Pour House in Boston was unquestionably a success.

Some nuggets I took away from the event:

Twitter rocks for promoting events. It was far and away the No. 1 way that word spread about the breakfast.

Social media evangelism isn’t going away anytime soon. I spoke with PR practitioners wanting to learn more about how to implement social media programs for their clients, as well as a client who’s struggling to school his agency on the social media press release. There is still plenty of work to do on the teaching and sharing front — all the more reason to have another breakfast!

Breakfasts only start the conversations. Now we have to continue them, and, as one participant suggested, take them “to the next level.” A Google Group is being formed to help us all keep in touch. We’ll ask and answer each other’s questions, offer up suggestions for social media projects, and spur each other on to new creative and innovative heights.

New faces, new stories. Some 40 percent of the crowd consisted of people I had never met, like Dave Cutler, who took the time to share his passion and hopes for public libraries with me. And David wasn’t even the librarian of the group — the affable Andrea Mercado was!

Having a sponsor helps. Chip Griffin and CustomScoop (also a New Comm Road sponsor) stepped up to cover the tab, sparing us all that terribly awkward task of whipping out $20 bills and then trying to divide a big check into neat and equal smaller portions.

The Social Media Breakfast will get bigger and better. When an event like this goes well, the next logical question is, “So when can we do this again?” I certainly heard that yesterday. Know that the wheels will be set in motion very soon for Social Media Breakfast II, and that it will likely be held in early or mid October. I’ll be looking for a venue that can accommodate even more of us next time, so drop me a line if you have recommendations.

Also, check out photos from the first Social Media Breakfast.

Technorati Tags: Social Media Breakfast, CustomScoop, David Cutler, Andrea Mercado

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Hosted by Bryan Person. Recorded from Boston, Massachusetts, USA and published for Thursday, August 30, 2007.

Subscribe to the New Comm Road podcast. It’s free, and it ensures you won’t miss a single episode! Click on the iTunes image above, or paste this feed into iTunes or your podcatching software of choice: http://feeds.feedburner.com/NewCommRoad

MEDIA MONITORING MINUTE

• A word from Sarah Wurrey of CustomScoop, New Comm Road’s sponsor.
• For a free trial of CustomScoop’s ClipIQ Service, visit http://www.customscoop.com/NewCommRoad

NEWS

I recap the inaugural Social Media Breakfast, held at The Pour House in Boston on Wednesday, August 29. You can also check out Social Media Breakfast photos.

I’m teaching an online class at Shel Holtz Webinars called “Monitoring and Participating in Online Conversations.” The class begins on Monday, September 10 and lasts five weeks. It does not take place at a specific time; participate when it’s convenient for you. The class will cover:

• RSS
• Using feed readers
• Blog monitoring
• Joining in the online conversation
• Blogger outreach and blogger relations

Register for the class now at ShelHoltzWebinars.com.

NEW COMM ROAD MAP
Getting the most out of Google Reader

1. Reading posts in list view (river of news)
2. Share posts of interest — including your own — to a public RSS feed
3. Share posts via e-mail with your colleagues
4. Star important posts and those that you want to come back to later
5. Give posts meaningful tags or labels
6. Add meaningful feeds in addition to blogs — keyword searches from Technorati or Google Blog search, Flickr photo streams, Google Reader shared feeds, etc.
7. Take advantage of Google Reader’s shortcut keys
8. Use the Google Trends feature to better manage your feeds

Thanks to everyone who added their Google Reader tips and tricks via the New Comm Road Travelers group in Facebook:

• Joe Thornley – use keyboard shortcuts
• Christopher Penn – share your feeds internally
• Michael Bellina – use tags and stars
• Daniel Cornwall – display your shared feed in a widget on your blog
• Steve Jay – add your Google Reader post into your lifestream
• Ben Digman – use river-of-news style and shortcut keys

Rob Cottingham, did we convince you to switch from Bloglines?

NOTES

• Visit the New Comm Road Travelers group in Facebook.
• This show can also be found on Blubrry.

MUSIC

• From GarageBand.com: Still Holding On, by Rantings of Eva

CONTACT US

• Leave your text and audio comments below this post
• Send us audio files or text e-mails to comments-AT-NewCommRoad.com
• Call us on our comment line: (206) 222-9130

Technorati Tags: Bryan Person, New Comm Road, Social Media Breakfast, CustomScoop, Shel Holtz Webinars, Google Reader, New Comm Road Travelers

LISTEN
Running time: 18:47

Direct download this episode, or listen using the player above!

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Thanks, CustomScoop!

Disclosure: CustomScoop is a regular sponsor of my New Comm Road podcast.

Technorati Tags: CustomScoop, Chip Griffin, Social Media Breakfast

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