Posted by Brad, Chief Explosion Officer
I’m leaving for a few hours to go present BlueFuego’s Independent Colleges of Washington Workshop with Howard. It’s a 4.5 hour session tomorrow, and we’re doing 3.5 hours of Q&A! I love Q&A, I wish more of my presentations were strictly Q&A. There are so many questions out there about all of these tools, practical strategies for moving forward, how to measure, and so much more.
This is the 6th workshop that BlueFuego has done, and we already have 8 more scheduled for 2010. It’s apparent that people are hungry for more, and have lots of questions on their mind about web marketing.
I was finishing up my slidedeck and decided to post the pre-workshop survey questions we received on a slide to magnify the fact that if you have questions during the workshop, you’re not alone. I then bolded words or questions or statements that stood out to me. When I finished it, it became a strong representation of where I think higher ed currently is in dealing with web marketing.
[View the Full Size Image]
It’s been interesting to watch our workshops evolve over the past 8-10 months. Last spring and summer, we were constantly answering questions like “What IS Twitter?”, “What is a Facebook Page?”, “How do I start?”, etc. Now that schools have moved past that initial first step, the questions have become like the ones in the image above.
“How do I sustain?” - Ensuring that efforts are manageable and scalable.
“Foursquare is awesome, but should we play?” - Recognizing that not every new tool is worth the time.
“Tools to help manage multiple accounts” – Now we’re not dealing with one Twitter account, we’re dealing with 12.
“How do I show my managers the importance of devoting time and money to these new techniques?” - “New media is a synonym for no budget”, Seth Godin once said. 
“How can we customize?” – Recognizing the need to stand out, and that simply being on a site isn’t a sustainable competitive advantage.
“I probably have a zillion other questions floating around in my head.” - Again, you’re not alone.
We look forward to tomorrow’s session and spending the large portion of the day with people from universities across Washington, answering questions like these and more!
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Very cool visual! I’m really looking forward to tomorrow’s session and digging deep into these questions and more.
Q&AFTW!
I agreed to do a “presentation” to a room full of the UW System’s Chief Student Affairs Officers (considered it a retirement gift for my boss – by the way, she was the Best. Boss. EVER.). From the start I explained “social media” had nothing to do with me, it was about all of us. I started with questions that they could easily answer. Pulled a few things up on the screen for them to discuss. Before long, it was like sitting around the family dinner table. Info flowing from all over, I fielded the “tough/tech” questions, but they handled most of the “what ifs.” The conversation carried over to lunch, best part, people were having fun.
Q&A beats powerpoint EVERY time, especially when talking about the “social” Web. There’s a reason people ask what “Three People You’d Love to Have Dinner With” and not “Three People You’d Love to Have Show You Slides.”
Brad and Howard, have fun sharing!
We ended up going 4.5 hours Q&A and skipped my presentation all together.
I shared a few slides on Social Web Callout research, but other than that we just discussed! It was a good time, glad we were able to be a part of it!