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Day one at the WOMMA School of WOM, and a key theme has already emerged … Advocacy.

It’s on the tips of everyone’s tongues - mentioned in every session yesterday.  What I took away …

• Advocacy is a marathon, not a sprint.  Takes true commitment.
• Scaling advocacy efforts are crucial to driving sustained WOM.
  
• Share everything that’s great about your organization (and even, in certain circumstances, what’s not so great) - the honesty and transparency will engender trust.
• You gain vocal advocates by focusing on people’s hearts/minds versus their eyeballs/ears.
• Desire + Direction = Change (per Dan Heath).  The path to success is to stir up that emotional desire ->  give people clear motivation to advocate on your behalf -> make the behavior visible to make it contagious.
  

Let’s see what day two brings …

Getting jazzed for the WOMMA School of WOM confab in Chicago (my hometown) on May 24-26.  A few thoughts and tips …

Sessions

The conference is packed with great sessions.  I’m seriously impressed.  A few I’m personally keen to catch …

• Jeffrey Hayzlett of Kodak speaks on Monday from 2pm-3pm.  You might know that Hayzlett recently announced he’s leaving Kodak, which could make for a very candid session.
• Also on Monday (4:30pm-5:15pm) , Pete Blackshaw and John Stieger lead a session on P&G’s customer relations efforts as a spark for WOM.  I’ve never met Blackshaw, and am looking forward to doing so.
• On Tuesday morning, Sarah Hofstetter and Roberto Mastracola deliver a case study on Coke Zero.  When Coke speaks, I listen.
• The Tuesday keynote is from Andrew Mason, CEO of Groupon.  These guys are darlings of the Chicago scene.  Very eager to hear what he has to say.
• Ogilvy’s very own Kaitlyn Wilkins will join Ford’s Marisa Bradley on Tuesday to talk about building a more social Ford Motor Company.  This is a topic near and dear to my heart; and knowing how passionate Kaitlyn is about her Ford work, I’m sure it’ll be a great discussion.
• Jason Anello of Yahoo will lead a session called “How 20 Purple Bikes Generated 20 Million Impressions.”  I’m a big Y! fan, and I’m really looking forward to hearing Jason deliver an overview of this program.

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Last week, I attended a webinar from WOMMA where WOMMA General Counsel Tony DiResta discussed the importance of disclosure across social media. This conversation normally focuses on brand-blogger relationships but the same best practices and government guidelines may also affect your Facebook Page.

Here are five things to keep in mind about your brand and disclosure on Facebook.

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At Stream, I helped facilitate a great session with Jory Des Jardins (co-founder of BlogHer) and Christine Cea (Director of Brand PR, Unilever) entitled After the One Night Stand – How To Get Beyond Buzz and Create Sustained WOM Programs. Our session focused on this challenge from three perspectives: the agency, the client, and the partner.

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One of the most useful free tools out there is Google Trends and I’m continually surprised by the innovative ways I see it used by my colleagues. Beyond the obvious function in SEM and SEO campaigns, the half of all internet users who are starting their session with a good Google must be giving use some other useful information. Google showcased this recently with their Flu Trends project and it got me thinking about other ways to bring the line graphs to life. Here are some of my favorite examples (including Quail Man) of interesting Google Trends and I ask you to add your own ideas and provide links in the comments.

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