I'm Sarah Pullman and I'm blogging live from the session on distributed grassroots marketing. The speakers are Elisa Camahort, Tara Hunt, Chris Messina, and it's being moderated by Marnie Webb. I'm definitely not catching everything and it won't all be totally correct but I hope you'll forgive me and find it useful anyway. :)

Elisa Camahort of BlogHer Conference

Speaks about how they made the website badge for BlogHer, and people totally took them and ran with them. Made up all kinds of spin-offs.

You have to have credibility with your community before you can ask them to do things for you. If you don't incroporate their ideas, say why. Transparency and authenticity are key – and they're real.

A lot of their traffic comes from people who click through from the badges  – including the homemade spin-offs.

If you want to find people and bring them to your site, cause, community, you need to go out after them. You need to find the right person to go out after them. They won't come to you!

You have to consider the tone of what you're writing - inviting conversation rather than telling people how it is.

Bring in your constituents and start talking to them about how you can ripple your work outwards. Proactively invite people to participate.

Taking comments and turning them into blog posts is a great tactic for getting MORE conversation going on your blog. It shows your community that you're paying attention.

Tara: when people have met you face to face they have a much easier time stepping up and commenting. Being a part of the community you're serving is essential!

Elisa says she actually doesn't post that much on their blog, but she comments a lot.

BlogHer decided to be a kind of telephone book of women's blogs, though they didn't start out that way. They now have an extensive listing.

Grassroots marketing requires an element of proactivity. Who do you WANT to be involved? Start linking to them before you even meet them! They'll notice and then you can start engaging with them. They'll then decide whether you're someone they want to engage with.

BlogHer started Feb 2005, then had a conference in July, and then launched the new online community Jan 2006. So it's been a while and it took a while to build momentum.

They had to establish credibility in the community, and what they've done is all done with human energy.

Tara Hunt of Riya - Pinko Marketing

http://pinkomarketing.pbwiki.com/

Snakes on a Plane – has gone viral and isn't even out yet. Barely even has a website! A blogger made up a line for the lead actor, and it got so much buzz that the movie has gone and added it in. The movie studio has no say in what's happening online but they're happy about it!

Interesting phenomenon, that anyone with access to a computer and the internet can publish. This is great news for non-profits! We can all make news and work with our communities to do it.

Pinko Principle 1 - Maximize on inbound, rather than outbound, messages.

This turns traditional marketing on its head. You spend a lot of time tracking what others are saying about you, and interacting with it so it grows.

Major directional change when it comes to influence. Nowadays, amateurs and enthusiasts have the influence that the elite and the wannabes used to have.

Pinko Principle 2 - Be a community advocate, not a company evangelist

Take yourself into the community you're trying to serve, take the feedback from those using the product, and take them back to your organization/company.

You try to create passionate users - Kathy Smith's blog is a great resource.

Pinko Principle 3 – 100% Authenticity

Ex: Chevy Tahoe ads – in the end they co-opted it, and said that they expected it. So in the end, did that buzz help them, or not?

Pinko Principle 4 - Serve Niche Markets

The long tail refers to the millions of people who aren't in the key target market segments. Near the end of the long tail, you get under-represented audiences, and they're much easier to reach.

Pinko Principle 5 - Follow Open Source Principles

Open the design of your entire program up to your community. Linux is a great example of this.
Really listen to our community, and let them hijack where you're going.
Wikipedia has been built by the community it serves and it has grown tremendously.
Open up an API – let the developers take it and create tools for your community.
Blogging – huge.
Transparency – at every step.
We're so inundated with messages that most don't get through. So do you want to pay to create messages, or build solid communities?

You can be transparent about the lack of openness, if that's what's true. And you can set limits on things even as you're transparent.

Have a goal, but be open about having your tactics hijacked.

And this is all about trusting your community – which is hard! We've spent so many years feeling afraid of our competitors. But amazing things happen when you decide to trust!

What about your constituents that aren't online? How do you reach them?
The Pinko Marketing wiki has some inspiring examples of doing this.

Many online groups have offline meet-ups.  Community face-time is very important.

Chris: Puts a lot out there in terms of what he's doing, what he's thinking about, etc. This builds accountability because people can see that you're for real.
SpreadFirefox – People around the world stepped up and took ownership of this community – they all gave money and were able to take out newspaper ads for Firefox. This couldn't have happened if Mozilla had driven the effort.

Find the person who can actually sound passionate about what they're doing – that person should be blogging, talking to your community, getting them passionate. That might not be your marketing professional but there is probably one of them in your organization.

Barcamp – the willingness to be transparent, and to fail, has served them well. Do something that is high-quality and that you want to spread. Make sure you take care of your chosen group, even if it's just 20 people. They'll be your best advocates.

Question: What about social marketing that's actually dangerous, because it's either misinformed or malicious?

Spread Firefox encourages people to use their trademarks but within guidelines.

You need to be liberal, but at some point you might need to put your foot down as well.

Question for tomorow afternoon – how do you open yourself up so you can be used in ways that serve, and not in ways that harm??

The end!

(Hope that was helpful – I'm going to crosspost it on my personal blog, http://sarahpullman.com)