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.]

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.

We can also share with you the draft agenda and can confirm speakers will again include Greg Sterling, Seb Provencher, Perry Evans and many more. We also will have a fresh panel of Super Social SMBs who are crushing it, asking our favourite Super SMB alumni back and are panning a new academic keynote speech – that will bring some fresh and thought provoking insights.

As always, we would be happy to hear from anyone with suggestions for topics, proposals to speak and who may be interested in sponsoring what is destined to be another ground breaking event. We encourage people to just get in contact with us (Dylan or Simon).

Tickets will go on sale during the week of 22nd August and we will let people know via email, social media and this microsite once they are available.

LSS ’11 – Programme

We are in the midst of a dramatic Local transformation, enabled by Mobile and Social Media. This shift is changing the way we communicate and connect with each other and Local businesses. For the 3rd year running, Local Social Summit stands boldly at this intersection bringing together thought leaders to understand this shift and realise the opportunity it brings.

Here is a preview of key themes we will explore:

• Search vs. Social
• How do you use Facebook at Scale?
• The Daily Deals Space
• Real Time Web
• Super Social – Local SMB Case Studies 2011
• Can Social Media Be Outsourced?
• The Local Data Storm
• Innovation in Mobile Payments
• Big Brands Going Local Social

Please join us at Local Social Summit ’11 as we once again explore the intersection of Local and Social media.

Dates: 9-10 November 2011 (Wed and Thu)
Venue: Wallacespace St. Pancras, 22 Duke’s Road, WC1H 9PN London
Agenda: draft Agenda is here.

What can we say, we are Über excited to have Greg Sterling from Sterling Market Intelligence and Search Engine Land back at LSS. This year he will be opeing the day with a Keynote and also running the panel: “Facebook and Local. Will Facebook do for Local what it did for Games?”

Here’s the teaser for Greg’s opening keynote:

The Local Social Paradigm Shift

The local market is on fire, thanks in part to the rise of mobile. It’s also in a state of profound transition. Google is going after local consumers and advertisers with unprecedented focus. Social sites are driving an evolution of the way consumers access and interact with local businesses. And daily deal platforms inject a potentially disruptive element into tried and true local ad models.

The local market has never been more dynamic — or chaotic — for consumers but especially advertisers. We’re in the midst of a “paradigm shift” in local. Greg Sterling will identify critical trends that are shaping the future. He’ll also tell you who he thinks will win and who will lose in Local 2.0.

Panel: Facebook and Local. Will Facebook do for Local what it did for Games?
Leader: Greg Sterling, Screenwerk, Search Engine Land & Internet2Go
Join industry thought leaders discuss and debate the future impact of Facebook on local. What will this mean for incumbents, start-ups and local businesses? How will SMBs navigate the landscape and who will control the revenue models?

Panel: The Local Content Challenge: Making Wine from Water

Leader: Robin Allenson, InnerBalloons

Local business want their content to be up-to-date, rich and correct. Publishers want rich, accurate content to generate traffic and leads. Users want to be able to find, find out about and rate and review businesses. Surely, there has to be a better way? What does perfect local content look like today, tomorrow and in 2014?

We have also update the agenda – you can find v1.2 HERE and also on Scribd (for easy download).

To my knowledge only a small number of us have been closely tracking the Local Social Media intersection for a few years.  But since Dylan and I organised  the first Local Social Summit, it feels like the world has taken notice and Local Social is going mainstream.

The Week that was in Local Social

Below, are some of the main stories from last week that caught my attention.

Yelp gets funding of $100 million.  My opinion is that this funding was the plan all along and Yelp played Google to get a solid valuation: a dangerous game to be playing.  Greg Sterling interviewed Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppleman to get some more details on where that money will be going.  As the PR on the investment came out during the Apple iPad launch, Henry Blodget’s harsh headline was:  Yelp Wins Award For Dumbest Funding-Announcement Timing Ever.

AT&T to launch buzz.com.  From what I’ve read, sounds like it’s geared towards mobile and is a standard Local business ratings services with a question function, tied into a friends and family social graph.  What I like about this is that it’s innovation from an old school telco.

Twitter has rolled out Local Trends to everyone (& the API).  The obvious point is that 3rd party innovation will make something interesting out of this.  One possible use is utilising the Local Trends as a solid data source for BI over Local information to determine requirements for things like:  Emergency Services and Content.

Citysearch launches openweb distribution to Local content and ads.  This is a smart play and one the traditional IYPs or those with heavy destination site content and advertisers should be looking to lock down as a move globally.

Facebook are looking at building a Foursquare killer.  Whatever, but what is interesting (both Greg Sterling and Seb Provencher agree on this one) is the comment from Foursquare co-founder, Dennis Crowley, who:

fully expects Facebook and others to launch "check-in" functionality, making it [a] "commodity by the end of the year."

As I’ve said for a few months now, I’m not that interested in the checkin but I believe the checkout is where this trend needs to be heading.  Once that happens, then you’re going to see widespread SMB engagement and things will get interesting in the Local Social games niche.

In Seb Provencher’s required reading deck regarding the Perfect local media company of 2014, which was presented for the first time at Local Social Summit ‘09, checkin is listed as one of the standard features.  You can see the video of that lab session below.

Some more links from last week

• Foursquare’s New Frontier: Newspapers
• Beatbloggers recruited for Guardian Local project
• Localeze To Power Local Business Listings For Bing

Video of the Perfect Local Media Company from Local Social Summit ‘09

In true social media sharing style we have put all the presentations up on the LSS Slideshare account.

We think most attendees will agree that two of the highlighst for the day were the keynote presentations which you will find below… Video and audio podcasts to following a few days as well…

• Keynote: Making sense of the networked audience: The case of Facebook
  - Dr. Bernie Hogan is a Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute

• Keynote: Decoding Generation Y: Who really has digital friends? – Robert Barnard, Founder of Decode

Mobile – The Future of Apps is Bright
This panel is all about apps – in particular social and local apps (and some mapping which is of course a key part of local)… Phones started out as social devices – we made voice calls. Then we had SMS (text) and then email (think Blackberry). Now we have smart phones, iPhones and Gphones – personal mobile devices. What does the present and future hold for “local social” on Mobile? How does the rise of the iPhone and emergence of Android change the game? We will examine the fast growth of and impact of applications (and app stores). We may also see some wicked demos, discuss new business models and view what an ‘augmented’ real local world might look like.
Moderator: Greg Sterling, Internet/Mobile Analyst
Panel/Demos:

• Claudia  Poepperl, Founder & CEO at adaffix/Yellix
• James Brown, CTO Cloudmade
• Miriam Warren, Regional Director Yelp
• Rob Hinchcliffe, UK Community Manager Qype.com

Our new panelist from Qype is Rob – here’s his bio:

Rob Hinchcliffe has been messing about on the internet since the mid-90s. In 2003 he founded the capital-centric blog Londonist, which he edited for two years. In that time Londonist became one of the most widely read blogs in the country, was nominated for a number of awards (and even won a couple), and was voted one of the top 10 most influential blogs in the UK. Rob left Londonist in 2006 to take over as Editor of Yahoo UK News, but after 18 months he decided it was time to get back to the excitement of the startup environment and joined the user-generated reviews site Qype.com where he works as their UK Community Manager.

At dinner last night we had a lively and interesting discussion with both Seb and Greg Sterling about this topic. The general consensus was that most traditional local media companies are quickly running out of time to start planning for their future. Greg also blogged about our discussion earlier today.

Here’s the presentation Seb will run through during the lab tomorrow: