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Apr 29

Speaker Spotlight: David Armano

By mesh conference mesh11

Within the social media world, there are a handful of people who talk the talk and walk the walk. These are people who provide information, insight and perspective about what’s happening with social media and get their hands dirty with clients.

One of them is David Armano, EVP, Global Innovation & Integration with Edelman, but he’s probably better known for being the guy behind Logic + Emotion, one of the most popular marketing blog.

Armano’s strength is how he explains many of the theories, processes and trend within social media and digital marketing in a way that is smart and accessible. It makes David stand out in a marketplace in which there are more people talking about what’s happening.

After some juggling with his schedule, we were excited that David will be able to join us at mesh, along with Valeria Maltoni, for a panel looking the growing role of influence.

The panel will explore the why influence has become so important and why influencers are regarded as a valuable and necessary asset. We’ll also look at how “influence” is measured, and how influencers should be approached.

mesh, by the way, happens on May 25 and 25 at the Allstream Centre in Toronto. You can purchase tickets here.

Apr 26

Love0

Speaker Spotlight on Janice Diner: F-Commerce, Anyone?

By mesh conference mesh11

One of mesh’s programming goals is presenting a wide variety of speakers, particularly people who haven’t appeared in Toronto or don’t speak often. To keep things fresh, we try not to have speakers make repeat appearances.

Of course, there are a few exceptions. One of them is Janice Diner, who made her mesh debut last year with a standing room-only presentation about Facebook. There was so much enthusiasm for Janice’s presentation we invited her to do a presentation at meshmarketing. And there was so much interest that we felt compelled to invite Janice to do a workshop at mesh ’11.

So why has Janice become a rare three-repeat presenter? As much as many people use Facebook, there is so much to learn about how Facebook is evolving and the different things that brands can do with it. Janice has a unique combination of insight and hands-on experience that makes her presentation “must-attends”. If you look around the room during one of her presentation, the amount of furious note-taking is impressive.

At mesh ’11, Janice is going to cover some new ground with a workshop focused on the growing amount of e-commerce happening on Facebook, aka F-commerce. Analysts predict commerce from Facebook stores will hit $30 billion by 2015 as more companies look at how to turn conversations into commerce.

“Businesses of all sizes are building and testing commerce solutions inside Facebook and are looking at how they can turn conversations into conversions,” Janice says. “Coca-Cola, Barneys, Sears, Pampers, Dove, Sephora, Lands End and many others pages have built “Shopping” Tabs in their Facebook pages. Facebook is launching, local group buying with its Deal platform and going head to head with companies such as Groupon. Facebook Credits will become the mandatory currency for Facebook games and applications as of July 1 2011.”

For anyone looking for real-world insight into where Facebook is going with e-commerce, you won’t want to miss Janice’s workshop, which happens during the afternoon of May 26.

Apr 20

Love0

The Early-Bird Special Ends Today

By mesh conference mesh11

Did you know that April is the 110th day of the year? Of that it’s National Pineapple Upside Down Cake Day?

It’s also the last day to take advantage of the early-bird special for mesh. There are now 14 hours left to jump on the deal that will save you $100 off the regular $639 ticket price. That works out to about 25 pineapples, which is a lot of pineapples no matter how you slice it.

Regardless of whether take advantage of the early-bird special or whether you pay the regular price of $639, you’ll get great value from mesh ’11. We’ve got a terrific line-up of speakers, led by our keynote presenters: Jeff Jarvis, Mark Surman, Ron Diebert and Gabe Zichermann.

We’ve also got more programming – 40% more than the first mesh in 2006 – given the move to the Allstream Centre has provided us a lot more space. This includes an expanded number of workshops in each stream. It means the biggest challenge may be selecting the sessions that you want to attend.

Looking forward to seeing you at mesh on May 25 and 26. You can buy tickets at the mesh Web site.