Monthly Archives: July 2009

Membership numbers of the business social networks are exploding. This is supported by a recent survey revealing that it is senior business decision-makers who are the dominant users of social media.

The research was carried out in the US, but given the worldwide membership growth figures for the business, or professional, social networks, it is likely that these findings are also relevant for Europe.

Key Facts
• The 3 principal social networks used for business purposes are market leader LinkedIn, Germany’s XING and Viadeo, a French-owned website.

• Research from Anderson Analytics and Greenfield Online carried out in May of this year and reported in Mashable revealed that:

o “The largest percentage of social network users are business users (31.8%) which correlates to a segment of 35 million users with an average age of 33 and an average income of $56k.”
o Anderson Analytics also revealed in an earlier report on LinkedIn that, 66% of the members are “decision makers or have influence in the purchase decisions” and that for individual members “the greater the number of connections the greater the likelihood of higher personal income”.

• Principal uses for all of the professional networks remains building a contact base, generating new business leads and recruitment.

LinkedIn
• LinkedIn is by far the biggest of the three, with 43 million members across 200 countries in May 2009, more than a 50% increase in membership levels since March 2008. In addition to the basic level membership there are three premium level memberships providing access to a range of services such as Inmail (allowing members to contact people outside of their network), introduction requests and the opportunity to view up to 700 results per search. Premium membership starts at $24.95 a month right up to $499.95 a month.

XING
• XING has over 7.5 million members (up 31% on 2008) and is available in 16 languages.

• Advantages of the XING network are listed as XINGJobs, more than 26 thousand specialized groups and over 90 thousand live networking events a year organized by members for members. The Headquarters are in Hamburg with local offices in Barcelona, Istanbul and Milan. Premium membership, starting from 4.95 Euros a month, provides messaging access to all members, the opportunity to enhance your profile with work samples and references and access to additional company information.

Viadeo
• Viadeo has 8.5 million members (a 50% increase in membership since April 2008). The head office is in France, with subsidiaries in Italy, Spain, UK, Mexico, India and China (through the acquisition of tianji.com in 2007).

• Viadeo positions itself as a global company with a local development strategy. Most of its members are not international business leaders but people who do business within their own city or region with members they know and trust. 90% of their professionals do business locally and 15% of the members class themselves as entrepreneurs. Members have an average of 50 contacts as members put quality, activity and interactivity before volume.

• Viadeo offers dedicated recruiting tools for HR companies and for business and alumni associations it has developed a specific platform called Communities, a private space to communicate and interact with their own members.

• Premium membership, starting from 5.91 Euros a month, provides access to all member profiles, the opportunity to see who has checked your profile, unlimited connection requests and the opportunity to place ads and create events.

Social Networking Developments
• Whilst there still appears to be some uncertainness as how to achieve the desired networking and lead generation results from these networks, a number of new companies have sprung up to provide advice on how to connect, build your profile or generate a group made up of your target audience. One such example is Linked:Group, who have set up and now administrate some of LinkedIn’s largest groups, including Group Linked HR with more than 150,000 members.

• LinkedIn has generated another new phenomenon, the LION’s (LinkedIn Open Networkers) who contrary to the stated intention of the network (where connections should be based on personal recommendations and trust), choose to connect to as many people as possible, even if they are perfect strangers. Some of the biggest “LION’s” now have more than 30,000 connections. A list of LinkedIn’s top 50 “most connected” is available at http://www.toplinked.com/top50.html. For those who want rapid access to a large network, it is possible to pay for access to the 43,000+ open networkers and their connections. (http://www.toplinked.com/). This phenomenon hasn’t appeared in the European networks such as Viadeo, where the emphasis is on building tight, close networks of trusted members.

• Highly-targeted advertising to selected professional profiles has been made possible with the networks offering tailor-made advertising formats.

Marco Corsaro, Managing Director of 77Agency who represent the largest business network in Europe, Viadeo, said “77Agency is proud of having been selected by leading business social media network Viadeo to manage some of their acquisition activities. Viadeo is a great platform and it is great that Linkedin is facing some fierce European and worldwide competition.”

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EventMingle announced today it has added support for Twitter in their popular online social networking platform for the tradeshow industry. Twitter is a free social messaging utility and micro-blogging service that enables users to send and read messages known as Tweets. These Tweets are text based and limited to 140 characters each making it perfect for event participants to comment about the event.

EventMingle is the first event-based social networking community to add support for Twitter. The implementation goals were:

Allow all members of the EventMingle community to monitor all of the tweets being sent about the event, without having to create a Twitter account themselves.
Allow event participants who have Twitter accounts to increase the number of people who are following them by listing their name, company name and title along with their Twitter name in a roster on EventMingle.
All event participants who use Twitter before, during and after the event can have their Tweet added to a message board on EventMingle simply by adding a special hashtag EventMingle creates and promotes on the site. EventMingle monitors the hashtag in real time and updates the message board on EventMingle.
“It’s a clean and elegant implementation by our EventMingle engineering team to support Twitter. During our beta test phase the last 3 months EventMingle participants have been getting into Twitter. They send Tweets during keynote and breakout sessions, they discuss the food and venue and more. One person sent a Tweet inviting people to meet him in the lobby of the bar for a drink and to his surprise over 100 people showed up.” Said Jim Harrer, co-creator of EventMingle.

Mr. Harrer went on to say, “Adding support for Twitter is just another example of our commitment to improve our social networking platform. Our team enjoys pushing the envelope by focusing on adding features EventMingle participants will use which is why we enjoy such a high opt-in rate time and time again.”

EventMingle Twitter support is now out of beta and available in our EventMingle Tradeshow Edition.

About EventMingle

EventMingle is the first Web-based, online social networking technology designed to cater to the tradeshow industry. EventMingle enables attendees, exhibitors and speakers to collaborate online prior, during and after the event. EventMingle improves networking among all participants while helping participants create an “action plan” prior to leaving for the event. EventMingle was launched in December 2005.

EventMingle is a wholly owned subsidiary of Specialty Match Network, a privately owned company based in Bend, Oregon. See http://www.SpecialtyMatch.com For more info about EventMingle, contact Jim Harrer, 949-607-0980. Follow EventMingle on Twitter @EventMingle.

The future of e-commerce is “social commerce” as online shoppers, particularly younger generations, are heavily influenced by social media and Web 2.0 technologies, according to a new “Future of Commerce” report from Hill & Knowlton.
“Online retailing is being profoundly impacted by the integration of social media into what historically has been a transactional experience,” said Joshua Reynolds, worldwide technology practice director, Hill & Knowlton and co-author of the report.
Key factors influencing behavior from the Future of Commerce report include:
Experience counts – 83 percent of respondents said “personal prior experience” has the greatest impact on where they choose to shop online. Trailing behind experience were the following sources: “family member” (48 percent); “friend” (44 percent); and “an online offer or ad from the online store itself” (43 percent).
Social media is “Word of Mouth 2.0” for younger generations – Younger generations are predominantly influenced by social media channels: 27 percent of Gen Y are influenced by an “online community or blog” compared to 19 percent of Gen X and only 9 percent of Baby Boomers.
Traditional media remains universal driver of influence – Traditional, offline media remains the most effective vehicle for reaching mass audiences: 19 percent of all survey respondents were influenced by an “article in a newspaper or magazine” and 12 percent by “radio or broadcast TV program.”
The link between thought leadership and corporate valuation – An analysis of more than 300 traditional news articles covering the industry’s top e-commerce leaders over a year-long duration indicates strong linkage between companies who talk about the industry – and not just themselves – and increased brand valuation. For example, e-commerce companies that discussed macro environmental topics, such as the evolution of e-commerce, scored highest in “brand presence,” perhaps an indicator of the positive impact of establishing a position and maintaining a strong voice in a changing market.
“The most effective way to reach consumers online is with highly-targeted campaigns tailored to engage micro communities that form around common interests,” said Julie Mathis, vice president, consumer technology, Hill & Knowlton. “One-size-fits-all marketing is not a viable communications approach in today’s PR 2.0 world.”
The economy is having a heavy impact on consumer online shopping habits according to the report:
Shopping is down – When asked how consumers have changed their everyday item purchases since the economy has receded, 46 percent of consumers said they shop less overall, whether online or offline. The older the consumer, the less likely they are to shop overall.
Value is key in a down economy – Fifty percent of respondents said they are shopping online more to look for better bargains. And, Gen X and Y are more likely than Baby Boomers to shop online for better bargains in a down economy.
“Our research indicates that online shopping increases in a downturn, providing a potential offset for offline retailers experiencing revenue losses in the downturn,” added Reynolds.
About the Survey
The report was based on a survey of more than 600 U.S. adults conducted by Penn Schoen Berland and Associates and supplemented with research conducted by Hill & Knowlton’s communications experts.
About Hill & Knowlton
Hill & Knowlton is a leading international communications consultancy, providing services to local, multinational and global clients. The firm is headquartered in New York with 80 offices in 43 countries, as well as an extensive associate network. The agency is part of WPP (Nasdaq: WPPGY), one of the world’s largest communications services groups.

The Sage LinkedIn Group, the largest Sage-related group on the popular business social network, today announced the launch of a new website for the group.

The website was built by Hall Web Services, a Sage Preferred Vendor, who developed the site free of charge to help foster the growth of the community. The new site boasts a fresh and simple web design and is powered by WordPress, an open-source blogging platform that allows for ease of management.

“We were happy to work with the group to provide a site that is easy to manage and user-friendly,” said Amanda O’Brien, Inbound Marketing Manager at Hall and Project Manager on the site. “The group’s administrators can easily add articles, upload photos, link to resources on YouTube and show spotlight members. The site is tied in with all of the social networking tools used by the group so that people interested can quickly find the other places they can interact with the group online.”

Interested visitors can now subscribe to the site using an RSS feed, like they would a blog, receive email updates from the site, connect to the group on LinkedIn, as well as follow the group’s Twitter feed. The Twitter feed features updates about the group, as well as news of general interest to the Sage and B2B software reseller community.

With more resources than ever and easier methods of sharing information and connecting with its members, the Sage LinkedIn Group looks forward to continuing to provide a valuable online community for those in the Sage reseller, employee, and alumni community.

About the Sage LinkedIn Group
The Sage LinkedIn Group (sagesoftwarelinkedingroup.com) is LinkedIn’s Largest & Most Active Sage Product Virtual Networking Group. The group is for all Sage VAR’s, employees, Sage alumni or anyone who has an interest in Sage. Its objective is to exchange ideas and expand its members’ network by sharing best practices, tips, techniques and strategies as well as letting members help each other with employment and career opportunities.

Gleedo™, the first ever livesharing application, expanded its open alpha program with the release of Gleedo for Windows Vista® and Windows® XP 64-bit operating systems. Gleedo is free and available for download at www.gleedo.com.

Gleedo is free software that layers live social networking over users’ favorite media. With Gleedo, users may share Internet videos, web sites, photos and music with friends and family in real time, in a private online media room. Chat and talk features allow for live interaction, making users feel as if they are all in the same room.

Gleedo will launch this fall. The open alpha program, announced this month, lets users get an early preview of Gleedo, share with friends as well as provide valuable feedback to the Gleedo development team. Said Mehrdad Nadooshan, CEO of Emerj, Inc. (maker of Gleedo), “We are excited by the great response to our open alpha program. Now we are pleased to further expand our reach within the Windows Vista and XP user communities with the launch of Gleedo for 64-bit operating systems.”

To download Gleedo, visit http://www.gleedo.com/content/download.

Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and other countries. Windows Vista is either a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

About Emerj, Inc.
Emerj, Inc. is the maker of Gleedo™, the first ever livesharing application. Gleedo layers live social networking over online and personal media, allowing users to watch – together, live – with friends and family on the Internet. Private equity-funded Emerj, Inc. is headquartered in New Jersey. For more information, visit www.gleedo.com or call +1 800.541.2027.

Amazee is an internet platform that empowers individuals and organizations to initiate and promote their ideas and plans in projects, to find like-minded people and raise funds. Amazee is the global action network! Examples of successful projects on Amazee are: Building an IT learning center in Sri Lanka, planning meetings of internet entrepreneurs in Zurich or ensuring the complete supply with running water in a small South African village.
Amazee is built for globally-minded activists who want to use the web for collective action. Thus their goals become projects on Amazee and these projects come to life.
Each project on Amazee has its online publication medium: the project magazine. Via an intuitive interface users can add a large variety of so called widgets to these magazines. Among many other things there are gallery, blog and event planning widgets which can be combined into a very attractive package. Amazee provides interfaces for the most important online platforms. Projects can be embedded in other places and therefore spread virally – for example on the Iphone or on Facebook.
The collaboration of members in projects on Amazee is being empowered by different state-of-the-art tools such as calendars, discussion boards, polls and chats, event planning modules etc. The networking of users on Amazee happens via projects and common goals. A “Livestream” informs all members about the latest activites and supports a lively exchange among these members.

A few days ago, the German company Trivid launched a new application, the Clipgenerator technology for MySpace. The Flash variant of the practical tool for creating online videos uses the latest technology and allows MySpace users to create their own professional music videos in just a few steps.

First, select your favourite track from the extensive Clipgenerator music pool, which is regularly updated with the latest songs and well-loved classics. Depending on the length of the track, 10 to 15 photos can then be added from any website or the user’s own hard drive to the clip using a simple drag-and-drop function. An integrated image editing tool allows users to edit and optimise the photos first. Finally, the effects and animations tailored to the music by professional motion designers transform the images into a spectacular, personal music video in seconds, which can be posted straight to the MySpace user profile via a dedicated streaming solution.

The incredible speed of the video production is due to the innovative combination of Adobe’s Flash technology and the patented and multi-award winning ClipTemplate Technology from Trivid. The video is created on the fly in Flashplayer 10.

This means even less technically-minded users can use Clipgenerator to create their own high-quality and professional-looking videos using holiday, party or event snaps quickly and easily, and show these off to their friends on MySpace.

The application can be called up directly at the following link: http://www.myspace.com/clipgenerator

About MySpace

MySpace is world’s biggest music platform and an international social network for communication, entertainment and lifestyle. MySpace allows its users to express their creativity and passions via personal profiles, find and communicate with friends, form networks, and discover pop culture. MySpace Germany, Switzerland, Austria has its head office in Berlin and two sales offices in Hamburg and Düsseldorf, and belongs to Fox Interactive Media Germany GmbH. According to the German online research study group AGOF, MySpace Germany registered 4.94 million unique users a month in the first quarter 2009, and logged 746 million page impressions and 55.2 million visits in June 2009, according to the IVW, a German advertising analysis group. MySpace is a division of News Corporation. (NYSE: NWS – News, NWS.A – News; ASX: NWS – News, NWSLV – News)

About Trivid

Clipgenerator™ from Trivid GmbH works with a newly developed patented ClipTemplateTechnology (CTT). The software prepares music tracks so well that the result is equal in every way to today’s professional music videos. Clipgenerator runs online on-the-fly in the Internet browser without the end user having to install any software. The only prerequisite is the use of Flashplayer 10. Users can access their uploaded photos directly, create a high-resolution video in just 2 minutes, publish it in real time, post it immediately in communities and video portals, and share it with friends. The music pool is constantly updated with copyright-protected hits. Clipgenerator technology is currently the only legally protected technology to link private content with copyrighted music to a legal user-generated video.

Tycoon Systems Inc. today announced a new educational business game application built on Facebook Platform. Tycoon Systems’ IndustryMasters application is a real-time multiplayer business game, which provides hands-on entrepreneurial experience for Facebook users worldwide.

“IndustryMasters is an opportunity for Facebook users to challenge their management skills and to grow their business acumen,” said Tycoon Systems CEO Thomas Lehnert. “Players can compete 24/7 in real-time with users from anywhere in the world in this very realistic, multiplayer business simulation game. IndustryMasters is a serious game, an empowering and fun educational experience.”

The IndustryMasters application allows Facebook users to build up their own corporation and to manage their products within a virtual economy, while competing with other players for the highest share price. As they play, users learn and absorb important elements of finance and accounting, corporate strategy and economics. By playing multiple rounds this learning is strongly grounded and embedded.

IndustryMasters on Facebook Platform is open to anyone with an interest in business. Facebook users can easily and instantly access IndustryMasters using their already established Facebook account, without leaving the Facebook Website. They can invite their Facebook friends to join the business game and to become their shareholders. They can also team up with friends to play simultaneously and coordinate strategies using Facebook Chat.

Facebook gives companies and the developer community access to the social graph through Facebook Platform. Using a rich set of tools and online services, developers such as Tycoon Systems are able to build an application that is deeply integrated into the Facebook Website.

About Tycoon Systems

Tycoon Systems was founded in 2005 and is a leading business education software company. Tycoon Systems’ business simulations are used in business education around the globe, in a variety of formats – from custom simulations used in executive education to ready-to-use SCORM compatible business e-learning modules – and now on Facebook Platform.

For more information please visit http://apps.facebook.com/industrymasters

Gigya, Inc., the leading technology for connecting content and consumers with the social web, today announced that its Socialize technology is now available as a module for Drupal. The Socialize module was developed in conjunction with Acquia, the enterprise guide to the Drupal Social Publishing System.
The new Socialize module enables site owners to authenticate users with a single point of access to Facebook Connect, MySpaceID, Sign in with Twitter as well as OpenID providers like Gmail, Yahoo! Mail and AOL Mail. Publishers using Socialize have increased site registrations by more than 30 percent.

“The Gigya Socialize Drupal module is a perfect complement to Drupal’s social publishing features,” said Rooly Eliezerov, President and co-founder, Gigya. “The module makes it easy for any site built on Drupal to add powerful social features, including pushing content and user activity out beyond the site and into the social networks, driving interactivity and viral promotion.”

Powerful Authentication, Social and Promotional Features

Gigya’s new Socialize Module for Drupal makes it easy for Drupal site owners to:

Enable users to link existing accounts with social network and OpenID identities, and personalize the user experience by making it easy for sites to integrate user profile and social graph data.
Increase user acquisition by enabling users to invite friends to the site, or to share site content or a specific event. For example, using the Socialize module users can choose to invite their Facebook friends to comment on a new post they created.
Increase site traffic through viral promotion, enabling users to send status updates, tweets and newsfeed events to their social networks. The Gigya Socialize module has been fully integrated with Drupal’s user action and trigger core modules so Drupal site owners can configure the viral promotion channels to work dynamically.
Easily configure the user experience, design, and module functionality using the Drupal administration panel.
“Content and community are the critical components of many Drupal websites and the Gigya Socialize Drupal module connects Drupal-based communities with the leading social networks on the web,” said Dries Buytaert, Drupal project founder and Acquia CTO. “Simplifying site authentication processes and integration with various networks and platforms can improve the user experience and extend the reach of every website.”

The new Gigya Socialize Drupal module is fully configurable and installs in minutes with no programming. The module is available, free of charge, on Drupal.org at http://drupal.org/project/gigya.

To learn more about how to use Socialize on your Drupal website, Acquia and Gigya are jointly hosting a webinar on August 4th, 2009 which will cover product features, implementation, and best practices. To register go to https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/550274306.

About Acquia

Acquia helps organizations of all sizes build social publishing websites quickly, easily and with a lower total cost of ownership by leveraging Drupal, the open source social publishing platform that blends content and community. Our products, services and support enable companies to leverage the power, technical innovation and economic value of Drupal while simplifying the experience, removing the complexity and minimizing the risk. Please visit: http://acquia.com. Download Acquia Drupal, the completely free Drupal distribution, at http://acquia.com/downloads.

About Drupal

The Drupal social publishing system has been downloaded over two million times since its inception and powers more than 400,000 web sites globally. Drupal includes an enterprise class content management system and is used to deliver a wide variety of web applications including single or multi-user blogs, wikis, community networks, digital media portals, e-commerce, and many more. Assisted by a thriving ecosystem of consultants and developers, a diverse set of organizations use Drupal, including SonyBMG, Warner Brothers Records, the New York Observer, Forbes, Disney, Intel, Harvard University, and Amnesty International. A huge community has grown up around Drupal, with thousands of active contributors to the open source technology. For more information, visit http://drupal.org.

About Gigya

Gigya’s technology opens the social web for publishers and marketers, providing powerful tools that increase audience reach and engagement. Gigya reaches more than 250 million people each month on its rich media social advertising network, enabling marketers to engage consumers in social environments and enlist them as brand advocates. The company’s Wildfire and Socialize products enable publishers to syndicate and track their content across more than 70 unique platforms and to integrate and promote their own websites with social networks including Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. Publishers and advertisers working with Gigya include: CBS, Coca-Cola, DoubleClick, Electronic Arts, Hyundai, JCPenney, Levis, MTV, Photobucket, Samsung, Turner, Unilever and Walmart. For more information, please visit: www.gigya.com.

Wrike Inc., the leading provider of on-demand, online project management solutions, today revealed a free application that will change My Yahoo! users’s everyday experience by letting them work on tasks and projects together in real-time.
Wrike Simple Projects (http://apps.yahoo.com/-JOaEL34s) is the first My Yahoo! app that lets users keep track of changes made in projects by their friends. Thanks to the ability to see who created, edited, reassigned and completed tasks in real time, they can always stay in the loop. Wrike Simple Projects lets anyone who has a personal My Yahoo! page easily create and assign tasks, organize tasks into projects, invite people to work on projects together and keep track of changes.
Saving time and making people all over the world more productive is a part of Wrike’ss mission. We developed Wrike Simple Projects for free specifically for Yahoo! to help millions of people become more effective in getting things done together, said Wrike’ss founder and CEO, Andrew Filev.
Wrike Simple Projects features basic task management and collaboration functions, such as sharing projects and assigning tasks. People who need a more powerful solution for managing business projects are invited to use Wrike’ss main product, which features the patent-pending Intelligent E-mail Engine, unique Flexible Structures and Dynamic Timeline. A free, 30-day trial is available at http://www.wrike.com.
About Wrike:
Wrike, Inc. is a provider of an award-winning, on-demand, online project management solution. It provides executives with a unique platform for gaining productivity for the whole team and getting things done throughout the company. Wrike helps companies from SMBs to global corporations stay in control of their business (http://www.wrike.com/stories.html). Its e-mail integration is the most advanced in the project management space. Wrike, Inc. has patents pending. Wrike was named a winner of RedHerring’ss Top 100 Global Company Award and a winner of eWeek’ss Excellence Award. Founded in 2003, Wrike Inc. is a privately held corporation located in California.

LinkedIn Group “Sales and Marketing Professionals Promoting HighTech and Technology in Los Angeles” invites you to the first group’s networking reception and panel which is produced in association with iHollywood Forum at the conclusion of their 7th annual Digital Media Summit. Over 200 are expected to attend from LinkedIn members and the Digital Media Summit attendees. The cocktail party is from 6pm-9pm on Wednesday, July 29 at UCLA Covel Commons.
Qualified press can receive a comp ticket by contacting event organiziers. Qualified press include editorial press only for commercial print, news, blogs, online, or trade outlets and must apply in advance for approval.
All others can purchase tickets for only $20 at:
http://www.linkedin7-29.eventbrite.com
To learn more about the Digital Media Summit from 9am-6pm, go to www.ihollywoodforum.com/digitalmediasummit or you can register at:
:www.digitalmediasummit.eventbrite.com. You can also call 310 736 1541 or send an email to [email protected].
The LinkedIn “Sales and Marketing Professionals Promoting HighTech and Technology in Los Angeles and its Vicinity”,
http://www.linkedin.com/groupRegistration?gid=1827… is the largest LinkedIn group in Los Angeles with about 4000 members. Or call Tommy Orpaz at 818 825-8167.
Address: UCLA , Covel Commons, 200 De Neve Dr. , Los Angeles, CA 90024 . Parking permits can be puchased from kiosk for adjacent UCLA lots.
Register now at : http://www.linkedin7-29.eventbrite.com
Program:
6:00 – 7:30 pm – Networking reception.
7:30 – 9:00 pm – Panel discussion on Using Social Networking to Generate Revenue
Our panelists will share the ways that social media is utilized for branding companies and individuals and social networking as a business strategy.
The panelists:
Fernando Espuelas , Host & Managing Editor at Cafe Espuelas on 1020am in Los Angeles
This is a radio talk show broadcast live M-F on 1020 AM. It is the number 1 rated Spanish language AM station in Los Angeles, part of the Univision Radio Network. Espuelas founded StarMedia, the first multi-platform digital media company for Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking people worldwide. StarMedia transcended national barriers, becoming the most recognized pan-Latin new media brand, eventually serving 25 million people per month. Espuelas went on to raise $500 million dollars for StarMedia in a combination of private and public offerings, including raising the first dollar of venture funding and the first IPO for a Latin Internet company.
Lane Soelberg, President – COOP Media Ventures
Creating engaging story systems around a brand and its community are his specialty.
The COOP is a brand entertainment boutique, which has served clients such as Ford, Mazda, Gateway, Virgin Mobile, Microsoft, Intel, and Chili’s.
Majid Abai, Chief Executive of Pringo, Inc.
This is an Enterprise Social Networking platform provider located in Los Angeles. His topics:
• What Are Enterprise Social Networks (ESN)?
• Effects of ESN on Business
• Convergence of ESN and Enterprise Portals
• ESN as a Marketing tool
• How Bank of America, Jack-in-the-Box, and other companies established successful ESNs
Neal Schaffer, Author
Author of “Windmill Networking: Understanding, Leveraging & Maximizing LinkedIn” . His topics are: LinkedIn LIONs and the benefits of open networking.
Brian Selzer , Executive and digital/social media producer ; Founder of Omgento .
Brian Selzer is a creative executive and digital media producer who has made a career pushing the boundaries of interactive entertainment. He has created, produced, and distributed multimedia content to a client list that includes Fox, Universal, Warner Brothers, Sony, Activision, EA, Marvel, Hasbro, Nike, Lego, Honda and many others. His topic: Augmented Reallity, as recently featured in the NY Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/12/business/12proto…
Contacts:
For more information about the Linked In Group, please contact Tommy Orpaz, [email protected] , (818) 825-8167 or join the LinkedIn Group Sales and Marketing Professionals Promoting HighTech and Technology in Los Angeles, at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/12/business/12proto…
The LinkedIn “Sales and Marketing Professionals Promoting HighTech and Technology in Los Angeles and its Vicinity”
For information about the iHollywood Forum and the 7th Digital Media Summit held on July 29 from 9am-5pm at UCLA, contact Zahava Stroud at [email protected] or call 310 736 1541. Qualified editorial press can apply for a comp press pass. Send full contact info with links to articles and “press pass” in subject line.

RealWebMarketing.net (http://www.realwebmarketing.net), a website marketing firm specializing in working with small to medium-sized businesses, has launched a new “Social Media Gateway Page” for clients.

The purpose of these gateway pages is to make it easy for visitors to connect with and follow a person or company on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, and to include links to all the person’s or company’s web sites and blogs, and to all the products they sell. It becomes a gateway to all of their activities. The service can also include setting up accounts in Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and other social media sites if the client doesn’t already have them. Readers can see a sample of a Social Media Gateway Page here: http://www.flourishandprosper.com/

John Eberhard, President of RealWebMarketing.net stated “These social media gateway pages are perfect for people who have a number of activities or businesses, or for companies who have a lot of news and other things going on. It gives you one central gateway page which links to all your various websites and activities. This is perfect for celebrities, giving one page that links to all their various activities and allowing people to connect up with them on social media sites. It’s also perfect for entrepreneurs or any company that wants to connect more with customers, followers or fans.”

John Eberhard has been involved in marketing for a wide variety of businesses for 20 years. RealWebMarketing.net was founded in 1999 in the Los Angeles area, and has clients all over the U.S, in a wide variety of fields such as health care, consulting, construction, personnel recruitment, court reporting, drug rehabilitation and detoxification, publishing, software, jewelry, residential and commercial real estate, dance instruction, tax consulting, plumbing, dentistry, pool remodeling, and many others. The services offered by RealWebMarketing.net include social media marketing, pay-per-click advertising campaign management, web design and blog design, search engine optimization, link building, article syndication, optimized press releases, and video production.