Free Social Media Summit for B2B Marketers

If you’re like me, you get dozens of invitations to webinars. Many of them sound simply fantastic but are often held at times that don’t fit my schedule. Other times they’re a bit pricey. I end up not attending any.

That’s why I was very pleased to hear about BrightTALK’s free Social Media Summit which is being held Tuesday, October 7. The summit begins at 7:15 AM Pacific time and goes all day. The one presenation for which I’ve already registered: ”42 Rules of Social Networking for Business.”

You can find out more about the Social Media Summit and register for presentations by visiting the Social Media Summit page.

BrightTALK is a new Web 2.0 platform that “reinvents webcasting.” Think of it as podcasting meets YouTube. If you’re a company (large or small) you can deliver live Webcasts via BrightTALK channels. If you’re a business person looking for information, you can attend the live webinars – free of charge — or view recorded webcasts on demand.

“A webcast or webinar is part of the overall conversation a company can have with its customers and prospective customers,” said Paul Heald, BrightTALK CEO, in an interview with me. “It’s the best way to engage customers digitally. We’ve found, in our work with enterprise customers, that one in four people who take part in a webcast will ask a question.

“What is even more interesting is that we’ve found that while a good portion of people will attend live webinars, an even greater number will view a webinar on demand. What this says to us is that a shift is taking place in how we consume information.”

According to Paul, it’s very easy to host your own webinar on the BrightTALK site. You simply create a “channel” by filling out a short form (five fields). Once you schedule your webinar, it is listed on the BrightTALK site and people can then register for it.

You upload your PowerPoint Presentation to the BrightTALK site and shortly before your webinar begins, the BrightTalk automated system prompts you through the speaker login process — and away you go.

The system saves your webinar once you’ve finished — making it available to anyone who either subscribes to your channel or who registered for the actual webinar.

As you know, social media is a hot topic, especially for B2B marketers, “who are very aware of social media but feel their audience isn’t ready for it,” says Paul, “which is why we’re offering this summit. Social media goes way beyond Facebook and MySpace — and marketers will learn this and more by attending this summit.”