Getting Social with Schwabe – Episode 3
Retail is an incredibly competitive landscape, in this episode Walter Schwabe speaks with Jay Myers, Lead Web Development Engineer out of Best Buy headquarters in Richfield Minnesota about the Semantic technologies he and his team have embedded within BestBuy.com to improve your online shopping experience. Retailers of all sorts and sizes won’t want to miss this interesting show about how the retail industry is changing as a result of the social web.
Getting Social With Schwabe – Episode 2
Episode 2:
Exploring how associations use social media, Walter Schwabe speaks with Maddie Grant from Social Fish, a social media consulting firm specializing in working with associations. Also, interviewed is Lina Hoffbauer, Project Coordinator with Alberta Senior Citizens Housing Association.
PR- SOCIAL MEDIA INNOVATOR LAUNCHES RADIO SHOW
“Getting Social With Schwabe”, a radio program focused on social media debuts Saturday, August 7th, on The TEAM 1260 in Edmonton with host, Walter Schwabe, Chief Evolution Officer of fusedlogic
“We wanted to create a program about social media that everyone could relate to — a show that informs, educates and entertains”, says Walter Schwabe, the show’s host. Guests on the debut show include Chris Moore, Chief Information Officer of the City of Edmonton, and Chris Heuer, founder of the Social Media Club out of San Francisco. The show will also be archived and streamed from www.fusedlogic.com.
Yardstick Software, a leading provider of online training and testing systems in North America, stepped up to sponsor the first 6 shows, which will air through September. “ We liked the premise and thought that there was a nice fit for Yardstick in the program. We’re very excited”, says Greg Kurelek, Yardstick’s VP of Sales and Marketing.
For inquiries, please contact Walter Schwabe at radio@fusedlogic.com 780-640-9339
Institute of Chartered Accountants of Alberta
Yesterday I had a wonderful time at the Jasper Park Lodge presenting to NOT the Certified General Accountants of Alberta as I blogged about in my previous post but the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Alberta (ICAA). I must be getting old, I’ve never got the association wrong before like this. This was (in my terms) similar to when the lead singer for a major music act exclaims they’re totally stoked to be in “Calgary” when they’re actually in “Edmonton.” I start talking about why those in the room should consider becoming a “social accountant.” Ok, so far so good, they’re all accountants. Then we start digging into specifics and I realize, yes we’ve got a different designation in the room. Now I explained early on that I was taking the approach of looking at the accounting industry as a whole anyway, so the impact in terms of data was still there. I talked about CGA’s, CMA’s, even a group of accountants from Ireland, all as examples to communicate various points. Still as a professional speaker this is not something you want to get in the habit of doing, I won’t do that again and my apologies to the Chartered Accountants in the room .
Everyone was pretty good about the little slip-up, although in true social media fashion, there is a tweet explaining the mistake I made and I couldn’t resist and also had to blog about it too.
The Giant is Asleep
In a room of just under 50 professional people, (2) were on Twitter, that’s not entirely unexpected for this industry after my preliminary research. There were also (2) self-proclaimed bloggers in the room, one of which I found out later was actually a teacher. That too was lower than expected. However, I believe that many started putting serious thought into taking some action towards becoming a “social accountant.” I can extrapolate this from the questions that were asked after my presentation was completed. Discussions of how to reduce white noise or irrelevant information flow, pilot projects and where to start, this was a very friendly and engaged group.
Admissions of the beginning of Linkedin profiles and Twitter accounts. By enlarge, this industry is dormant in terms of social activity. Certainly with respect to Alberta, we have a long way to go before anyone could state that our regional accountants of any designation are truly invested in social. My hope is that for one person or organization, yesterday’s presentation was enough inspiration to take action. I did receive a little feedback from folks which I always appreciate as it helps me improve. That despite the faux pas mentioned above was quite positive and I feel really good about the experience as well. We’re all human after all and prone to mistakes, it’s how we learn from those experiences that is the real story.
I want to thank the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Alberta for the chance to speak at their wonderful event at the Jasper Park Lodge and for the wonderful speakers gift too.
Certified General Accountants of Alberta
This Friday is going to be a really fun day, as I’ve been asked to provide a keynote address to the Certified General Accountants of Alberta. I’ll be presenting on the topic of social media for business and all of this will be taking place in one of the most beautiful places and tourist destinations in Alberta, Canada and frankly the world. – Jasper.
The Social Accountant
This association of accountants, many of which I’m sure will be from major centres such as, Edmonton, Red Deer and Calgary but also I suspect from locations all across Alberta. The Certified General Accountants of Alberta is one of many chapters from across Canada as of the national association. I’ve been performing some research as I typically do prior to a speaking engagement and I have found some very interesting uses of social media by accountants and accounting firms. There’s also a large opportunity to mature this usage in many areas which I look to cover in Jasper. Over all, social media is still a relatively new concept for the majority of this industry of professionals and I’m excited to be presenting some of what I would consider the social media basics, as well as, some advanced concepts that will help those Alberta accountants in the room interested in generating new revenue to get started with social right away. For example, the opportunity to become a “social accountant,” a term I will define further during my presentation and what that would mean in terms of general awareness for the accounting firm that takes this advice to heart.
Another benefit to this opportunity is that I get to travel out of the Edmonton area and that is welcomed, especially as it falls on a weekend, so I will be taking the opportunity to breath some fresh mountain air and return to Sherwood Park at some point on the weekend.
Also, here’s an article I wrote on “understanding social media” that was published in CGA Magazine in December of 2009.
