Social Media Week Toronto – The ROI Discussion

Registration opens up today for the Toronto edition of Social Media Week – an international “conference” that takes place in a variety of cities across the globe. It’s not your typical conference, though. Instead, individuals and organizations of all types and sizes can create and host an event, as long as it has to do with social media. Social Media Week helps with event planning and coordination, but you’re on your own for the content and venue.

This will be the fourth Social Media Week where I will attend events, and the second one where VIA Rail will host an event. In September 2011, I worked with an amazing team to create the event “Brands, Agencies and Influencers – Unite!”. I wanted to host an event that would benefit anyone and everyone, regardless of their personal and professional background. Whether you’re an influencer looking for content opportunities, a brand hoping to increase your user-generated content or visibility with a niche group, or an agency trying to find the right creative and cultural match between these two groups, we all need to think about how to approach these partnerships, and how to leverage them using social media.*

This year, I focused on a hot topic in social media – Return on Investment (ROI). By partnering with The Fairmont Royal York Hotel, we are happy to host four amazing speakers on the subject, each with their own personal, professional and (perhaps) controversial views. We’ll hear about how these speakers define ROI in social media, what metrics they consider when creating programs or campaigns, and what they think the future of social media ROI looks like.

I’m also excited to be organizing a pre-event train ride to host a group of social media influencers from Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa and Kingston. We’ll be discussing a wide range of topics as we travel to Toronto, and feed all of our thoughts into the event hashtag #SMWTOroi.

Social Media ROI: Myth or Reality? will take place on February 13th, in the Fairmont Royal York’s Imperial Room, with a reception at 5:30 PM and speeches starting at 6:30 PM. To ensure that anyone can attend the event in Toronto, we’re making it free, though capacity is limited. As of 10 AM E.S.T this morning, you can sign-up and secure your place!

What would you like to ask our panel of speakers about social media ROI? Let me know in the comments!

* We also organized this event to set some benchmarks to measure against future initiatives – come back tomorrow when I share some of the results.