For the 3^rd year in a row Local Social Summit (LSS) explored the cutting edges of the intersection of local and social media. This is a place where people including consumers, businesses and community collide. Where the use of smart phones and tablets has created the SoLoMo ‘Mandala’…

This year the co-founders of LSS, Dylan Fuller and Simon Baptist, expanded the summit to 2 days. The expansion was based on feedback from last years’ Summit and input from the growing global LSS community. Plus the sheer volume of great topics to cover. Additionally, they wanted to allow sufficient time for networking and space to organise the unique LSS pop-up burger & beer café with Young & Foodish… Probably the best burgers in London were served that night along with some great conversations.

The Summit keynote kick-off was again given by Internet analyst and LSS principle Greg Sterling. Titled: Local Social 2011 – The Paradigm Shift Picks-up Speed, Greg’s talk had 6 major themes:

• Hype-Local: Demand, Awareness Growing
• Mobile Momentum Continues
• Social Media, SMBs and the ‘Now What?’ Problem
• Local Data Tsunami
• Payments and Real-World Analytics
• From Clicks to Transactions

“Social Media, SMBs and the ‘Now What?’ Problem” was probably one of the most challenging themes discussed throughout day 1 and into day 2… If you’re a small business, what do you do in social media after you set up your account? This is what Greg Sterling called the “Now what?” problem in his keynote address on the first day of Local Social Summit 2011. And as he pointed out, SMBs aren’t getting a lot of help solving it.

Instead, many are sorting it out for themselves. When Eric Partaker, co-founder of UK-based burrito chain Chilango was asked in the Super Social Businesses panel whether he would outsource his social media activity, his joking response was “Where do I sign.” But he pointed out that, while he would have outsourced when the business was first starting, because he was scared and didn’t know what to say, he’s now seen how PR professionals have failed to capture the tone of voice he wanted for the business, so he does all his Twitter posts himself, spending up to four hours a week.

He also weighed in on the question of what social media is actually for, arguing that “it’s just a tool that allows you to do the fundamentals more efficiently”. This was an idea expressed earlier in the day by Dennis Yu, CEO of Blitz Local during the Search vs. Social panel. He said that social media isn’t a channel, but an overlay over all other marketing. He also argued that what most people describe as the sales funnel is really an hourglass, with the transaction at the waist. Social media, he said, can play at both ends of the hourglass. It can raise awareness of your products and services at the top, and it can do customer service at the bottom. And, as JoinHere founder Justin Sanger pointed out on day two, social media gives the customers you’re retaining the ability to help you with further acquisition. Or as Tupalo CEO Mike Borras put it, for SMBs, “customer service is the new marketing.”

This view of social media as a customer service and CRM tool also informed the discussion of Groupon and other deals-based models. A number of participants criticised these model for encouraging the “tour bus” approach, by which a group of customers turn up, get a discount and then vanish, leaving the merchant uncertain whether they’ll ever be seen again. Keynote speaker Perry Evans, CEO of Closely, summed it up; “Businesses love the underlying concept of deals – the guaranteed pre-paid transaction. But they hate the business model”. What’s happened, he said, is that the simple concept of the daily deal has been atomised, so that there are now multiple deals available at varying times across different locations, being delivered by multiple channels. The result is a move towards a yield management approach, giving merchants the opportunity to incentivise people to come in at certain times when demand would otherwise be low.

And it’s this sort of business issue that companies who want to serve SMBs need to understand and help with. As Borras admitted, one of the things his company didn’t focus on enough at the start was the customer perspective. That changed, he said, when “we realised we needed feedback from local businesses, because both consumers and local businesses are our customers.”

Greg’s full presentation is imbedded below:

The LSS team will be producing a Summit report that is due out before the end of December. Stay tuned. [Attribution: thanks to Mike Nutley for helping write this majority of this post.]

Eric Freeman will be joining The Changing Landscape of Local Content panel at LSS'11 – which is on Day 1 (the Full Schedule is Here). Eric joins us from sunny Spain.

Eric has worked in the technology industry since 1994, for multinationals in Silicon Valley (Oracle, Intershop Communications, AirWave and others) to entrepreneurial ventures in the US and Europe.

Eric has founded, raised venture capital funding, staffed and managed 2 start-ups and worked with 10 others to launch new products and services. An expert in strategic marketing and in international business development, Eric focuses on building corporate alliances that build strategic value while driving revenue. He understands the challenges that start-up companies face and the need for organizational infrastructure to support rapid growth.

Following 11 years in San Francisco, CA, Eric relocated to Madrid in 2006. Representing Schober Group, Eric travels frequently throughout Europe, working with mobile application developers, digital cartography companies, 118XY service providers, yellow page directories and leading online search companies to deliver quality geo-coded business listings and POIs.

Academic Background: Eric has a BA in History from Trinity College, Hartford Connecticut, an MA in Hispanic Civilization from New York University and an MBA from the Anderson School UCLA in Los Angeles, CA. Since 2008, Eric has served as an Associate Professor at Instituto de Empresa in Madrid where he teaches Entrepreneurship to international graduate students.

Michael Weston has worked for the past 14 years in the digital world, focused on creating value by understanding how to collect, interpret and act on the rich seams of data that digital channels create for marketers. A frequent speaker on both sides of the Atlantic, Michael draws on a passion for advocating the power of digital media and its ability to help businesses and people fulfil their potential.

Michael launched himself into digital media in the early days when, after several years working for The Mail on Sunday, he was part of the early team for Associated Newspapers' first web business. He joined Engage in 2000, embarking on a journey with SaaS companies providing the tools – and the strategic insight on how to best use those tools – to understand customer journeys and their context. Since founding the agency Digital Oxygen in 2005, Michael has led the European expansion for first Silverpop, and more recently the email / analytics company Lyris.

You call follow mike on Twitter @sandlines and read his blog. Mike will be moderating the Big Brand Local panel at LSS next week.

Greg Sterling

Greg Sterling is a leading analyst and blogger covering the local search, social and mobile markets. He is a senior analyst with Opus Research's Internet2Go program and the founder of Sterling Market Intelligence. He is also a contributing editor with Search Engine Land, the leading online publication covering search. Before this Sterling ran BIA/Kelsey's Interactive Local Media program. He was also a producer at TechTV and an original editor AllBusiness.com. Prior to AllBusiness Sterling was a practicing attorney in San Francisco.

Duncan Ogle-Skan joins us from EMO. He is the creative genius behind our Big Brand Local panel which will explore how global/national/regional brands are developing social into something that works locally.

Duncan joined in EMO, the specialist localisation marketing agency, in 1997 having worked client-side at Allianz Cornhill Insurance and Renault UK. From 1999, Duncan ran EMO Group’s then new media division (Star-Fish Networks Online) and co-authored the company’s distributed local networks websites system. Duncan engineered the integration of EMO’s digital offering with its core business and is now a Board Director – with oversight on all elements of the digital mix, from local PPC and SEO, to managing sister agency Sky Rock and their new local website platform, Vicinity.

Miriam Warren from Yelp will back at LSS’11 as one of our star panellists on the Finding Locals – The View From Europe session.

Miriam joined Yelp in 2007 as the company’s first Community Manager in Washington, D.C. and was promoted to oversee the East Coast Community Management team. As Vice President of European Marketing, she now oversees the company’s expansion efforts in Europe, including recent launches of Yelp in France, Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Switzerland and Belgium. Prior to joining Yelp, Miriam worked in executive search and talent acquisition, most recently at McKesson. Miriam holds a B.A. in ethnic studies from Mills College.

We are pleased to announce that we will have a dedicated session at the 3rd Annual Local Social Summit with the 1st European based executive at foursquare. This will be a conversation between Omid Ashtari from foursquare and Greg Sterling our ever skilled chief moderator. The session is schedule for 11.30am on Thursday 10th of November (Day 2 of the summit) – see the full schedule here. As a big fan and user of the foursquare app it will  be very interesting to get first hand insight into how 4sq plans to evolve the service for users with new features like Radar and develop the commercial side for merchants. We are looking forward to the conversation with Omid.

Speaker Profile:

Omid Ashtari is Director of Business Development for foursquare and is focused on expanding the European footprint through strategic partnerships. Before joining foursquare, Omid spent 7 years with Google in Dublin, London and San Francisco. During his Google tenure he held multiple positions in sales and business development, working with a broad range of clients and partners across the globe. Omid holds a bachelor’s degree in European Business Administration from Cologne Business School Germany and graduated with Honors. He is currently based in London, UK.

Niels Borgers will be on our The Changing Landscape of Local Data panel. He is Business Development Manager at infohubble.  Infohubble stands for smarter local search data. The company aims to provide a better user experience with relevant and correct business data. infohubble is satisfying this need through the aggregation and systematic enrichment of business information into databases and additional data services. Context-based information requests can be fulfilled with in depth data (base level, geo level, rich level, dynamic level, real-time level). The founders’ past experience in data aggregation is the foundation from where innovation will move the company forward. Accordingly, infohubble is stating their data is the quality commodity to make your platform content smarter. Niels is leading Business Development, pushing infohubble from a start-up into a sound business with strong market position and solid strategy. With a past in business development (ilocal, DGI) and international experience (USA, Spain and South Africa) Niels is able to represent the scalability of the company’s state-of-the-art toolbox worldwide. Niels received a Master of Science in Economics from Erasmus University and lives in Amsterdam.

Grant Muckle is Managing Director of Upcast Social – a world leading technology platform for managing ads in Facebook. Upcast Social is the sister company of I Spy Marketing where Grant was previously heading up their Natural Search, Social Media and Analytics division.

He has 10 years experience working at the leading edge of digital marketing on campaigns that include some of the biggest brands in the UK and globally. Prior to joining I Spy in 2008 Grant was Product Director at Touch Local responsible for setting up their search agency and developing their range of online advertising products aimed at businesses, from SME’s to large brands. He was previously managing director of a leading global SEO agency where he focused heavily on product development and innovation in this fast paced, changing industry.

Grant will be on the Search vs. Social panel at Local Social Summit 2011.

Tim Plyming is the Project Executive, Digital & Editor Live Sites in the BBC’s London 2012 project team and will be speaking at Local Social Summit 2011 about BBC London 2012: The First Digital Olympics.

Tim leads the day to day activity of the ‘Digital Olympics’ project which is responsible for the delivery of all 2012 content across digital platforms including online, mobile and connected TV. As Editor of live sites, Tim is responsible for developing the public screen strategy in 2012, including the official London 2012 Live Sites programme with Locog. Tim is also project director for the Ultra HDTV (Super Hi-Vision) project which will deliver the London 2012 Olympic Games in Super Hi-Vision for the first time to locations across the UK.

Prior to working on the 2012 project Tim was Project Executive for the BBC Electric Proms and before that worked at BBC Radio 2 where he was responsible for the first Radio 2 and 6 Music websites.

Prior to working at the BBC Tim worked for News International on the first internet additions of The Times, Sunday Times, Sun and News of the World.   Tim has also worked on the staff of All Souls Langham Place in London as the workplace minister.

You can find more about Tim on LinkedIn.