Dr. Neil Hair

I presented a paper last weekend at the Summer AMA in Boston that Chris Adams and I authored on marketing professionals perceptions of personally branded websites. It identified ten thematic areas of importance in the context of an ideal personally branded experience. The research question we posed were; what are marketing professionals perceptions of ideal personal brand experiences on personal websites? What counts? What are the features we can use to effectively communicate our expertise? How are these features perceived and at what cost? What are the intended and unintended consequences and how do these relate to our overall perceptions of professionalism and expertise? Ten things count:

1.  Design and aesthetics – perhaps not a surprise, how you look online transfers into perceptions of your expertise and ability. Avoid the chintz, sound, busy designs or garish colours.

2.  Credibility – how you project your expertise, experience, knowledge and compassion. Discussing former experience, lessons learned and understanding succinctly what value you offer your end user.

3.  Challenges to the visitor. Whilst visitors want to explore and be challenged by innovative or interesting content they do not want to have to hunt for hours to find it. Structure is of critical importance.

4.  Proprietor of the site. What does your site actually say about you? Not just in a professional context, but personal as well. Is presenting a personal face on a professionally branded personal website a problem? Not according to our findings. People want to see the whole person when they’re forming opinions about professionalism and expertise.

5.  Interest stimulation. Is your site actually interesting? Are visitors skipping over content or deep diving into what you have to say and offer? A quick review of your google analytics account will tell you how long people are staying – 5 minutes or 15 seconds?

6.  Topic of the site. The all important relevance question, how are you impacting your audience? Have you considered what topics are of importance to them? How are you helping them become more effective? Are they learning anything from you?

7.  Comfort / threat level. Are you easy to engage with? Is your content aimed at someone with a physics degree? We found that people’s perception of personal effectiveness is directly related to one’s ability to be able to ‘speak’ to their audience. Are you making a connection that is meaningful? Are you even asking the question of your audience?

8.  Applicability to the visitor. Linked to the above, how many connections can you make with your audience so that they feel they are connecting with the many multiple facets of the real you? Are you all about work and no play? What about your hobbies or other aspects of your life that enhance your abilities as a professional?

9.  Career usefulness. How effective are you at solving problems or expanding issues relative to your audience needs? Can your site make a direct impact on those using it? What categories of blog posts do you use?

10.  And finally site presence and liveliness. Are you as boring as a weather text received on a Sunday morning? What are you doing to engage, or update your site? Are you using a twitter feed on a daily basis updating your activities?

Hat off to my other colleagues that presented papers this summer – Joe Miller and Raj Murthy. By all accounts only Saunders and St John Fisher were represented locally at the nation’s premier marketing academics conference. That’s good news for us and representative of the fact that we are engaged in relevant, leading edge research.

Recently I took 85 members of the local YPO chapter through an afternoon social media bootcamp using the technology of the students Innovation Center at RIT. The facilities are impressive; from fully controllable sun screens to a four strong projection unit, plus more external screens than you can shake a stick at. These features enabled me to simultaneously demonstrate Second Life capabilities, a deck on social media strategy and a live twitter feed that enabled delegates to post questions about the event in a live setting. Didn’t stop there – three other screens to the right presenting a second twitter feed providing feedback on my performance, and a live Adobe Connect session broadcasting the event across the net – oh and don’t forget the wireless keyboard! All in all a great way to showcase RIT technology. What also made the difference though were the non technical facilities such as modular seating, fantastic food from Max’s Market and of course the quality of the delegation (including amongst others, William Mattar and many presidents from well known local and regional organizations). Thanks to Jon Shull and Ian Gatley of the Innovation Center for use of the facilities, Donna Slavin for her assistance in organizing behind the scenes, Katie McDonald for an overview of the RIT SL island, the YPO chairs for the opportunity to present and Dean Ash Rao for suggesting the Saunders college of business as host. 

Next Thursday, 4th March 2010, I have the distinct pleasure of hosting a training event for the Empire State Chapter of the Young Presidents Organization at RIT's Innovation Center. The event is aimed at young presidents considering actionable social media campaigns and runs from 2pm to 7.30pm to include dinner and cocktails. Im really looking forward to demonstrating the T in RIT – and exploring the capabilities of the newly opened Innovation Center.

Official Event details:

CALL TO ACTION:

Society has been greatly impacted by advances in social networking technologies that have enabled and supported one’s ability to connect, engage and compete. Despite the promise of social media and the rapid deployment of these tools many businesses and individuals are struggling to make sense of these phenomena. How do I use Twitter? Why should I be on LinkedIn and how do I make money from my participation? Isn’t Facebook for kids? Can I really benefit from a YouTube campaign for my business? How do I crowdsource? Why Geo tag my pictures? How do I access global experts and develop relationships with them? Do I really need
a SecondLife?

ACTION:

This hands-on workshop was designed to answer these questions and more. In partnership, the YPO will pitch state of the art technology of Rochester Institute of Technology’s Center for Innovation, with bleeding edge knowledge of social media strategy from one of its most dynamic and engaging speakers – Professor Neil Hair of the Saunders College of Business. The session is aimed at all levels; providing a introductory overview of social media channels; the intermediate of designing personal and corporate social media strategy; and the advanced by exploring the metrics, resources and caveats of some of the world’s top social media  sers. Participants can expect to leave the session with a better understanding of the options, the business models of social media, and a plan of action for managing personal identity as well as corporate identity in this new world of web 3.0.

I recently developed a promotional youtube video with the YPO chairs which can be found here.

Today I visited the center to finalize the technical wizardry. View my video update report (and notable excitement!) here.

Im excited to announce a three part bootcamp program on social media. In conjunction with the Henrietta Chamber of Commerce and two well known social media experts – Emily Carpenter and Susan Beebe, we will be taking delegrates through the highs and lows of social media strategy. Increasingly, organizations are experimenting with social media platforms and channels like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn without grasping either the opportunity or the challenges of this new world of collaboration. This three-part series on Social Media will be aimed at all levels of experience.

7:30-8:00 am Registration
8:00-9:00 am Program (includes breakfast buffet)

February 24: Introduction to Social Media

• Basic overview of key Social Media sites
• Steps to establishing a solid Social Media infrastructure
• Walk away with action items to start your Social Media campaign

March 24: Strategies for Social Media

• Tools for managing Social Media sites
• Discover common metrics and analytics that demonstrate the impact of your social media initiative
• Know what to do when you walk out the door to measure your success

April 28: Social Media Panel Discussion – Q&A session

• Now that you've had a taste of the new world of Social Media, come ask the questions that you never knew to ask before
• Straight talk about Social Media with the speakers and each other
• Keep the momentum going for long-term success in the realm of Social Media
  

Delegates can sign up for this event here: http://hccsm4biz3.eventbrite.com/

Update: 24th Feb 2010.

The event today went well, always delighted to see so many local organizations taking social media seriously. We covered a great deal in 45 minutes and have homeworks for delegates so that they continue their journey. Looking forward to working with Emily and Susan again a month from now where we will explore strategy and the tricky but all important issue of metrics!

Just finished a cracking session with four teams that are building their own businesses using the Second Life platform. If youre looking for creativity in the brave new world of web 2.0 – look no further. I had previously checked my enthusiasm and expectations of excellence at the door so as not to die of disappointment (not that this group was ever going to disappoint). I sat at home, pulled up a coffee and an HD Flip camera and so the experience began. The first team had a few issues with technology and so we moved to the second without delay. A roof top presentation that made use of a teleporting system from ground to roof. Great concept – because of the experience (and noise of being teleported Star Treck style). Great practical presentation that demonstrated the progress being made – the competition being assessed and the concept and value proposition of their business – came to life. Quite the treat seeing fellow terraformers sat listening, learning, and enquiring. The second presentation added a unique feature that impressed me as much as the experience of the first – a virtual brand avatar to help launch and promote the business. Whist I cant tell you much about the companies (some are planning on launching these ideas as commercial entities after the course) I can pick out some of the highlights of their unique pitches. The third presentation offered the class a wonderful amphitheatre setting for their presentation. Again – plenty of creativity on display as they danced through their slides. Finally we moved to another roof top meeting space of the 4th team – Corbusier LC2's to sit on none the less! Another unique display that saw all members presenting and animating their avatars whilst speaking. Im so proud of them as a class – its not easy building a business from scratch in any case – but doing so in virtual worlds under unique constraints is all the more impressive in my book. Thanks guys, truly impressive stuff today and HD video snippets and youtube videos to follow.

Next Friday (29th January) morning during Webster Chamber of Commerce's regular breakfast briefing event I will be providing attendees with an overview of social media. The focus will be on how it has impacted business and what role it is playing for advanced users. Should be a great event and I would encourage any interested parties to attend. Event registration can be found at www.websterchamber.com/ . The event starts at 7 and ends at 9am. Hope to see you there!

One of the most useful conferences I try to attend each year – the International Colloquium on Relationship Marketing – is being held in Henley on Thames next year in sunny England (dont worry – in September, when it should still be sunny!). Vargo and Lusch aka Drs Service Dominant Logic will be in attendance as well as the usual RM crowd including David Ballantyne, Roger Palmer, Moira Clark and most likely my good friend from over the boarder Lyle Wetsch. As I have blogged before now, the conference is a single track affair which means should you get a paper accepted for presentation you get to run the gauntlet of excellent feedback (which proved really helpful for my PhD back in the day). I cant recommend it enough. Accordingly, as a heads up, we are proud to host the 2011 ICRM conference at the E Philip Saunders college of business. I look forward to seeing the worlds relationship marketers converge on our shores to discuss progress in the field.

Over the summer one of my other projects was the design of a new course on commercializing virtual worlds. Despite some of the press signaling the end to virtual worlds, usage by the dedicated has continued to grow. Its a bit like saying just because Oprah has got fed up of tweeting that the era of micro blogging has waned. Utter twiddle. Accordingly Saunders has, what I believe to be, the worlds first class that looks exclusively at commercializing new student run enterprises inside a virtual environment. For this purpose we are using Second Life. Second Life retains its popular interest, virtual entrepreneurs are continuing to make real money, and we get to use the RIT Second Life island facilities (which now sports a spangling new business park facility that my students are using). The core aim of the class is to show students how you can apply marketing towards establishing a viable virtual business thus becoming a cadre of virtual terraformers. The deliverables are (expectedly) many. A business plan and presentation aimed at venture capitalists; a personal branding strategy that strategizes the best use of virtual media for putting students in their best light; an e-portfolio charting learning experience and key findings from their travels and of course the intangibles of developing supporting media that can be used in-world (such as youtube videos and the like). Whether Second Life is here to stay is not the question. What will remain however is expertise in researching, planning for and executing a market enabled business plan that graduates will be able to continue to use in any virtual world environment. Yet another course to add to the experiential learning list of a Saunders’ student resume.

So, it's somewhat inevitable that we are likely to suffer from some sort of flu this season on campus – the joys of being in close proximity. I like many have probably found themselves sanatizing their hands as they enter and leave buildings like something out of a bad hospital movie. What I love about the campus spirit of course is the can do attitude of its constituents. Life goes on (we hope) and we have to make the best out of a duff deal. In amongst the 40 emails I have recently received in the nature of the threat an what you can do to prevent it came a request for contingency plans for those teaching this quarter. Got me thinking about the benefits of online learning and how it can affect in class training programs. As you probably know, Im no stranger to the use of Adobe Connect to deliver streaming sessions when needed from where ever to where ever (try hospital maternity ward to my MBA class last Winter for instance with the wife in bed about to bring Lillian into the world). No reason why we cant use the same technology to stay connected if were home recovering from flu. So yesterday I published my contingency plan for my students and enclose a copy of the letter here. Stay happy, healthy, and keep sanitizing those hands..

Dear all, we have been asked to write to our students informing them of contingency plans for an outbreak of the H1N1 virus. First off – I don’t want you to worry. You have more chance statistically speaking of being killed by an elephant in Times Square then you do from this virus. However, that said it’s important we have plans in place to continue with our work if any of us become ill. By now you will have received details of what to do and not do if we have any problems on campus. Stay at home. Here are the steps that we can take if there are any issues (and again, don’t worry – remember the elephant in Times Square).

1.       Email or phone me immediately if you suspect you have a problem. THIS IS MANDITORY.

2.       DO NOT COME TO CLASS. THIS IS SENSIBLE.

3.       I will use Adobe Connect (an online video conferencing package that is web based to record live our usual class session so that you can log in, see and hear the usual lecture and team activities, and participate from your home). THIS IS COOL TECHNOLOGY.

Go to *connect room* and log in using your normal RIT account information. You will be transferred to a live video session that will display powerpoints, and live video recording of the lecture taking place in the usual class. Please note – you can also use this to communicate with your team should you miss a face to face meeting.

You should connect your webcam and your microphone so we can interact as we would in a physical setting. If you do not have a webcam this is not the end of the world, you are though behind the times in this super-connected world of ours. You will though need a microphone.

Step 1. Run the audio wizard in connect to automatically set yourself up for this task. >meeting>manage my settings>audio set up wizard

Step 2. Run the select camera wizard in connect so we can see your beautiful face.
>meeting>manage my settings>select camera

Step 3. Press play in the video box and accept any invitation to start broadcasting your mic and or your video.

4.       Sit back, relax with a hot cup of tea with milk in it, and continue to learn and get your monies worth from the course.

5.       Make sure you start your research papers now. Medical documentation will be required for anyone missing the deadlines.Provided you are physically present during the live connect session there will be no penalty what so ever for your unfortunate predicament. And you never know, I might end up being the one delivering the lecture from my bed to you in the A400 room.

Once again, don’t be alarmed by this message, its sent on a ‘just in case’ basis and I'm quite confident we won’t need to put this plan into action.

Best wishes, keep washing your hands, see you soon.

Prof H.

A new academic year is upon us and I'm teaching evenings this quarter. That doesnt stop the e-family from saying goodnight however and Lillian is pictured here suddenly realizing it was her daddy in the box (aka the laptop screen). Teaching two cracking courses on internet marketing and B2B e-marketing to seniors at the undergraduate level. Ive a number of great local clients to work with on pro bono student consultancy projects and Im fortunate enough to be teaching these both in the state of the art A400 Learning with Technology Center housed in a secret location under the library. One pleasant surprise – almost all of my B2B students have sat classes with me before now. Looking forward to working with them again. Best of the new academic year to everyone!