We have several guest speakers confirmed for this season.

Please take a look at the 2009-2010 CRPRA Meeting Schedule and mark your calendars!

A note about Membership Rosters...

Going forward, CRPRA Membership Rosters will only be distributed electronically. Furthermore, only those persons who have attended a CPPRA meeting during the two most recent seasons will appear on our mailing list and membership roster. This fall, all persons listed on the roster will receive a PDF version of the roster via email. After that initial mailing, persons who are added to the roster will receive the PDF following the roster update and those currently listed on the roster may request a current copy anytime.

 
        by Eric Wylie

September 2009 Meeting: "Show Me the Money! - Monetizing Social Media"

The 34th season of CRPRA kicked off with a presentation from Dr. Lisa Van Allen, a personal, executive and business coach and social media strategist, who explained the importance of not just using social media to simply spread your name around, but where to post and how to know if your efforts are helping you make money.

A lot has been written and presented in recent months about the importance of jumping on the bandwagon of social media - which Van Allen defined simply as people interacting through text, photo and video postings online - but little has been said about how to quantify, and therefore justify, employing social media.

Van Allen explained that using social media is important for your business because it creates connections between you and people who could become customers or resources, plus it has the ability to increase your rankings on Google, the most popular search engine.

"Google loves social media," Van Allen said. "Post on YouTube. Tweet on Twitter. Host an online radio show. Get your name reserved on every site you can, so that you own it." And then, she advised, leverage the sites that make the most sense for you and your business.

Van Allen cautioned that posts on these sites should be business-centric if you're posting for your business social media account. Posting a tweet (a Twitter message) about wearing accidentally mismatched socks is less likely to attract a customer than a post about the great sock sale your store is having this weekend. But even the mundane can catch someone's eye...Van Allen shared a story about how her thoughtful post about a favorite Starbucks concoction made a connection with a reader, which led that person to her Web site.

For those who thought that social media was comprised of only Facebook and Twitter, Van Allen displayed a wide variety of stand-alone and integrated sites that target specific audiences and also supply tools that help simplify the 'work' of employing social media.

And of course, Dr. Van Allen explained how to measure the return on investment for utilizing social media. It is only through capturing data over time and analyzing trends that you will be able to tell how people flow from your social media sites to your company Web site and finally become paying customers. It's then that you will know more about which sites and what types of postings attract customers and show the boss that, yes, this social media thing can make the cash register ring.

Contact Dr. Lisa Van Allen through her Web site: www.vanallencoaching.com or search for her on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn...well, you get the idea!

Congratulations!

At the Professional Women's Network 30th Anniversary Celebration meeting, CRPRA attendee Sheila Semler was honored with the 2009 PWN Shining Star Award for outstanding performance and lasting contribution on the PWN Public Relations Committee & Embracing the Motto "Women Helping Women."