SIPACON 2009 - Silicon Valley 2010 and Beyond

November 7, 2009 Saturday
8 am to 4.30pm

SIPACON2009 our annual event for the year is coming up. We have an exciting list of speakers and topics lined up. The annual event will focus on the changing business climate and how Silicon Valley will emerge out of this recession. More importantly, what skills do we as professionals need to acquire to thrive in this business environment.

Key Highlights of SIPACON 2009
• Keynote by Tom Campbell - former Dean of Haas School of Business, the Budget director for Arnold Schwarznegger and a candidate for the next Governor of California.
• Workshop on Communications by Peggy Klaus - BRAG! THE ART OF TOOTING YOUR OWN HORN WITHOUT BLOWING IT
• Showcasing new startups – A 30 minute showcase of new and innovative startups bring new ideas to the marketplace.
• Panel on Enterprise application trends consisting of CIOs and Vendors, who will discuss the evolving enterprise needs in the new economic climate and the vendors response to these needs.
• Panel on opportunities in Green and Clean technologies.

Stay tuned for more information.

In September, we had a fantastic event on becoming better networkers. This month SIPA takes networking to the next level. Fasten your seat belts and be ready for a No Agenda, No topic, Energy packed and fun filled speed networking. If you have never attended a speed networking session, join this one. We promise it will be fun and you will get to meet upto 30 professionals in less than an hour, something that might take you a month.

We will break the ice for you. Be prepared to hone your elevator pitch using the ideas from Rajesh Setty’s workshop. Some of those ideas can be read at our blog – blog.sipa.org

You can also read the two eBooks by Rajesh Setty.
Lasting Relationships: http://www.rajeshsetty.com/resources/books/lasting-relationships/
Defiant : http://www.activegarage.com/projects/defiant


Register here:
https://www.123signup.com/register?id=jszzz

When: October 22nd (Thursday) 6pm to 9pm

Location : Club Illusions
260 S California Ave
Palo Alto, CA 94306

Registration :
Members Online $ 10 Walk In $ 15
Non Members Online $ 15 Walk in $ 20


Agenda :
6 - 6.45 Registration and Networking
6.45 – 7 Introduction
7 – 8.30 Speed Networking
8.30 – 9 Networking

There will be a cash bar. Complementary appetizers will be provided.

**SPECIAL ** Discounts on the upcoming annual event and annual membership will be provided at the event.

How to be a better networker and make lasting relationships

Rajesh Setty does know something about networking and making relationships, and he proved it well last Thursday. A well rounded presentation highlighting topics filled with positive reinforcements that could be easily incorporated in our daily lives was what made Rajesh stand out. Imparting knowledge through a 2 ½ hrs session filled with energy, humor, wit and active participation made the evening incredibly worthwhile.

A few takeaways from the presentation are listed here below:

Introducing yourself, the Boxing Match

o People tend to ‘box’ you before getting to know first. It happens all around us and Rajesh emphasized staying ‘away’ from the ‘box’ing game.
o An easy trap is to say something like “I work at Cisco”. This sort of introduction does not say anything about you and boxes you into something the user has experienced about Cisco (good or bad).
o Your introduction should say something about you that is relevant to the listener. Be relevant, so that if and when the boxing does happen, you are put in the ‘right box’.

6 word memoir

o This was a very interesting exercise as it raised a question for all of us to try: Write your memoir, how you would like to be remembered in exactly 6 words. Try this exercise for yourself. It will be amazingly revealing, I promise!

Likeability

o How likeable are you to others? People respond to likeable people more than others. So put that smile forward and become approachable today! Think for a moment all the people you know, and identify who you think really likes you. Now grow that circle.

What matters to you?

o Whatever matters to you, think through it and internalize it. What is it that you value? Is it fame, money, title? We tend to spend our days keeping up with the day to day activities and not realizing what is that core value that we are striving to achieve? If you have not answered it yet, take some time to pen that downs
o Create a graph with time on the X axis and your core value (or what matters) on the Y axis. Plot where you are today and mark where you want to be,say in 5 years. Obviously, this point is roughly in the North East direction.
o Your network needs to have people who can help you get to that point.
• Now here is key. How can you help in someone's "What matter's graph?"
o You can help in someone else’s “what matters” graph either by shortening their time horizon or providing additional value or both.
o If you can be of value to someone’s “What matter’s” graph, then you have made a lasting relationship.

Making powerful requests

o Asking the right questions is critical. And when you do ask, ask in a powerful way. These powerful request will become opportunities to add value to both parties, not just for the person asking the question.
o Rajesh mandated us to make one powerful request in the group. His notion that there is tremendous help around, the only barrier that we need to overcome is ASK. We need to ask in a way that creates opportunities and thus transforms a simple request into a powerful one. This was a fear -breaking activity filling one with humility!
o Rajesh has a number of examples of reframing questions in his blog.

There is no simple way to summarize the learning from the evening. Rajesh made it clear right in the beginning that the value you get is proportional to your input.

Make sure to check out Rajesh’s blog consistently for continuous knowledge feed and growing professionally and personally! Also read the two free eBooks mentioned in the previous post.

Contributed by Dipti Jain

Last night's networking workshop by Rajesh Setty was a huge success. It was one of the longest event and went on till 10pm. Rajesh provided some simple but critical insights into how we can all be better networkers. The exercises helped a lot too. For those who attended, thanks for your participation and I am sure you got a lot mileage out of this workshop.

For those who could not but wanted to, we missed you and hope to see you again. While we cannot replicate the atmosphere and learning from last night electronically, we will attempt to write a few points and update them on our blog. Please wait a couple of days. In the meantime, you can still read the two eBooks mentioned in our original invitation.

We would like feedback and comments from those who attended. Share what you learnt and what action you will take. We also want to learn about your successes so that others can be encouraged.

November 7, 2009 Saturday
7.30am to 4.30pm
HP Campus, Palo Alto, CA

SIPACON2009 our annual event for the year is coming up. More information will be provided in upcoming blog posts. Meanwhile, save the date! We have an exciting list of speakers and topics lined up. The keynote speaker for this year is Tom Campbell, former Dean of Haas School of Business, the Budget director for Arnold Schwarznegger and a candidate for the next Governor of California.

Our annual event will focus on the changing business climate and how Silicon Valley will emerge out of this recession. More importantly, what skills do we as professionals need to acquire to thrive in the new business environment. Stay tuned for more information.

Networking Workshop – Practical ideas to improve your visibility
September 24, 2009, Thursday 6 to 8.30pm
Location: Hewlett Packard, Oakroom Auditorium
19447 Pruneridge Ave, Cupertino, CA 95014

The dreaded N word. No matter where you go, or what stage of career you are in - the most common advice is to Network, Network, Network. And yet, many of us fail to network effectively. The most common reason cited is that we are busy with our jobs or that we don't know how to do it effectively. With the recession still strong and jobs scarce to come, networking is the only effective means of securing a job. You may be lucky to get a job without networking, but is that a job you will like?

As you progress through your career, networking will become even more important. So why not start now. SIPA is conducting this workshop that will be a combination of instruction and practical exercise. We will help you with tools you can take to become a more effective networker. Please join in for this workshop and bring your friends/spouses along. This is ONE skill that you can't ignore.

This workshop is conducted by Rajesh Setty.

Rajesh Setty is an entrepreneur, author and speaker based in Silicon Valley. You can read more about him at http://www.rajeshsetty.com/about/. Rajesh has written and published nine books so far with his first book published at the age of thirteen. He has also written more than 1300 articles on his blog Life Beyond Code. You can follow him on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/UpbeatNow

Notes and Pre-Requisites (PLEASE READ)

Note #1: This is a workshop - meaning you will participate and actually use the skills right away. If you are planning to watch from the sidelines, this workshop is not for you. We want everyone to get the maximum benefit from this workshop and that can happen when everyone fully participates in the workshop.

Note #2: You have to make a promise to share your learning with at least ONE person in your network. Obviously, we can't track whether you will fulfill the promise but we hope that you will do it.

Pre-Requisite #1: Read Lasting Relationships (free download) a primer on building relationships. It is a 20-page eBook and a quick read.
http://www.rajeshsetty.com/resources/books/lasting-relationships/

Pre-Requisite #2: Read defiant: Practical Tips to Thrive in Tough Times - It's a 90 page eBook filled with tips submitted by more than 50 people. You can download it here:
http://www.activegarage.com/projects/defiant

Pre-Requisite #3: Come with your burning Networking Question and actually ask that question. Together we can find answers.

To Register for this event - https://www.123signup.com/register?id=jvczz
Agenda
6pm – 6.45pm Registration and Card Exchange Networking
6.45pm – 7pm Introductory Comments
7pm - 8.30pm Main Event including Q&A
8.30pm – Wrap Up and Networking

Leveraging the Power of Social Media for your product, your business and yourself

by Chris Vora 08/27/09



Social media has truly transformed the internet landscape. It's large and pervasive reach through various channels has given new meaning to the always-on, always-connected world.

But how does one leverage the immense power of Social media?
An event organized by SIPA held on August 20, 2009 explored many aspects of social media. The experts on the panel, who work with social media everyday provided many practical insights on how to harness and benefit from the social media.

The event started in earnest with the panelists introducing themselves and their companies.

Edith Yueng, the moderator talked briefly about her own business of TechBizdaily and the events she hosts for small businesses and entrepreneurs are meant to educate them on the tools and technologies they can use to advance their business. Edith had worked at many software companies before. Edith explained that companies start out with using a coins-and-slot-machine approach i.e. trying out different social web techniques before settling on one channel or technique or methodology that yields the jackpot i.e. gives them the desired results.

Gary Swart CEO of oDesk explained that his company's model is all about hiring and managing remote employees, service providers and contractors and operating as a virtual team. oDesk has an active blog (www.odesk.com/blog), Facebook page (facebook.com/odesk

), and Twitter account (@odesk) - as well as a vibrant and interactive community in the site's own forums. Gary had previously worked at Rational which was sold to IBM.

Megan Casey is a founder and chief editor at Squidoo. Squidoo www.squidoo.com

has an interesting model of creating overview pages (called lenses) on topics of interest. Her prior experience was in publishing at Penguin and Random House.

Himanshu Jhamb founded Active Garage www.activegarage.com

which attempts to provide rich content that is posted by the best business experts. Himanshu will be publishing his first book titled Project Management Tweet later this year. According to Himanshu, he learned to use the social media as a channel and by using the right tools and contributions from the experts he learned how to increase his site's brand value and participation from his audience and content providers. He believes that by using the social media channels and tools as Active Garage has done, anyone can brand themselves on an equal footing with the big folks.

Tony Welch is the lead for Social Media strategy in the PSG division at HP. He constantly evaluates the latest tools for HP. His experience spanned 14 years and he was the person responsible for setting up Sun's blog systems which posts CEO Jonathan Schwartz's blogs.

With so many tools and channels available, how does one choose? asked Edith.

Megan's answer was that one should choose to focus on one channel instead of spreading oneself thin over several social media channels at once. Her advice was to not try to be everywhere but instead to focus on one channel for a few months e.g Twitter and develop a deeper relationship in that channel with the target audience. Emails in your in-basket about these channels or otherwise still get read. So these emails should be engaging. Readers should be delighted by the content and providers have to give delight to the audience.

Gary indicated that social media is like free beer and provides nearly free publicity whereas spending on Google Adwords is expensive. Blogs have been very successful for Himanshu and great content has led to the increase in audience to 30k visitors/mo. Facebook fan page for businesses and/or individuals have been an effective way to gain audiences and get "buzz". One can update readers about new content by tweeting on Twitter, updating the status on Facebook and Linkedin. Comments and discussion can follow from the reader community.

HP uses tools such as Friendfeed to simultaneously spread or distribute content through social media and tools such as Radian6 and Biz360 for listening. They also have special tools for moderating, filtering or creating dashboard for monitoring and analytics. Third parties can also be contracted to do these activities and/or responding. Virgin America and Comcast use the social channels to provide customer service as well.

Edith cited an interesting example of a Kogi BBQ truck tweeting about its menu and about its lunch time itinerary in LA. It has quite a following, some 20K strong, and probably very hungry or salivating, eagerly following every tweet and this story was prominently featured in the LA Times.

Edith asked the panel to talk about a success story of using the social media in their companies.

oDesk talked about theirs. They had posted a blog about "The top tweeters you ought to be following". oDesk's post soon went viral with their tweet being re-tweeted multiple times attracting attention to oDesk. oDesk provided value to its readers and in that process increased its brand awareness.

Himanshu elaborated on his example where he was able to figure out the strategy, tools and channels. In the early days of his company he was puzzled about how to increase his audience. He discovered tools such as Tweetdeck and his strategy about positioning the company was then formulated around tweeting and posting good content. He also discovered that the Discus commenting tool was a great tool to have when one reader expressed that he was happy to be at Active Garage because the site was using the Discus commenting tool.

HP discussed the example of when an irate customer posted a blog about how he would set fire to the HP Mini and drag it behind his motorcycle through town. Tony spotted this blog and simply responded by saying " Can I help you". He was also able to work with the customer to find out where he was and dispatched an HP employee to meet him in person in Thailand ! The customer was happy with the service he got and even posted a 20 min. video on youtube. The example served as a reminder about how important it is to review and respond in a timely manner to customers.

Megan cited her example in which her greet box is able to figure out where the user was coming from. If the user landed into Squidoo from search engines or sites such as MSN, Digg, Linked in then she would know that the user would be in a hurry and the best content should be made available at the first click. If on the other hand if the user came from Facebook or Twitter then they are used to seeing 16 pages on average of content and 18 friends of theirs may have seen the same pages and they would spend 9 minutes on average at the Squidoo site. Knowing where the user came from helps Squidoo provide the right amount and type of content to the user.

Edith also explored how the panelists monitor and measure the impact of social media for their sites and how much time they themselves spent on social media.

Megan pointed to tools such as Google Analytics and stated that she found Mint to be a better tool. Feedburner measures engagement so as to figure out how many users like the site enough to subscribe.

Gary stated that his time goes in editing the publication on his site. He spends 15 to 20 min on Twitter in a day. One may need to monitor Facebook events, contests, affiliates etc. Megan cited the fact that although 'you are what you measure' there is a risk of over-measuring and under-prioritizing. Gary also mentioned that they closely monitor the cost of the 'free' acquisition as compared to paid acquisition and aim for continuous improvement. Tony stated that he spends as much time as possible tracking the social media that HP uses, almost all day. He cited the example of people whose job was not like his and were 'twouted' i.e let go because they tweeted to people and were supposed to be in a meeting on time and arrived late as a result of tweeting. The bottom line according to the panel was to use tools that best served the strategy one had in mind. Megan explained that they do campaign tracking, mood dashboards to see how many people love, hate or are ambivalent about brands. For instance. www.brandsinpublic.com

is a site managed by Squidoo in which they present brands and how they are perceived by the users of social media sites. Squidoo has an 'army' of 800 to 900 volunteers and the company taught them how to tweet in a half-hour session. Gary suggested that using channels to recruit volunteers or customers 'en masse' i.e. leveraged acquisition as opposed to acquiring them individually is an effective way to gain mass. Twitterfeed automatically tweets blogs that are posted on a site. Facebook fan page, 'attending event' status or other status on the wall also build traffic as friends can follow the post.

Edith also asked the panelists about their favorite disaster story.

Tony mentioned that he is often amused by how creative people can be in their insults. One person for example wrote that 'I hate HP so much that it hurts my 'something that rhymes with the last letter'. Some folks just want to blow some steam and are not looking for further engagement. Other times one has to actively manage posts in real time. Gary cited another example where a person tweeted that she got a job in Cisco but is not excited about it. Apparently some folks at Cisco shot back a tweet saying do us all a favor and don't take the job. Sometimes people post negative reviews on yelp and it best to address these instead of ignoring them. Another famous example of a negative review is the song called "United breaks guitar" on youtube. A strange case was brought to light about Best Buy's CMO who tried to 'cut off' a person tweeting negatively about Best Buy in which case the CMO got a lot of hate mail/tweets. Hiring tweeters to write positive reviews can lead to embarrassment if that is 'outed' i.e. made public so it is best to avoid that.

At Squidoo an email bug during the early phase led to a broadcast of a negative email to all the users. Megan and other founders quickly reached out to the subscribers and offered to talk to them in case they wanted to discuss the negative email. The subscriber base at that time was small but their gesture created a positive sentiment for Squidoo at that time. Megan suggested that one must listen and respond, applaud or redirect as need be.

One of the questions from the audience was regarding the distinction in the use of social media for professional and consumer markets. Gary described his approach at oDesk and suggested that it is best to start the test and measure process on a small scale first to study effectiveness of lead generation, sales and payment. In his case he uses feedback to generate test scores of the virtual team members that are employed so as to be a good criterion for their future selection. Linked in is also a great channel for SMBs. A small business can join groups, post comments, participate in Q&A, provide support etc. Authenticity is key to long terrm success. Free tools are available for tracking keywords in postings. Following key influencers and giving information to them gets something back from them when they cite you as a source of information in their posts.

Another question from the audience was about brand awareness and loyalty. Megan reiterated that her strategy was to keep affiliated parties engaged and the way she did it was by teaching her volunteers a way to tweet and blog effectively and thereby help her site and the volunteers in turn would rise up in the ranks and influence as their posts became more read over time. Gary cited the example of eBay's customers who used to be supported very well by other customers and vendors, so much so that some of them were recruited by eBay to be permanent employees. eBay demonstrates to us how to create a great community with transparency, mutual co-operation and support. Gary pointed to a great opportunity for entrepreneurs to take advantage of the 'social graph' i.e a graph/map of how people are connected and related to each other (see http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/social_graph_concepts_and_issues.php

)

to contextualize the targeting of customers. While Yelp, About You, Radian6 and Biz360 are good tools for businesses in general, some businesses are better off using Google Local or other local sites. In order to target communities online, businesses need to be 'hanging out' in their relevant forums, read appropriate blog posts, follow key people e.g HP CTO McKinney, Cisco's Chambers or Sun's Schwartz and understand who or what is influencing them. The principle to keep in mind is that you need to be where your audience is participating. Edith added that she found the business page of Jansport facinating and many CEOs these days are regular tweeters. She recommended reading Seth Godin's blogs.

Edith's final question to the panelists was to identify the "one thing to do" and one last piece of advice or take away point for the audience.

Gary pointed to what is at the heart of the social media phenomenon. He said that that the social phenomenon has not changed the principle that was applicable before, i.e. it is (still) about the conversation, it is still about being true to yourself, who you are. Technology is an enabler and the reach is on a much grander scale and so is the speed. Social media ought to be used strategically and it is not about selling first but rather engaging with people. Megan reemphasized that one must stop using the social media channels until such time as when one knows why one wants to use it and what one wants to achieve and by when. In other words set your goals and know what is achievable by when. For example one can state that I want to achieve an increase in Twitter audience growth of x% in the next month. Find your focus and figure out what works. Edith cited her own blog titled 7 habits of effective Linkedin users. An example of tactics may be to buy a list, do a mailing, track the source of activity, how much they buy and how many repeat customers are there. An ROI can be tracked easily i.e spend $1 and get back $2. Megan pointed out that the marketing strategy in the age of social media is still about having a vision, being persistent, having great products, compelling stories and telling the story in an interesting, convincing way.

Publications such as Techcrunch, articles such as "How the top 100 Brands use social media", "Twitter as a Marketing tool", books such as "The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web" by Tamar Weinberg are a good source of information on social media.

After the event I had a chance to talk to Richard from HP on the panel. I asked him about who are good bloggers to follow for social media and what websites may be good to follow. Here are some names he suggested.

Jeremiah Owyang, Steve Rubel, Chris Brogin, Brian Solis, Shel Israel, Marshall Kirkpatrick. The websites to follow include Mashable, Readwrite web, Adage. Yahoo Experts in various fields are also a good resource.

I also talked with Edith and asked her about which types of companies may benefit most from the social web. She was unequivocal about the fact that services businesses can certainly benefit a lot from using the social media/web. Why? Because the audience they serve are there. The product companies would very likely benefit from using Yahoo or Google local, Yelp, and traditional channels.

The event and panel was a huge success providing the attendees many strategies and insights. More importantly it inspired everyone to start to use social media and increasingly harness its power to connect and communicate with their relevant communities and ecosystem. Everyone can benefit from the various channels and tools of social media, whether it is for themselves, their products and/or their businesses.

I know I came away excited and inspired by the event and discussion. Excited enough to write my first blog ever ! Thanks for reading it !