Keynote Speech: How Magazines Can Leverage Facebook

Andy Mitchell, Strategic Partner Development, Facebook: "The web is organizing around people. We now know that people turn to their friends to understand the world."

Conference Opening Address

Nina Link, President & CEO, MPA – the Association of Magazine Media: "Social networks offer magazine publishers some of the most potent opportunities to engage, connect and expand their communities, touching almost everything we do. Magazine media brands are communities of passion that can fuel the social media conversation."

Keynote Speech: The 360 Degree View of the Social Media Marketplace

Robert Michael Murray, Conference Chairperson and Vice President, Social Media, National Geographic: "We are social animals. In social media, it's about the human beings, about the relationships. And it's the stories that connect us. The reason these social networks work is because of our social history—the way we communicated in the past."

Interstitial: Getty Lucky with Foursquare

John Jannuzzi, Style Collective Editor, Lucky: "We are focused on shopping so partnering with Foursquare just makes sense. One of the key goals for brands is driving consumers to brick-and-mortar stores. Lucky has a way of showing that through Foursquare and our elite shopper badge."

Panel: Social Media and the Advertising Mix

Tanzina Vega (moderator), Advertising and Media Reporter, The New York Times: “Content is a word we used to own on the editorial side, but now the business side uses it more and more. Does it mean the walls are being broken down?”

Andrea Spiegel, Vice President, New Product Development, Forbes’ Editorial Group: “We’re not on a one-way street anymore. It’s a two-way street. It’s an engagement process. Advertisers are used to ultimate control, and getting them to let go of control is hard but it’s important. When the user, the ad voice, the social editor, and another user are engaging in a conversation—that’s when it gets interesting.”

Romina Rosado, Executive Producer, US Weekly Digital: “The voice and the content is 100% owned by the editorial team. They have the ultimate control over what is on the site.”

Kristine Welker, Chief Revenue Officer, Hearst Digital Media: “If you’re going to monetize your efforts, you have to not just give it away. These are brand extensions with real value. We now see things as content packages—you have print, web, and social platforms—and we are designing content for each of these platforms.”

Panel: Social Media Experts at Magazine Brands: Nerds or Your Next Boss?

Whitney Parker (moderator), Vice President, User Experience, Brazen Careerist: “Are we just the nerds du jour?...Does your personal brand get entwined in your company’s brand? Are social media strategists the lynchpins, and what kind of job security does it give?”

Patricia Cesaire, Director of Digital Marketing and Public Relations, Black Enterprise: “The two people in the social media positions in our office have been an integral part of how we message across all our platforms…Putting Twitter handles on the masthead is going to become normal.”

Michelle Edelbaum, Digital Editor, EatingWell: “Our social media really influences our content development. And it is becoming a part of everyone’s job. Having these skills is crucial.”

Lauren Salazar, Social Media Manager, Weight Watchers International: “Integrating social media has made it influential to where the company strategy goes. The content team is responsible for the day-to-day contact, and we take what comes from that to connect to the greater strategy. Our agency partners help us with that.”

Jason Snell, Editorial Director, Macworld: “Our editors started all our social media interaction, both individually and as a brand, and then it became evident how important social media was. Editors can’t keep up with all the iterations of Facebook and other social media, so the importance of having someone who knows how to connect it back to our strategy—the social media person plugs all the different things together for the bigger picture.”

Panel: The Seven Deadly Sins of Editorial Tweeting

The panel defined the seven deadly sins of editorial tweeting: hashtag obsession, multiple personality disorder, headline misuse, dabbling, narcissism, analytics blindness, and the Wizard of Oz syndrome.

Michael Calderone (moderator), Senior Media Reporter, The Huffington Post: Our panel sees the good, bad, ugly, and possibly the deadly.

Alison Dempsey, Social Media Editor, Parenting (on hashtag obsession): “We call it ‘#hashtag #hashtag #hashtag disorder.’ If you bold every word in a sentence, it loses meaning. Hashtags can help, but use one hashtag and make it count.”

Anne Roderique-Jones, Senior Manager, Community and Social Media, XO Group: “On Twitter, we want to spell words correctly. We want to show we are journalists so we spell out words. We don’t use ‘4’ for “for.” Unfortunately, even something as fun as social media still has to have rules.”

Allie Townsend, Social Media Producer, TIME (on headline misuse): “Certain headlines are appropriate for print, some are appropriate for Twitter. You need to sound conversational, and be funny when appropriate. Ask questions, make them giggle.”

Hank Will, Editor-in-Chief, GRIT (on dabbling): “If you dabble, your followers realize they can’t rely on you, and they will fade away. Response is really important. We want people to know we’re really answering questions if possible.”

Sponsored Panel: How Social Media and Other Tools Boost Site Engagement

Daniel Bernstein (moderator), Vice President, Business Development and Emerging Revenue, Meebo: “Engagement is not tied to economic efforts. What it boils down to: engagement is just interest in the topic.”

Lisa Brewer, Director, Digital Audience Development, Time Inc. Style and Entertainment Group: “One of the great things about social is how real-time it is and how people want to voice their opinion.”

Kimberly Lau, Vice President, Business Development, Hearst Digital Media: “Social is still nascent enough that advertisers just have to take a leap with you. You can’t justify everything up front, but if you have an audience and build audience, you can find a way to monetize it.”

Chandra Magee, Senior Director, Audience Development, The Economist: “On Facebook, users want to talk to each other—they want very little involvement from us. From Twitter, it’s more about us broadcasting to followers, and we do try to be regional somewhat. On Google+, we are just starting to determine how to use it…it appears that there will be more interacting with our journalists. On LinkedIn, we keep the posts much less frequent and more business-oriented. Tumblr is owned by our editorial team almost exclusively.”

Lisa Schneider, General Manager, Digital Products, Budget Travel: “When we are having a conversation, we get more followers. It’s more important to know what you’re trying to do in a particular instance [rather than looking at overall numbers]. We use engagement numbers to then interest advertisers.”

David Singer, Vice President of Product Development, TV Guide: “We have tried to keep same tone across platforms, but then Twitter became more about broadcasting. Now it’s become more interactive again—it’s a place to ask questions and get answers publicly. This has shown us that what’s important is to change and be able to change quickly”.