RECon ICSC 2011 Summary… Social Media!
Excerpts from Linear Retail blog post by Diana Podaski on June 06, 2011
Did you feel the buzz this year at ICSC RECon? Although I didn’t make it to the show last year, I was at the last three before that and 2011 had its own unique feel.
We all know the industry has taken a hit, but this year at ICSC you didn’t feel it as much, mostly due to everyone’s positive energy. The central and south halls were bustling with traffic, booths were clicking with iPads, the pretzel line was massive and you could keep track of everything going on via twitter. There were definitely some leading trends this year, largest of which I experienced was…
Social Media!
One of the hot topics this year was Social Media; even Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks was at the show speaking about it. Schultz mentioned to the large lunch audience on Tuesday, that no matter the business size, everyone needs to educate themselves and embrace social media. He also spoke largely about mobile technology and some new ways Starbucks was utilizing it. New this year, ICSC set-up various networking pavilions, one of which was specifically designated for Social Media. The booth was mostly orchestrated by Cohn Marketing, a marketing company out of Denver, and they really did a great job with it. Other companies that spoke were Walmart, Madison Marquette, Digitas, Loopnet, Blend Marketing and Developers Diversified Realty.
There were 22 sessions in “the theatre” as ICSC explained it, based around various social media techniques that were practical for the Shopping Center Industry. These sessions included everything from the basic Social Media 101 to blogging, crisis management-cleverly titled “Oh Sh#t” – YouTube, Mobile Marketing and Social Media ROI.
I had the pleasure of attending several social media seminars at the theatre and below are some key take-aways.
Crisis Management:
Put a crisis management plan in place, follow up with social media policies on your various websites. Don’t be mechanical, be REAL, address the situation publicly then take it off-line, stay on top of reviews and push negative comments off the page by posting positive ones.
Mobile Marketing:
Snap tag is old and outdated; the big technology on the forefront is NFC- Near Field Communication (yes, I am referencing Wikipedia) where you tap your phone to a unit to get information and to pay, Google Goggles – an app where you take a picture of anything and get information back on that item, Google Places -claim your business!
B2B /Retail Real Estate Marketing:
Ask your facebook fans which stores they think would be great at one of your centers (once you grow a good following), post a picture of a retail space on facebook with a stripe across it saying “Leased” or “Rented”, check out Center Social – Market Research for Shopping Center Social Media Programs, add vacant space on the ROFO application on Linkedin, add easy share buttons to pages on your website, follow @MallManager on twitter – he’s supposed to be hilarious, upload shopping center videos to Shopping Center Tube and find new tenants by using Yelp.
iPads!
iPads were a big hit this year. Our CEO and Partner-head of Leasing thoroughly enjoyed having their iPads as well as many others who attended the show. (Cool iPad video of someone using it at RECon.) This was the first year I’ve been to the show where people either had a rolling briefcase and/or iPad. I really didn’t see many hand-held 10lb 3-ring binders this year filled with uneven-sized demographic reports and fact sheets. ICSC even stepped up to create their own RECon app. I really liked the design but had problems searching for companies; for some reason it was always stuck on “Mexico” in the region search bar. Also new to the show were giant touch screens showing off the app – I didn’t see too many people using them but it was a great effort. What percentage of the 35,000+ people do you think will have an iPad at ICSC RECon next year?
