Breakaway Digital

I had the pleasure of being part of the Module 09 Midwest Digital Strategy conference. Based on the response of people that attended, and the traffic online it was a huge success. We were able to take the top top trend on Twitter beating out Hannah Montana, and Oprah. There was a lot of live blogging going on, just take a look at the #module09 hash tag.

I was also a presenter at the conference. I had the privilege of being a part of a great group of thought leaders in the digital strategy space. We come from all areas of the space, and definitely offer different points of views.

Here was our presenter list:

Ken Burbary on Twitter @kenburbary

Adrian Pittman on Twitter @adrianpittmann

Shannon Paul on Twitter @shannonpaul

Amber Naslund on Twitter @ambercadabra

Marcel Lebrun on Twitter  @lebrun

Oz Sultan on Twitter @ozsultan

Jeremy Tanner on Twitter @penguin

Chris Brogan on Twitter @chrisbrogan

Scott Monty on Twitter @scottmonty

Also have to give a huge shout-out to Terry Bean, who was our MC for the day. With little preparation he was able to come up with some very entertaining introductions for each speaker. This was my first time meeting Terry but man did he leave a great impression!

His partner in crime, Charlie Wollbrg (@CharlieCurve) was also keeping things moving by being an online moderator. He kept the conversation going online on Twitter and Ustream.

Stop trying to build a better mouse trap

My presentation was on why brands need to stop trying to lure their audience into their web properties, and instead try to enrich their lives with it. This means that they need to make their content live beyond the walls of their web site. Customers are no longer just a part of the transaction, they are now part of the company.

This is especially apparent online as customers have a voice, that voice has the ability to reach a much bigger audience than it once did. As Ken Burbary presented “every person online can be an influencer.” Of course there are levels of influence but you have to treat every customer as that influencer.

Giving them the opportunity to own the brand, and build a movement can create astounding results. One example I presented was the Charmin, Sit or Squat application for iPhone. This application has had wild success but really has a weak tie to Charmin’s products. I’d dare say it is not really selling toilet paper, but it is engaging the consumer. The consumer is learning to trust Charmin not only for quality products, but as a reliable source of information. That relationship will surely extend into the transaction.

I then explored what else we can learn from mobile applications, because many websites try to do too much. Mobile on the other hand needs to be a clear, and concise feature-set. Your user doesn’t need access to everything, they only need the information that they will use on the go. Then making it so they can connect with friends/family via the mobile tools allows them to share that information as well. It all boils down to allowing them to own the brand, and putting your brand in their hand.

That was the gist of the presentation, and certainly just the tip of the ice berg. Here were my slides:

Apparently I also have a Barry White presentation voice… Looking at my @replies I saw things like this:

amurphyCount me in!RT @ShaunaN: @bchesnutt Maybe after lunch we can nap and have @drintelmann sing to us #module09

At first I was like… hmm, do I want to be soothing? Then Brandon Chesnutt told me that it really helped with presenting the information in bite sized pieces. I’ll definitely take that as a huge compliment.

The entire experience was excellent, and the relationships that I built during the whole conference will be a great take away. It after all really does come down to building long lasting relationships both online and offline. I’m looking forward to doing this again next year! There are too many people to thank because we had a ton of great people involved in the conference. To all of you, thank you!

Some images of the conference taken by Brandon Chesnutt:

* Update * : @mattroush wrote a fantastic post on the Module conference. Give that a read as well.