Eight take-away tips from Social Media Down Under 2012

How does Australia’s use of social media compare to the rest of the world?

On Wednesday, 17 speakers assembled to discuss the state of social media in Australia and to debate what we need to do to become world-class.

Here are my take-away points from the eight keynote presentations.

1. Socially responsible organisations do the best

International keynote, Melissa Jun Rowley shared her personal journey into social media and corporate social responsibility, and said 90% of us want to know what an organisation is doing to benefit a social mission.

In fact, companies that focus on the intersection of people, the planet and profits were the most successful.

2. We’re in a relationship based economy

Iggy Pintado, author of Connection Generation, highlighted that we live in a connected world and relationships are central to this. We must focus on thinking in terms of relationships, not simply transactions.

3. Be committed to content

Blogger Jeff Bullas pointed to the increase in volume of visual content getting shared on Instagram, Pinterest and Facebook.

Being committed to producing visual content as well as written content is central to social media success.

As inspiration, Jeff told us that when Stephen King was asked how he wrote, he replied, “One word at a time, 2,000 words a day, seven days a week.”

We need the same dedication!

4. Monetise social media

Laurel Papworth taught us ways to monetise what we do on social media.

Laurel showed us ways we can collect donations, take out loans and how we can buy and sell online by using social tools.

The opportunities for making money via social media are better than ever.

5. Learn from the best

Brett Kelly, CEO of Kelly+Partners told us to follow the people who are the best in the world at what they do. And he learnt from them by reading about how they’ve done it.

The people at the top of their game are actually very generous with their time and advice, if only you ask. Brett would know. As a 22-year-old, he interviewed Bob Hawke and Sir Donald Bradman for his bestselling book, Collective Wisdom.

6. Get people talking about you

MiniMovers founder Mike O’Hagan likens social media to a Sunday barbecue.

The name of the game is being different so that people talk about you. If you are commenting, entertaining and informing, people will talk about you!

7. Internal communications is huge

Simon Townsend, innovation manager at Deloitte Australia, told the story of how their organisation uses internal communication tool Yammer to keep attrition at an all-time low and staff engagement and referrals high.

By doing this, they have kept recruitment costs low and staff happy.

8. Every problem is an opportunity

Finally, I spoke about how the biggest opportunities exist where people face a problem or hassle.

If you can solve this problem for someone and make their life easier, by creating an app, helping them via social media, or sharing what you know, opportunities will be abundant.

Thank you to everyone who attended Social Media Down Under and who posted over 1,000 tweets using the #SMDU tag. See you next year!

Next time, I’ll share how to plan out your social media strategy.