Social Media Week is on again in Toronto and if you’re looking to get social media savvy without breaking the bank this is the place to do it. It started on Monday but there are still a lot of awesome, and FREE, events taking place until Friday. Here are a few of our top picks.
Wednesday
The Crowdfunding Success Pattern
Designed for project leaders who want to leverage crowdfunding, this session examines how to maximize this funding model – supported by key data from a leading global platform.
Location: Courtyard Café at the Windsor Arms (18 St. Thomas Street)
Time: 1:30-2:30 pm
Social Media and the Culture of Sharing
Someone once said, “To know a language and not the culture is to make a fluent fool of yourself.” Many of us have learned or are learning the language of social media but do we truly understand the culture of sharing? Can sharing really heal us and others? Find out what you can do right now to make yourself and others around you happier and healthier.
Location: Courtyard Cafe at the Windsor Arms Hotel
Time: 3:00-4:00 pm
The Role of Media in Social Media
“Often when we talk about social media, we focus on the social. What about the media? In this talk, we will unpack the evolving role of content in shaping and informing our digital social lives. From finding people who “Like” the same things we do, to using images, video and “emojis” instead of words, find out how social is evolving the media landscape.”
Location: Courtyard Café at the Windsor Arms
Time: 4:00-5:00 pm
Thursday
Social Machines: Exploring our Socially Connected Future
“How many followers do you have on Twitter? Nice. Congrats. Now, how many of those followers are real people? Good question huh? The bots are on the rise. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing, especially if you put them to good use.
This #smwsapientnitro session will kick off with David Bradfield (@dbradfield), strategy director at SapientNitro, delivering a quick overview of StoryScaping and the role of Social in brand stories, but will shift to an exploration of connected thinking. Howard Goldkrand (@goldzillen), innovations director at SapientNitro, will inspire. Stories become experiences. Social credentials and data becomes a utility. It feeds our cars, makes our appliances smarter and makes our lives easier, through passive social engagement and mobility triggers.”
Location: Courtyard Cafe at the Windsor Arms Hotel
Time: 10:00-11:00 am
Social TV: How Brands and Marketers Can Make the Most of What’s Coming
“Social media and other disruptive technologies are changing the way we find, consume, interact with and recommend television programs—and this is creating unprecedented opportunities for brands and marketers. Find out what’s happening in the fast-moving social TV space and how to prepare for future opportunities.”
Location: Courtyard Cafe at Windsor Arms
Time: 11:00-12:00 pm
Social Media for Freelance Writers and Communicators
“Learn how to maximize the time you spend online during this free panel discussion, where established freelance writers and communicators will share how they use social media and content to get clients, maintain business relationships, and make work easier. Need to know who to contact about writing for a particular company? Looking for good sources for a story you’re working on? Want to be sure that potential client you met doesn’t forget you by the time the budget for her project is approved? Need quick answers from other writers who have faced challenges similar to your own? Discover the value of social networks you may be missing.”
Location: St. Thomas Room at the Windsor Arms
Time: 3:00-4:30 pm
Campaign to Commitment. Social Media, Brands and Long Ideas
“Social media campaigns are table stakes for brands, but as the digital ecosystem evolves, social campaigns can no longer effectively run on their own. To reach customers brands need to integrate campaigns across platforms creating long-term experiences that reach consumers in a sustained fashion. Critical Mass has a long history of creating these sustained multi-channel experiences, using social as a lynchpin. In this session we’ll show you our philosophy and how it has manifested itself across our clients’ digital and social ecosystems.”
Location: Courtyard Cafe at Windsor Arms
Time: 5:00-6:00 pm
Invest in Your Social Media, Tech Loving Mind
“Join Social & Good for an experience for all your senses. You’ll leave thinking about your relationship with technology in a different way. We’ll take you through 3 distinct scenarios that will challenge your minds’ connection with your work, humanity, yourself and the tech gadgets around you.
With a little help from technology, you can be a master in intuitive decision-making, concentration & creativity.”
Location: Social + Good, 477 Richmond Street West Suite 406
Time: 6:00-8:00 pm
Friday
The Democratization of Storytelling
“What do Margaret Atwood, an 18 year old college freshman, a Filipino writer living in Italy, and the creator of fictional stories about hit band One Direction all have in common? Each is helping to redefine and democratize storytelling in the mobile age through the global community of readers and writers on Wattpad.”
Location: Courtyard Café at the Windsor Arms
10:00-11:00 am
The Future of Sexual Education in Schools and Online
“Sex Ed is the building block of healthy sexuality to which young people have a right. But teachers are insufficiently trained and often embarrassed to carry out this education. The majority of Canadian parents support sex ed in schools; however, a powerful minority fear that schools will cross the line into shaping students’ values and behaviour. School boards and politicians feel pressured not to address the topics that students actually want to learn for fear that it will encourage “early” sexual behaviour. The reality is that youth learn about sex from the world around them, with profoundly negative and even life threatening results.”
Location: St. Thomas Room at Windsor Arms Hotel
Time: 11:30-12:30 pm
“The Day of Disruption Demo Pit will showcase startups and entrepreneurs that are part of the Greater Toronto Area eco-system, who are building communities, apps, digital and hardware solutions across many verticals including Life Sciences and Healthcare, ICT, Cleantech, Education and Social Innovation. If you want to see what’s coming up in technology, then you should check out these startups.”
Location: Courtyard Café at the Windsor Arms
Time: 4:30-6:30 pm
There are SO many amazing talks and presentations to attend, so be sure to check the Social Media Week site to see what’s available. It’s rare that events like this are open to the public, at no cost, so let’s take advantage of it! And even if you aren’t free during the day, there are quite a few networking opportunities (aka parties) you can attend!
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