Jenny McCutcheon's Blog

As I walked down the short flight of stairs at the Upper Arlington library Tuesday night, I felt a twinge of nervousness.  I was about to attend my first Columbus Social Media Cafe (CSMC) meeting–and I’m so glad I did.

The Tuesday meeting turned out to be a medium sized group (maybe 25-30 people) from nonprofits such as Ohio State University (OSU), WOSU and COSI, but also included individuals from other companies, some devoted Columbus bloggers, a Fisher college MBA student, and even a high school student.  Three presentations by OSU employees provided insight into how OSU is utilizing social media, and what the response has been from OSU students, Alumni, and employees. The diverse group made for an interesting discussion about how social media is being used by companies and consumers today.

Above :: Columbus Social Media Cafe’s (CSMC) new logo.

Last month I graduated with a B.S. in eMarketing from Franklin University, and as much as I love this newly emerging field, it’s sometimes difficult to find like-minded people within this evolving industry.  I was grateful to be referred to the CSMC by a new connection I made while interviewing for a position at OSU.

I am particularly interested to discover how B2B for-profit companies are successfully using social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Blogs and LinkedIn.  The folks at CSMC had some great feedback regarding the use of social media in this space.  A couple of suggestions I heard for using blogs in a B2B for-profit setting were as follows:

1. Provide a personal voice to blog entries rather than just using the company blog as a place to push press releases.
2. Encourage employees to use blogging as a way to discuss new product development.

The idea is that people are going to discuss your company whether you choose to listen or not.  As a business, would you rather keep track of those conversations about your products and service–and possibly participate–or pretend like the conversations aren’t happening?

I think the wave of social media (social networking sites, blogging, etc.) being used by groups of varying demographics will most certainly revolutionize the way we think about doing business.  What does this mean for businesses?  I think it means it’s time to either be a part of the conversation, or be left behind.