November 2008

With 200+ people already signed up, we expect a full house at our Nov. 6 luncheon program with Patrick Crane, so please register soon.

Patrick has been graciously engaging the 159 members of BMA Chicago’s LinkedIn Group, soliciting questions about LinkedIn to cover on Nov. 6. Check it out and share your questions about LinkedIn with him.

If you don’t have a LinkedIn profile, or would like help to improve it and maximize its discoverability, sign up for one of the free coaching sessions LinkedIn is offering on Nov. 6. Please register even sooner, though, as there is limited availability.

If you can stay around after lunch, don’t miss the special 90-minute drill-down session, from 1:45-3:15 p.m., when LinkedIn’s Steve Patrizi will go into much more depth on how b-to-b marketers can use LinkedIn to collaborate and connect with other professionals, do contact discovery, recruit talent and even advertise.

Catch a RoundTable Soon!
If you haven’t yet attended one of our monthly Breakfast RoundTables yet, consider doing so. October’s RoundTable on writing value propositions drew this reaction from attendee Bill Moller: “George Stenitzer was a SMASH! Are all the meetings this good??!”

Unlike our MarketingMasters Luncheons, which are speaker-focused, our RoundTables are topic-focused and usually have more of an interactive feel and format. Attendance is growing, too, with a new high of 66 people present this past Wednesday at our RoundTable on emerging social media led by Edelman’s Steve Rubel.

In fact, Steve Rubel got some pretty great immediate feedback of his own, from new-member Jeff Carrigan, who told us, “The Edelman speaker was terrific, accommodations were comfortable and the professionals and students I encountered were warm.”

Important News on Event Registration!
BMA is converting this month to a new member database system, Computility, and we want you to be aware of one change.

Even if you have registered for past BMA events, the very next time you register, you will be asked to create an account. This step will enable us to better track what events you are attending and have attended.

Despite a little extra up-front work, here’s the benefit for you: You will no longer have to enter contact information each time you sign up for an event.
So far the system is working well, but please give us your feedback as you begin to use it.

Other News and Announcements
Congratulations to Tom Tarr, owner of TomTheWordsmith, who won our September New Member Contest and a set of Cubs-Brewers tickets.

Congrats also to Debra Brinkman, marketing manager at Arthur J. Gallagher Risk Services, for winning our September Referral Contest and a free Table for 10 at an upcoming MarketingMasters Luncheon of her choice.

And, congrats to Hewitt Associates, for winning our September Corporate Contest and a free Table for 10 at an upcoming MarketingMasters Luncheon of their choice for adding four new members to the BMA rolls.

Thanks to Reggie Riley, I wanted to pass on news that The Wall Street Journal, a longtime BMA sponsor, has just completed a massive market segmentation study that should be of interest to all b-to-b marketers. You can download a one-page preview of the study here.

Lastly, if you are not already a member of BMA, please consider joining today. You can join or register for BMA programs through the BMA Web site.

All the best,