The two-day 140 Character Conference just wrapped up! Amazing speakers from all walks of life, from CMOs, startup CEOs and news anchors/producers to ex-convicts, musicians, lawyers, daddy bloggers, the homeless, and educators, have all graced the stage at 92Y.  The reoccurring themes at this year’s conference included crowdsourcing, social good, authenticity, innovation and transmedia. I’ve compiled key marketing-related takeaways (each) in 140 characters or less:

• Customer Engagement
  • Two-way conversation and authenticity are crucial in being successful in social media
  • Engaging customers in physical activities engages 60% of the brain, not just 10%
  • Scale relationships, not audiences
  • It’s not about you, it’s about them. Start talking to customers who love you & learn about them, & they’re more likely to listen
  • Playboy’s key to success in social media is exclusivity! They use social to provide an inside look at Playboy, feedback, and more
  • Consumers will purchase from companies who invest more in customer engagement
  • Emotionally relevant content creates customer engagement
  • Engaging consumers with content is no longer enough; creating intimate relationships is more important now
  • Brands must have an open mind and share things about the brand with consumers in order to impact their decisions
• Customer Service
  • Customer service is all you got. You have to learn about the likes and dislikes of your customers and cater to that
  • 68% of Turbo Tax customers are more likely to complete their taxes after getting help from their Twitter handle
  • Only 10% have heard from the brand after remarking on negative shopping experience
• Location-based Networks
  • Foursquare is still trying to answer the question, “How can Foursquare can be used with consumer brands?”
  • Foursquare hints that the location-based network will begin experimenting with daily deals
  • The future in 4sq is unlocking real tangible goods based on influence with masses
  • What’s the worth of badges on 4sq? Having social media icons on billboards? Ridiculous! So what if you’re on FB? So is everyone
• Social TV
  • 56% use the Internet when they watch TV, 40% use social networks
  • It’s nice to have Facebook fans, Twitter followers, but if that does not translate into viewers and Nielsen ratings, nothing matters.
  • There are roughly 1.65 billion likes on tv shows
• Internal organization
  • Brands need to be openly organized and invest in their own employees–the cheapest media you can buy

Fun stats:

• 40% have remarked on negative shopping experiences while 46% remarked positive experiences, 18% used Facebook, 8% use Twitter
• Facebook reaches 73% of the US online population per month

Great quotes:

“Be one thing. Let your cause be one thing, one story and let people share that one thing” – @lizstrauss

“You want your ‘onlinelity,” personality and your brand to be cohesive.” – @alissasheley

“Don’t be honking just to honk; ask yourselves what you can be initiator of, the father of the big idea” – @themarketingguy

“We need a different kind of CMO now, not a chief of marketing officer, but like Seth Godin says, ‘a chief movement officer’” – @hankwasiak

“We used to buy consumers’ eyeballs, now we are buying consumers’ minds, souls & friendships.” – @hankwasiak

“Top 100 people on Twitter are TV! Producing compelling content on Twitter is not enough!” – @tijuanajackson

You can catch more information on the #140conf by following me on Twitter @irinaskaya