Amongst a couple of others, I was asked yesterday on Twitter for a recommendation for where to get a decent cup of coffee near Victoria Station.  Influential UK foodie blogger, Young and Foodish, replied with Flat Cap Coffee, which was new to me.  As I’m a burgeoning coffee geek, I decided to add it to the Google Map I’m building to track good coffee bars in London   Here’s where it gets interesting:

Google Search brings back, for me, the Foursquare venue page as first result (see image below):

From going to Foursquare, I get a map, some tips and the official Twitter account @flatcapcoffeeco.

I then go to Google Maps to add it to my map and nothing.  Actually, this is an awful results set

Ok, it’s inconclusive and I’m in a rush but interesting none the less because of the following:

1. Twitter was used for what I call an over the fence request ahead of Search
2. Twitter replied with somewhere I hadn’t heard of and looked good
3. Google hadn’t heard much of it, other than bringing back results from Foursquare, Twitter and Blogs
4. It was nowhere near Google Maps

So, actually I think I’m going to stick with my title as at least in the example Local Social whooped Local Searches ass.  Agree, disagree, got some more examples?

Local Social Summit is very excited that Stephen Leighton owner of leading UK coffee roaster, Has Bean, has agreed to come speak at LSS@Social Media Week on 4th February 2010.

We are planning to have a conversation with Steve about how as an artisan coffee roaster he is utilising a proliferation of Social Media channels to build engagement with his customers and the coffee community in general.

In reality, we’re fanboys of Steve (and without saying the amazing coffee Hasbean brings back to the UK) and would be happy if he just comes along and shares his wonderful passion for coffee and with that his direct trade approach with growers (actually, here’s hoping we get some of that because when you think about it, that’s still Local Social).  Regardless of what Steve talks about, our hope is that those who come along to LSS@Social Media Week will agree with us by the end of the evening when we say, we believe Stephen Leighton is coffee’s rising answer to Gary Vee.

To get a taste of why we think that, here’s a video from In My Mug, Steve’s weekly video show:

To fully get an understanding of how Steve is using Social Media in furthering the success of Hasbean, we suggest you:

• Read his blog
• Follow him on Twitter
• Check out the photo stream on Flickr
• Watch episodes of In My Mug or check out the Hasbean Vimeo channel
• Not forgetting the Hasforum

You can read more about the LSS@Social Media Week event by clicking here.  Go to the eventbrite microsite or start the booking process below:

LSS@Social Media Week:  The Science of Social Media

It could be said that most people have faith that Social Media is more than a new hype bubble. While faith alone isn’t a bad thing, we plan to add some reason as we explore the Science of Social Media

LSS@Social Media Week is brought to you by:

Confirmed Speakers:

• Dr. Bernie Hogan from the Oxford Internet Institute – Bernie will taking time out from his busy teaching and media schedule to present his latest research into the emerging issue of social information overload and effective methodologies for leveraging online interactions and new media in everyday life.
• Stephen Leighton owner of Has Bean Coffee: http://www.hasbean.co.uk/ – A conversation with the up and coming UK and coffee’s answer to Gary Vaynerchuk (Wine Library and Crushit)
• Paul McCrudden - from Imagination & #6weeks fame, will share insights and knowledge from how consumers are interacting with brands
• Carolyn Watt, Founder and Managing Director of Yabber, Profero’s digital PR and social media division will be presenting an exciting case study

When: Thursday, 4th February 2010, 6:30pm-8:30pm
Where: The Hospital Club (http://www.thehospitalclub.com/)

Social Media Week: The second annual conference will take place between February 1st – 5th, 2010 simultaneously in New York City, Berlin, London, San Francisco, Toronto and São Paulo. The five day conference will explore the profound impact that social media has on culture, business communications and society at large.

More Details & Register:

For more details click here to go to the event page and you can get your tickets through the eventbrite ticket microsite.

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.

• Mobile panel is now 11.40am
• Local Gets Social is now 2.10pm
• Local Content & Monetisation is now 3.50pm

All times are GMT. Full schedule see below…

Carolyn Watt is the Managing Director of Profero’s Social Media and Digital PR business unit.

She is responsible for heading up Profero’s social marketing offering adding core competency around digital PR consultancy, social marketing strategy and implementation, blogger relations and community management, advocacy programs, content creation and brand reputation management, online buzz tracking and analytics.

She was formerly Mindshare’s Head of SEO, Digital PR and Social Media, leaving the WPP agency in October 2009 to launch this new Profero digital PR and conversational marketing division as a key part of its digital solutions offering.

Carolyn set up Mindshare’s search engine optimisation (SEO), digital PR and social marketing division in April 2008 incorporating online brand positioning, SMO, SEM, analytics and tracking technologies as well as the design and creation of digital content. She has worked with some of the biggest clients in the business including LG, Volvo, HSBC, 3, Talk Talk, IBM, ITV, Unilever, Nestle, Ford, Jaguar and Land Rover.

She has nine years experience in strategic and tactical marketing, PR and communications (both digital and offline) including the previous Client Services Director at Netrank Ltd both pre and post Netrank’s January 2008 acquisition by LBi. She was also the Strategic Marketing Manager for Intel’s first foray into services, and has managed the PR
and marketing for a range of American and British IT and comms companies. She also worked part-time as a party agent for one of the UK’s main political parties, conducting research, editing reports,canvassing and writing speeches for MPs.

This combines with five years experience as a print, digital and broadcast journalist writing, editing and presenting news and features for a range of TV, radio and print media including the Guardian, The Sunday Times, Voice of America, GMTV, BBC Radio Five Live, CNN, Sky and Channel 4.

She has a BA Hons in Politics, NCTJ accredited (National Council for the Training of Journalists) and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM).

Specialties:

• Digital marketing strategy across global markets
• Natural search strategy and Project Management
• Digital PR Consultancy and Project Management
• Social media campaigns – definition and implementation.
  Blogger relations and community management
• Content creation
• Brand reputation management
• Technical SEO Consultancy
• Competitive benchmarking
• Training & Workshops Reporting, tracking and analytics consultancy

Local Social Summit Speaker Biography Footnote: As set out in this post, our policy is to publish Speaker Biographies as is.

Anton Grutzmacher – Director of Custom Data Products UK

Anton Joined Experian Hitwise in Aug 2001 and has been a member of the senior management team for the last 4 years.

Anton spent the last 3 years as Head of Client Services where he was responsible for client retention and revenue growth across the UK business. Anton has been a major contributor to the development of the Experian Hitwise proposition over the last 8 years and has recently moved into a new role as the Director of Custom Data Products in the UK. Anton is responsible for identifying and developing new opportunities for data integration and product development by working with other Experian businesses and external data providers.

Local Social Summit Speaker Biography Footnote: As set out in this post, our policy is to publish Speaker Biographies as is.

James is currently responsible for overseeing the development of BBC Local, the BBC’s online news and information service across the UK, and location services across BBC Online including mapping and location based technology.

He spent four years as Assistant Editor for the local ‘Where I Live’ websites in England and has worked on many new initiatives for the development of news gathering operations and enhancing BBC journalism output on new platforms, including the increasingly role of user-generated content.
He has been working in regional and local broadcasting in the UK since 1998, initially as a strategy analyst covering the audience reporting and strategic positioning of regional television and local radio services across England.

Local Social Summit Speaker Biography Footnote: As set out in this post, our policy is to publish Speaker Biographies as is.

Andrew Burke is CEO of Amino Technologies Plc which specialises in digital entertainment solutions for IPTV, Internet TV and in-home multimedia distribution.  He has overseen the acquisitions of AssetHouse, digital proposition management experts, and Tilgin’s IPTV set-top box division. Andrew is Chairman of Crisp Thinking and a non-executive director at the IT Forum Foundation. Previously, he was CEO BT Entertainment where he devised and ran the company’s IPTV initiative (BT Vision), chaired their Premium Rate Services activity, pioneered their Digital Media Services and led BT’s relationships with the media world.  Prior to that, Andrew was Director Online Services and responsible for all value-added services developed to complement Broadband in the UK. Before BT, Andrew was founder & CEO of eVerger, an eMarketing focussed venture fund created in 2000 by Aegis Group, and Warburg Pincus, which together committed $100m to the venture.  Previously, Andrew was COO of eVentures, the Internet incubator owned by News Corporation and Softbank, founder and CEO of LineOne, the Internet service provider now known as Tiscali UK, and established News International’s initial Internet presence back in 1994.

Local Social Summit Speaker Biography Footnote: As set out in this post, our policy is to publish Speaker Biographies as is.