Please Note: Open only to full conference pass holders – wristbands will need to be shown to gain access Networking Party Partners

About Social Media UK

‘Social Media UK’ is a networking community based in London consisting of a LinkedIn group of 850+ members, a crowdsourced blog www.socialmediamonday.co.uk and a monthly networking event ‘Social Media Monday’ with presentations & plenty of ‘social’ till late… (follow @SocialMedia_UK & tweet about #SMUK)

We’ve grown tremendously over the last 6 months and we’re really proud to be continuing these talks in the Workshops at the Social Media World Forum 2010.

‘Social Media UK’ is organised by the Digital / Social Media recruitment specialists; Fresh Resources. We’re ridiculously passionate about all things digital and absolutely believe that being an active part of the community and contributing towards the industry we specialise in, means we’re poised to consistently deliver precision services to our much adored clients.

#SMUK loves social media, that why even this description is wrapped up in 140 words!

Enterprise Social Media is growing up. Those working in the areas of corporate knowledge sharing, knowledge management and workplace collaboration have long known that the systems they help devise and implement can drive business transformation. Yet the industry has long been dogged by questions about measurable Return On Investment (ROI).

Instinctively, we’ve always known that enterprise social tools help businesses by increasing the opportunities for workers to collaborate more effectively on projects, share knowledge and experience more efficiently, and often help those seeking to get things done to cut through unnecessary bureaucracy by flattening corporate structures. Those of us in the industry know it’s true – we’ve seen it work time and time again – yet a good five or more years since the term “Enterprise 2.0” came into regular use, only now are tough questions about ROI being asked, and answered, in ernest. The second wave of adopters are demanding to see real numbers before taking the leap.

During Social Media in the Enterprise on the 15th of March, we’ll be asking all our contributors tough questions about ROI. What is measurable? What are they measuring? How do the costs and benefits of implementing enterprise social tools compare, directly, with the costs and benefits of parallel activities?

We’ll hear case studies from leading corporations, including Virgin Media, Pfizer, Santander, ASDA, AXA and ING.

We’ll also hear from the consultants who make their living helping their clients better understand the impact enterprise social tools can have on their business processes and, ultimately, their bottom line.

Leading journalists from the field will also be on hand, including Dion Hinchcliffe from Social Computing Magazine, Pete Swabey from Information Age, and Jemima Gibbons who has recently authored a book on Social Media at work, to provide an industry overview, helping us understand how these case studies and the work of leading enterprise consultants fits within the overall picture.

Along the way, we’re hoping to learn more about how the businesses at the forefront of the social business revolution overcome the obstacles to implementation, work towards increased levels of engagement, and sustain positive outcomes. What are the main obstacles and how can they be overcome? What resources are required? What tools are needed? Who “owns” enterprise social media?

Those of us working in enterprise social media know that it can and does transform businesses that embrace it and, on this day, we’ll be rolling up our sleeves and sharing our insights into exactly how we, and others, are making business transformation a reality.

Robin Hamman is Head of Social Media, Headshift
http://www.headshift.com

To find out more about the next Enterprise Social Media event taking place on 15th March 2010 at Olympia, London, visit http://www.enterprisesocialmedia.net/

Speaker line-up announced at the London Social Media Events.  200 confirmed speakers across the conferences.  See our full line-up below.

Speakers @ Enterprise Social Media & Cloud Computing http://www.cloudcomputingcongress.com – 15/16th March

* David Akka, MD, Magic Software Enterprises UK, Eire & Nordics
* Chris Rae, EMEA Director, Automation Solutions, CA
* Dion Hinchliffe, Editor in Chief, Social Computing Magazine & Web 2.0 Journal
* Geoff Timblick, Group Internal Communications Manager, New Media, Vodafone Group
* Helen Farrar, Head of Internal Communications, Virgin Media
* Martin Bellamy, CIO, Cabinet Office
* Adrian Steel, Head of Infrastructure Management, Royal Mail
* Thanos Kokkiniotis, Business IT Analyst, Shell International Ltd
* Eachan Fletcher, CIO, Sporting Index
* Simon Revell, Associate Director, Collaboration and Web Technologies, Pfizer
* David Wilde, CIO, Westminster City Council
* Per Rombouts, Project Manager Intranet & Social Media, ING Group
* Kenneth Verlage, CIO, DHL Express
* Paul James, CIO, Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, MOD
* Dominic Burch, Head of Corporate Comms and New Media, ASDA
* Sonia Carter, Senior Manager Online Communications, AXA
* Anthony Frost, Head of Corporate Communications, Santander
* Euan Semple, Independent Advisor/former Director of Knowledge Management BBC
* Alison Coward, Owner, Bracket
* Evangelos Kotsovinos, Vice President, Technology, Morgan Stanley
* Eachan Fletcher, CIO, Sporting Index
* Richard Ellis, Manager, UK & Ireland, Iron Mountain Digital
* Andrew Charlesworth, Director, Centre for IT and Law, University of Bristol
* Dr Bill Ashraf, Director of Technology Enhanced Learning, University of Sussex
* Adrian Davey, Head of IT, Tube Lines

Speakers @ Social Media World Forum 15/16th March – http://www.socialmedia-forum.com

* Lucas Herscovici, Global Marketing Manager, Becks
* Dr. Torsten Wigenter, Head of Social Media Marketing, Lufthansa
* Trevor Johnson, Head of Strategy and Planning, EMEA, Facebook
* Stephane Panier, Global Head, Bebo
* Nick Halstead, CEO, Tweetmeme
* Allison Wightman, Head of Marketing Systems, Virgin Atlantic
* Kerryn Dinsdale, Senior PR Manager, Barclaycard
* Muhammad Karim, Senior Brand Manager, Mars
* Peter Crosby, COO, Viadeo
* Dr. Helmut Becker, COO, XING
* Mark Schmid, Communications Director, Talk Talk
* Martine Edgell, CRM Specialist, Mercedes Benz
* Neal Sato, CTO, mixi
* Christian Schultz, Head of Communications, Mattel
* Michael Smith, Deputy Director of Interactive Services, COI
* Lorenz Bogaert, CEO, Netlog
* Jason Baker, Head of CRM and Digital Media, Ikea UK
* Justin Kan, founder and President, Justin.tv
* Guy Clapperton, Freelance Journalist, Editor and Broadcaster
* Penny Power, Author, International Speaker, Entrepreneur and founder of Ecademy
* Matthew Fraser, Senior Fellow at INSEAD & co-author of  ‘Throwing Sheep in the Boardroom
* Fred McIntyre, Vice President, Product, CBS Interactive
* Sienne Veit, Social and Mobile Commerce Development, Manager, M&S Direct
* Ricky Chopra, Digital Marketing Manager, Speedo International Limited
* Igor Beuker, Founder, SocialMedia8
* David Henry, VP Digital Marketing, Europe, Monster Worldwide
* Mark Watts-Jones, Head of Development & Innovation, Orange UK
* Lisa Mane, Head of Social Media, COI
* Mike Gamoroff, Owner & MD, Gamoroff
* Will McInnes, Managing Director, NixonMcInnes
* Michael Caselli, Editor, Online Casino News
* Adam Caplan, Vice President – Virtual Currency (Super Rewards), Adknowledge
* Neal Sato, CTO, mixi
* Fred McIntyre, Vice President, Product, CBS Interactive
* Oli Newton, Head of Emerging Platforms, i-Level
* Celina Maguire, Consumer Director, Gorkana
* Laila Takeh, Online Manager, British Heart Foundation
* Kristin Wadge, Director, Metrica
* Sam Barratt, Head of Media, Oxfam
* Craig Elder, Online Communities Editor, Conservative Campaign HQ
* Alex Aiken, Head of Communications, Westminster City Council
* Kerry McCarthy, Labour MP for Bristol East & New Media Communications Spokesperson
* Mark Jones, Online and Social Media Editor, Thomson Reuters
* Alex Miller, Head of Social Media, i-Level
* Markus Berger – de Leon, CEO, VZ Networks
* Angel Gambino, Vice President, Sonico

Speakers @ Social TV & Mobile Social Media 15/16^th March  include – http://www.social-tv.net & http://www.mobilesocial-networking.com

• Robert Marsh, VP, Interactive & Telephony, Freemantle Media
• Peter Ward, Co-founder & CEO, WAYN
• Bob Rapp, Head, User Communities, Vodafone Group
• Rahul Chakkara, Controller of TV Platforms, BBC
• Angel Gambino, Vice President, Sonico
• Mark Watts-Jones, Head of Development & Innovation, Orange UK
• Yoel Flohr, Head of Mobile, Bebo
• Andrew Kearney, Vice President TV Products at UPC Broadband
• Richard Griffiths, Director TV and Entertainment, Eircom
• Nicolas Bry, Vice President, Orange Vallee
• Kevin Baughan, Head Technical Strategy, Virgin Media
• Ian Kegel, Head of Future Content Group, BT UK
• Triona Campbell, CEO, Campbell Ryan
• Pasa Mustafa, Head of Digital Studios, Endemol
• Damien Byrne, Head of Entertainment, T Mobile
• Miroslaw Smyk, General Manager TV Business Division at Romtelecom
• Matt Dicks, CMO, Flirtomatic
• John Cole, Managing Director UK, Adknowledge
• Claudio Venezia, Researcher, Telecom Italia
• Cian O’Sullivan, Editor in Chief, GoMo News
• Tim Hussain, Head of Mobile and Video Advertising
• Guillaume de Saint Marc, VP R&D New Initiatives, NDS
• Konstantinos Papamiltiadis, Head of Product, Mobile – EU, Yahoo!
• Paul Berney, Managing Director Europe, Mobile Marketing Association
• Adrian Drury, Principle / Media, Broadcast & Telecoms, Ovum
• Paul Berney, Managing Director, Europe, MMA
• Deborah Porton, Head of Mobile Development, Badoo Ltd
• Franco Beschizza, Head of Mobile, Interactive Services, COI
• Konstantinos Papamiltiadis, Head of Product, Mobile – EU, Yahoo!
• Martin Harris, SVP Corporate Sales, Bango
• Peter Ward, Co-Founder & Co-CEO, WAYN.com
• Stefanie Hoffmann, CEO Finance, Business Development, aka aki
• Simon Spanswick, Chief Executive, Association for International Broadcasting
• Dan Cryan, Head of Broadband, Screen Digest
• Paul Bristow, Vice-President of Strategy, ADB
• Dr William Cooper Founder and Chief Executive, informitv.com
• Justin Kan, founder and President, Justin.tv
• Aliza Beckett, Business Development, Web, Mobile & New Platforms, Channel 4
• Chi-chi Ekweozor, Director, RealFresh.tv
• Dick Rempt, CEO, Talents Media
• Richard Lindsay Davis, Director General, DTG
• Benjamin Schwarz, Owner, CTO Innovation Consulting
• Martin Jarrold, Chief, International Programme Development GVF

The success of Web 2.0 consumer web sites teaches us many lessons about how we can improve internal IT and business to consumer online applications. Social technologies have made it progressively easier and easier for people to find each other, share information and collaborate, and we have seen how a singular focus on supporting individual needs can crete powerful network effects when aggregated at scale.

However, these and other lessons have not yet penetrated the world of corporate IT in most companies today, which means expensive, centralised and highly bureaucratic models of co-ordination and collaboration are the norm.

The recession is a perfect time to change this, and to seek leaner, flatter business processes and structures that act as enablers rather than dampeners of innovation and initiative. We simply cannot afford the high-cost models of internal co-ordination that have persisted for so long.

The key to this change is recognising that, in most cases, people power is the best way to get things done, and the role of technology is to augment human cognition and decision making, rather than try to replicate or replace it. People over process. This is why so many employees in companies have reached out to find each other using consumer online social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn in preference to their own internal systems, which do not provide easy ways to network with colleagues to get the job done. Similarly, we have seen people go outside the firewall to initiate wikis for collaboration, or blogs for sense making, or perhaps consumer RSS management tools for information management. Each of these capabilities should be available within a modern corporate IT setting.

We can now take advantage of a range of enterprise-ready social tools, including blogs, wikis, social networking tools, information management tools and so on, and these are generally a great deal cheaper and more effective than older generations of internal IT systems. As people have become accustomed to the simple user experience of Google’s tools or Facebook in their non-work lives, they are increasingly asking why the experience of internal IT in their companies must be so poor, so frustrating and such a time sink. The fact is, it doesn’t need to be that way. It can be smarter, simpler and more delightful to use, and the transition to lightweight social tools can achieve much of what internal IT has promised, but so far failed to deliver.

Lee Bryant is the Director of headshift www.headshift.com

To find out more about the next Enterprise Social Media event taking place on 15th March 2010 at Olympia, London, visit http://www.enterprisesocialmedia.net/

We have introduced a Bloggers Pass for the event. Bloggers Passes are available for Enterprise Social Media/Cloud Computing bloggers looking to cover the show and become a Blogger Supporter for the event.

All bloggers passes will include the below:

* Access to all five conference streams over the two days – Social Media, Social TV, Mobile Social Media, Enterprise Social Media, and Cloud Computing
* Full access to the conference exhibition
* Access to the bloggers lounge
* Invite to the evening networking party
* Free WiFi

Bloggers Passes are limited and to receive a pass we ask the below in return:

* Display of an event banner/Blogger Supporter badge on your main website
* Post at least two blogs pre show about the event

You can find the event banners/Blogger Supporter badges on the event’s collateral pages, http://www.cloudcomputingcongress.com/media/collateral.html or http://www.enterprisesocialmedia.net/media/collateral.html

Once your blog has been published and your supporter’s button is live, please email eva (@) sixdegs.com. Once received you will receive your Bloggers Pass invite.
(subject to organiser’s approval)

For full event details for Day 1 visit http://www.enterprisesocialmedia.net, for Day 2 visit http://www.cloudcomputingcongress.com

We’re pleased to announce a new incentive – a quota of 50 complimentary conference passes for CIOs and IT Directors.

The pass includes:
• Access to Enterprise Social Media on 15th March 2010
• Access to the Cloud Computing Congress on 16th March 2010
• Access to the conference exhibition
• Access to the conference workshops
• Post event online presentation
• Lunch & refreshments
• WiFi access
• Invite to the evening networking party

The number of passes is limited, so if you are a CIO or IT Director, register today for a free pass.

To register, please send your full details to Andy (@) sixdegspeople.com. Once approved you’ll receive your free CIO pass.

For full event details for Day 1 visit www.enterprisesocialmedia.net, for Day 2 visit www.cloudcomputingcongress.com

Time to let your staff use social media at work?

It’s a license for staff to waste time.   There’s no control about what they say.   What happens if a customer makes contact with them direct?

Today’s arguments against allowing your staff to use social media at work?  Actually they were pretty much the arguments used by companies to restrict email use in the mid 1990s.

That’s worth bearing in mind as the social media in the office debate rages.

Today it’s received wisdom that email is an essential business tool, and so it will be with social media before too long.

Especially with metrics firm Nielsen showing that communication via social networks overtook communication via email.   And from personal experience, I can now think of several instances of clients messaging me direct on Twitter as opposed to pinging me an email.

However just like with 90s email, the first stage of workplace social media acceptability is to publish dos and don’ts guidelines about what’s allowed.   Even though a survey by Monster showed that 90% of workers are afraid of using Twitter for fear of getting in trouble, a number of firms have done just that.

As with all internal guidelines this ranges from the simple to the ones filled with corporate speak.

For example, Opera, the makers of the Internet browser of the same name, published a series of eight easy to understand rules: Share your thoughts, be active, “we’re not your mama”, don’t give away the farm, check your sources, our friends are your friends, for the squeamish post a disclaimer and use your common sense.

Australian telecoms giant Telstra publicly released guidelines revolving around the ‘three Rs’ – responsibility, respect and representation.   And at the far end of the scale, Canadian broadcaster CBC published criteria that they backtracked on after it caused a fuss, saying that personal blogs couldn’t be used to espouse a partisan political opinion.

The bottom line is though social media isn’t going to go away, it’s part and parcel of today’s Internet environment and it’s what graduates in particular who join your organisations see as second nature.

As with so much of social media, you can either set out the parameters of your involvement now.   Or stick your head in the sand and wait until it comes to you, when you are forced to react to it.

Follow Dirk Singer, Director and Digital Planner at brand communications agency Cow, on Twitter at twitter.com/dirkthecow or visit his blog at http://www.thisisherd.com

The next Enterprise Social Media event takes place on 15th March 2010 at Olympia in London.

To be in for a chance to attend the “Must attend” Cloud Computing event of the year FREE, simply take part in our Re-Tweet competition!

It’s Really Easy to Enter

All you need to do is put your social media skills to the test and re-tweet our competition tweet on your twitter. Just make sure your tweet contains our Twitter name (@cloud_comp_news so we can track you as a contestant) and link to this blog post

Tweet – “I am tweeting to win a free pass @cloud_comp_news, http://bit.ly/8qBTYm”

That’s all you have to do!

Winner Announcement

The winner will be selected by random on the 22nd January 2010 at 12.00 GMT. We will announce the winner via Twitter the same day (so we highly suggest you follow us and will contact the winner through DM. The winner will win a two day pass to the Cloud Computing Congress & Enterprise Social Media event taking place on the 15^th & 16^th March at Olympia Conference Centre, London.

Please Note: The winner will be responsible for their own travel and accommodation costs.

Rules of Competition

In order to participate, you must have a Twitter account, and have accepted the Terms of Service of Twitter. Members from every part of the world can enter the competition. In order to participate, you must send a valid Twitter message. A valid Twitter message, or tweet, contains our Twitter name (@cloud_comp_news so we can track you as a contestant), and a link to this contest page (of which http://bit.ly/8qBTYm is a short version)

For more information about our events please visit: www.socialmediaseries.net www.socialtvseries.com www.cloudcomputingseries.com

We’re pleased to announce that BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, will be supporting Enterprise Social Media and the Cloud Computing Congress.

BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, promotes wider social and economic progress through the advancement of information technology science and practice.

We bring together industry, academics, practitioners and government to share knowledge, promote new thinking, inform the design of new curricula, shape public policy and inform the public.

As the professional membership and accreditation body for IT, we serve over 70,000 members including practitioners, businesses, academics and students, in the UK and internationally. We deliver a range of professional development tools for practitioners and employees.

A leading IT qualification body, we offer a range of widely recognised professional and end-user qualifications.

The Cloud Computing and Enterprise Social Media Series Team are getting in the festive spirit and have decided to extend the 25% early bird discount until the 15th Jan, providing you with a couple more weeks to take advantage of this great saving!

The Cloud Computing and Enterprise Social Media Congress will be taking place on the 15th & 16th March 2010 at Olympia, London. With over 3000 visitors over the two days, this really is the place to be!

Our Early Bird saving can save up you to £340* if you book before the 15th January 2010!

Our gold conference pass includes access to all conference streams (Social Media, Social TV, Cloud Computing, Mobile Social Media & Enterprise 2.0) sessions taking place over the two days, expo hall, complimentary Wi-Fi access, hot food & refreshments and access to the official networking party taking place on the middle evening.

Conference passes for just the Cloud Computing Congress & Enterprise Social Media Forum streams are available too.   For full pass opportunities please visit here

Book you conference pass today!

Merry Christmas from the Events Team

*applies to Gold Pass Savings