Social Media, WOMMA, NST, and Wine Wednesday: Hawt.

I’ll drink to that

What better way to spend a Wednesday evening after work than with high-energy industry peers, downing wine, great food, and networking among professionals? A diverse and peppy crowd of marketing, public relations, and media types came together on August 24, 2011, at Proper Gastro Pub in PETCO Park for Wine Wednesday, a follow-up event to the annual San Diego Social Media Symposium.

Nuffer, Smith, Tucker —a prominent and highly social public relations firm —hosted the event on behalf of Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA), a non-profit dedicated to “advancing and advocating the discipline of credible word of mouth marketing.” Wine Wednesdays are part of a series of WOMMA social gatherings intended to bring together industry folk to share ideas and have a generally awesome time talking —in person!

Now before this turns into a long-winded press release, let me stop myself and get to the good points. After attendees had a chance to mingle and enjoy a first round of wine, NST President Bill Trumpfheller presented the keynote. Some major highlights:

• A large majority of effective word-of-mouth communication and marketing nowadays is still done offline (according to Pew Research)
• Many people who are increasingly active communicating via social media and most young people have a vastly different understanding of privacy, if at all, than folks of an older generation
• QR codes are still hot and yet still aren’t being used creatively enough
• Augmented reality is an upcoming communications tool which may transform not only geospatial marketing but travel and tourism as well
• Payment system companies are working closely to integrate with location-based social networks; Check-in at a restaurant via Foursquare and pay for dinner in the same app!
• The quality of marketed sales deals may be less attractive to consumers than the level of engagement with the businesses themselves
• Of course, customer service can make or break your entire social media campaign

Brief photo gallery of the event: