The Marketing Department at Madison College hosted its first Digital Marketing Summit on Feb. 20. The Goal of the Digital Marketing Summit was to bring together Madison College Marketing program students, future students currently in high school and business marketing professionals to learn about digital marketing.

“We wanted to showcase our Digital Marketing programs here at Madison College,” said Kristen Uttech, a marketing instructor at Madison College. “We had 600 people attend this event to hear our speakers, all whom are leaders in their industry.”

They had partnered with the Social Media Breakfast-Madison, as well as the American Marketing Association- Madison Chapters to bring this event to Madison College.  Marketing Student, Harry Dettinger, fully developed the event app that the attendees downloaded and used.

To make this event successful, the Marketing Department had to bring together an incredible line-up of speakers. This was only possible based on the professional contacts to outreach.

Keynote speaker, Suzanne Fanning, Word of Mouth Marketing Association, gave a talk about Social Media in 2015 and beyond. Fanning discussed why it is important to get people talking and how to approach marketing from a marketing perspective.

“Ninty-two percent of the consumers, worldwide, trust recommendations from friends and family more than any for advertising,” Fanning said. “Your strategy starts with people, not platform.”

Fanning also gave three questions for the students to answer when figuring out the target fans: Who are your fans? What are your fans? Why are they your fans?

“About one-fifth of your budget should be spent on social engagement,” Fanning said. “There are 25 billion conversations happening on social media.”

Why not take advantage of this high amount of participation?

Garrison Cummings, Digital Manager for the Green Bay Packers, offered the second Keynote Address on Creating a Winning Social Media Strategy. Cummings talked about who the people are whom you are reaching, how are you reaching them, and how to use this to your advantage.

“Social Media is Commitment,” Cummings said.  “The goal is to focus on the audience, content, and metrics to increase the audience reach/depth.”
Look at the personas and ask yourself: Is your fan a hardcore fan, casual fan or displaced fan?

When it comes to hard-core fans, “They are going to be creating our own value board; they are going to follow us around all year long,” Cummings said. “Casual fans will follow us until the end of the season. Displaced fans have different needs then hardcore fans, so we showcase how the fans are engaging.”

Cummings uses metrics to monitor social impact along with competitors.

“We get connected with our fans in a deep level, it’s amazing, and only benefits our fans,” said Cummings.

Melissa Johnson, from Shoutlet, presented information about Search, Social and Email. She helps build the relationships that build business through social media.

“We believe that the true value of marketing is in social media, and how we use that social media,” Johnson said.

She suggests that students align their social content strategy with their search strategy and email strategy.

“We always need to keep customers in mind,” Johnson said. “Make your content customer centric; offer the best answer to your customer in their stage of the customer journey.”

Madison College’s Marketing Department offers a Social Media Certificate and the Mobile Marketing Certificate. These are useful for already working professionals in marketing that are seeking to sharpen their skills in the Social Media and Mobil Marketing areas.  Several traditional students add these offerings onto their 2-year associates degree, which can differentiate themselves from the market.

New as of Fall 2015, the Marketing Department will be offering 34 credit, 1 year Marketing Diploma that will incorporate ‘cutting-edge’ digital marketing focusing on mobile, social, and e-commerce.

Check out the Madison College Twitter and Instagram feeds to find comments and information about what happened at the Digital Marketing Summit.