Social Media Marketing, Lifestyle, and Traveling
Subscribe by email:

Connect With Me...




Have You Read ...


  • Razorfish Report, Influence of Social Media on Buying Decisions
    Razorfish released an interesting survey called, Feed: The Razorfish Consumer Experience which talks about the influence of social media on buying decisions.Â...

    Read Article »

    • Free Ebooks Because I Love You

    Social Media for Authors

    Twitter for Business 101

    Panel Discussion at Web 2.0, Everyone Agrees?!

    Posted: April 28, 2008 • Filed under: Social Media Marketing

    If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed to get the latest posts, Thanks for visiting! If you want to link to me or this post please read how to link to me

    Don’t get me wrong I had a great time at the expo and met a lot of great people. However, one thing that really irked me was some of the panel discussions. Let’s take the facebook marketing best practices panel. I do not remember all 4 panelists and the companies they represented but I think one of them was Avenue A. Jeremiah Owyang (from Forrester) was the moderator and did a good job.

    So there I am sitting in a room full of people listening to Jeremiah ask some interesting questions about best practices and strategies for facebook marketing. Now I am sitting there thinking that these 4 companies must have 4 different strategies, 4 different opinions, and 4 different methodologies…boy was I wrong. Most of the questions that Jeremiah asked were responded to with either identical answers or head nods from the panel members. Now I am sure the folks up there were smart and qualified, but do I really want to go to a panel where everyone just agrees with each other? I go to a panel to here a difference of opinion, I want disagreement, I want to hear differentiation. You cannot possible expect me to believe that all 4 of the speakers up there, all have the exact same ideas and ways for doing things.

    If you are going to have a group of 4 panelists act as one person, then why not just have one person present the topic? Jeremiah could have easily answered his own questions (and in fact did at one point). It was just a bit frustrating to hear the same thing over and over again from the panel members. I hope that the next panel discussion I attend will actually have panel members who DISAGREE with each other. I am not saying they need to argue with one another and start throwing chairs at one another (that would be entertaining) but, it would be nice to hear them debate a little bit, don’t you think?

    Would you want to go to a panel discussion where everyone agrees with each other?

    Thanks for reading everyone

    Thanks for Reading!

    If you want to link to me or this post please read how to link to me

    Follow me on Twitter

    Connect with me on Linkedin

    Connect with me on Facebook

    17 Total TweetBacks: (Tweet this post)
    • en: isn't sure if she likes tweetboard on her blogs or not http://posted.at/UAo 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: @ThatGreenGent YESH! Invites, invites. But let's do it tomorrow, or after I sleep, because I'm too tired to not cry if my laptop acts evil. 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: I have to wake up by 10am or else my mom would get mad. Fuck insomnia :( 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: Twitter: What are you doing? (: just watched a Michael Jackson special... Wow.. I love him though.. Always have(: well since i was 9 or 10(: 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: @ikkhan agree climax or the last part was dragging - otherwise good, especially the lower arm jab by optimus. 07/03/09 09:04am
    • nl: @Brenkin warm or HOT? 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: My Matey has been polishing his boots for an hour and a half. He has not showered or shaved yet. Two hours til we catch the train 07/03/09 09:04am
    • : Tape it or something? 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: Dare to be different too whether your looking your best or looking a mess your bound to look like something 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: Life is about making choices: right or wrong, good or bad, hope or despair, love or hate. Sometimes the choices are clear, at times not. 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: waiting for @theJheG or @chii18... 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: @BobbyDorito you doing it or watching it? - lunch today? Currie and I are meeting at 1230? 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: Saying some baby words consistently. Like "Ahhh" or "Ehhhh" or "Heyyyy". Also learning to walk with support. I'm growing 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: No more electricity or hot water in the flat...I managed to get them back! I'm getting better at these stuff ^^Shopping with coop, then cine 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: hungry but getting food soon. sleepy but getting sleep soon (in maybe 6 hours or so..) bored but seeing friends soon. lucky eh? 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: Close the door bed or floor I cnt get enough of u... 07/03/09 09:04am
    • en: @taxidesign Do you have a server, location from where I can FTP or HTTP download? 07/03/09 09:04am
    Share and Enjoy:
    • Digg
    • StumbleUpon
    • Technorati
    • del.icio.us
    • Reddit
    • TwitThis
    • Facebook
    • Google
    • Ma.gnolia

    If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

    Viewing 2 Comments

      • ^
      • v
      Two things:
      a. I now realize that to get a more dynamic panel discussion the moderator needs to be in contact with each panelist well in advance and get the wheels rolling towards a debate rather than a "what he/she said" session
      b. everyone needs to know the rules of engagement - I was at one session where a panelist tried to get a bit of a debate going and the person he engaged with took serious umbrage, so the rest of the session had a negative, not a productive, tension - think world championship wrestling not a pub fight
      • ^
      • v
      Hi Des,

      You are quite correct. After the panel discussion I spoke with Jeremiah and told him that he should have almost made the panelists feel uncomfortable. I would have looked at all four of the panelists square in the eyes and said, "you're kidding right? you can't all be doing the exact same thing here."

      There is nothing wrong with some friendly debate, I mean everyone has an opinion. Panelists should expect to engage in some sort of a debate, if they are that thin skinned that they get offended at the sign of confrontation then they either have no idea what they are talking about, or should not be sitting at the panel table with the big boys.

      Knowing the rules of engagement is definitely a good idea, but I like to push the envelope :)
    close Reblog this comment
    Powered by Disqus · Learn more
    blog comments powered by Disqus