“Keeping Social Media Human” in Virginia Beach

The Virginia Beach chapter launched in October where a crowd of 50 people discussed, townhall style, what platforms work well for those in business? How do we merge personal and business ? These questions led to lively discussions on privacy, such as  how to create the Facebook group lists and hide what some friends can see. Lori Aitkenhead, a founder, was at a conference in Boston, so she gracefully allowed us to do a live Skype call to introduce her to the group.

The demand for the social media approach was high so we continued with “Keeping Social Media Human.” at the November 9 event.  Momentum remained strong for this, our second meet-up ever! We were thrilled to have a nationally-recognized social media personality as our guest speaker. Francina Harrison, “The Career Engineer,” – a national career, business and networking expert – lead an interactive discussion about building business relationships through social media. She emphasized the importance of connecting with your audience regularly, staying engaged and providing good content. In fact, one of Francina’s most valuable nuggets of wisdom was, “Content is king!” Amen, Career Engineer!

After the meet-up, one attendee commented, “Great event! Many familiar faces, but lots of new ones. Info shared was fabulous–especially by Francina.” Indeed, Francina was an amazing guest speaker with a ton of relevant personal experiences and great information to share.  After the event, she was gracious enough to speak with us via podcast. Thanks to Garner New Media, this podcast will allow you to share in what we learned from The Career Engineer! We plan to have monthly podcasts highlighting and breaking down each meet-up.

Our December 2nd event will have small break out groups where the discussion will be about entering the Blogosphere: Set-Up, Strategy, and Content. Join us for daily discussion on our Facebook page, where members have reached over 400 and growing!