Last night marked the official kick-off of the local chapter of the Social Media Club. If you haven't ever heard of Social Media Club, you should take a few minutes to visit its site and familiarize yourself. Failing that, here is Social Media Club's mission:
Social Media Club's mission is to connect media makers from around the world to advance media literacy, promote industry standards, encourage ethical behaviour and share the lessons they have learned.
In short, the social media club is the professional organization for a new industry. Just like there is an American Advertising Federation for agency professionals, and Legal Marketing Association for legal marketing professionals, Social Media Club is taking a similar role for professionals in the world of social media. With a speaker directory, education programs, regular events, and all the other benefits you might expect from a professional organization, it is becoming a resource for those in the industry and those looking for help.
Buffalo has a healthy supply of social media professionals and advocates, along with people who are being dragged or pushed into that responsibility (just like any industry). Given the success of the first social media meetup on June 30, and then its successor on July 27, it was pretty clear that Buffalo had an interest and a need for a professional support community.
And so began the planning and ultimately formation of the Buffalo Social Media Club chapter. And to bring that back 'round to the beginning, last night was the kick-off event to welcome new members, prospective members, and the curious. Unlike previous social media events, this one saw a lot less tweeting on the fly as people took some time to get to know each other and talk about how they use social media professionally or casually.
The Buffalo News covered the event and wrote up a story: New club aims to help enthusiasts learn how to cash in on social networking. From the article:
Nicole Schuman, president and co-founder of Social Media Club Buffalo, said the club is open to all kinds of savvy users of online social media outlets, like Kin, whether they’re media professionals who use Facebook and LinkedIn to enhance their business connections or simply new social media enthusiasts.
"This event itself was only advertised through Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare [and] LinkedIn. We’re going to have over 100 attendees in the area just because people passed along the information to one another. It’s just a new word-of-mouth," Schuman said.
Skunkpost also showed up and interviewed some attendees. While I managed to dodge the camera (by hiding behind my own), you can see my tweets at 0:51, sandwiched between interviews with guys with hair:
Given how dark the venue was, it may be some time before I have my photos posted. Until then, enjoy this dark photo from my phone showing off some food and watch for the photos later.
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