Top 5 2011 Conferences for Social Media
Marketing conferences give the pulse of what’s going on in the industry. They update you on what you missed during the year and help you identify what you should tell your customers. For others, those events elevate the channel over the objective.
We would love to go to all of them but it has become impossible as there are too many and we’re all too busy.
So we need to pick the right one. Social Media can provide an unbiased insight into the popularity and nature of each of them.
We ranked the following conferences by volume of conversations:
- SXSW
- Blogworld
- Womma
- LeWeb
- Pivot
Our analytics are based on the last 6 months of conversations produced by the top 2000+ influencers in Social Media (english speaking). Therefore the bulk of conversations from SXSW show in March 2011 does not count in this analysis. SXSW is ranked number one by a long shot.
Here are the important dates:
- August 16th, 2011: grand opening of SXSW PANELPICKER 2012 (the event is held in March)
- Sept 22nd, 2011: WOMMA Talkable Brands Exchange
- October 17-18th, 2011: Pivot 2011
- Nov 16-18th, 2011: WOMMA Summit 2011
- Nov 3-5tth, 2011: BlogWorld LA 2011
- Dec 7-9th, 2011: LeWeb 2011
Below are the word clouds featuring the top 50 expressions used when one of the conference is mentioned. Click to zoom in:
The text version of those expression clouds is available below, where I highlighted a few expressions to see how the keywords are ranked. The ones on the top of the list have high occurrence.
A couple of interesting notes by looking at how expressions rank for each conference (one color per expression):
- ‘Social Media’ (obviously), ‘Marketing’ (obviously) and ‘Business’ appear at the top of everyone’s concerns.
- ‘Brands’ issues are a top priority for Pivot attendees.
- Platforms (i.e. Twitter, Facebook,…) are not a primary concern for Blogworld people but rank fairly high among LeWeb attendees.
- ‘Influence’ is only discussed by people mentioning Pivot.
- ‘ROI’ & ‘Measurement’ are only talked about at WOMMA.
# |
BlogWorld |
Pivot |
SXSW |
LeWeb |
WOMMA |
1 | social media | social media | social media | social media | social media |
2 | blogworld & new media expo | marketing | sxsw | social | word of mouth |
3 | blogworld | pivot conference | year | new | word of mouth marketing |
4 | blog | rise of the social consumer | new | company | womma |
5 | new media expo | social consumer | marketing | social networks | word of mouth marketing association |
6 | time | brands | time | leweb | marketing |
7 | marketing | social advertising | south by southwest | social media marketing | |
8 | new | business | work | marketing | brand |
9 | social media marketing | consumers | help | community manager | |
10 | los angeles | social networks | business | le web | social media monitoring |
11 | business | new | brand | web | public relations |
12 | content | social media marketing | event | social business | business |
13 | year | brian solis | company | social media policy | |
14 | expo in los angeles | new york | world | business | new |
15 | conference | share | climb the social business hierarchy | womma summit | |
16 | blogworld expo | time | social networks | time | share |
17 | new york | advertising | social media marketing | app | code of ethics |
18 | event | networks | year | time | |
19 | video | year | content | brands | companies |
20 | social networks | social marketing | conference | social business hierarchy | social networks |
21 | share | work | blog | content | |
22 | work | panel | share | help | |
23 | company | customers | create | users | social media roi |
24 | brand | trends in social advertising survey | day | social media marketing | work |
25 | help | content | well | social media crises | blog |
26 | bloggers | state of social | blog | social media week | |
27 | world | companies | great | work | customers |
28 | great | share | new york | report | social media measurement |
29 | social media business summit | engagement | ideas | change | best practices |
30 | well | week | online | discusses | best |
31 | blogworld expo in los angeles | steve jobs | customers | george colony | measurement |
32 | qr codes | change | comments | social media club | manager |
33 | week | ad | connect | conference | community |
34 | online | state of social marketing | community | show | |
35 | social media club | new york city | san francisco | well | video |
36 | day | digital | vote | social media in europe | online |
37 | presentation | products and services | presentation | video | womma summit 2011 |
38 | expo | experience | new york times | world | social media today |
39 | influence | sxsw interactive | services | provide | |
40 | san francisco | world | network | jeremiah owyang | engagement |
Well, if you are interest in social media ROI or ROI Measurement discussions, WOMMA is probably your conference.
Contact us with your interest and we’ll look up which conference you should spend your time in: conversation+conference@ecairn.com
How will you pick a conference in 2012?

For my industry (wedding) it was the Get Engaged Tour.