Mar 23, 2009
Communicators Conference in Las Vegas
Did you ever see someone blend a yard rake in a normal functioning kitchen blender? I know you’re probably thinking, yeah right! This is a true story. While attending the Social Media for Communicators Conference in Las Vegas I saw just that. Interested? www.willitblend.com.
Besides blending, the CEO of Zappos, Tony Hsieh also attended the conference and gave a great presentation on what Zappos is all about. According to Hsieh, the ultimate aim of the Zappos brand is to be the very best when it comes to customer service and consumer experience.
Hsieh firmly believes in creating a ‘wow’ experience for the customer and investing in a corporate culture that allows employees freedom and space. “If you get the culture right, then most of the other stuff, like great customer service or building a brand will just happen naturally”, said Hsieh. Zappos has formalized the definition of its culture into ten core values and employees are hired and fired based on those values. The company culture is different because it is not driven by the CEO or Management, but the employees who themselves determine how they want the culture to evolve.
Needless to say, Zappos has Sundance Vacations CEO Tina Dowd in a frenzy and willingly changing the corporate culture at Sundance Vacations. Just check out the corporate intranet!
Gosh, this conference sounds more like a seminar for women. With blenders and shoes, one would think. But, it was actually very fulfilling and taught me a lot about all the different types of social media, blogging, vlogging, and tweeting. I learned a lot about web strategy and building a successful brand for Sundance Vacations. Also about building an online newsroom, which is currently in the works. Don’t worry, this isn’t the last you’ll hear of social media. Pretty soon I have a feeling Sundance Vacations CEO Tina Dowd will be tweeting from the moon!
The conference was presented by Ragan Communications and the Public Relations Society of America. The conference was held at the Encore at Wynn Las Vegas.
What companies have you been impressed by? What impressed you most?
A few years ago, I was remodeling my home. I spent quite a bit of time visiting Home Depot. I found out some interesting things about Home Depot’s business model. One of things that caught my attention was an award system called “Help Buttons”. Employees were awarded with buttons, which they wore on their smocks, for receiving positive verbal or written recognition from customers. I thought it was a great idea as most often people who are unsatisfied have no problem sitting down to write a complaint letter, but it’s not often when one receives good service that they take the time to write about it. Good service is expected! Therefore the Home Depot employees who’s letters were displayed near the front of the store deserved the recognition and awards as they must have really “WOW’d” the customer with outstanding service.
By the way what is “vlogging” and “tweeting”?
Candy,
Vlogging is Video Blogging. We are going to be doing some very soon, so stay tuned!
Tweeting comes from Twitter. Whenever you post your status or other post to you, we call it “tweeting”. Interested? http://twitter.com/sundance91
Any more questions?