Sessions has a year-round (3 semesters) enrollment model, graduation certificates that are presented monthly and classes that can be enrolled in anytime for enrolled students.  So his use is everyday for the various tools Session employs (blog, micro-blog and social networks) to connection to the audience.

What’s the biggest obstacles for the growth of social media presence for Sessions?  Scott says ‘patience’, he sees the the education product characteristics is not the commodity of a fast moving consumer good with a low price point.  His effort is to get subscribers to engage in all areas in a way that they appreciate and have a value associated with the Sessions brand.

Scott has determined that for Sessions, there is a way to use social media to establish a lifetime value with the audience – education is pretty much a one-shot sale in most cases.  The maturation of the relationship allows a prospect for Session.edu to become a student, attend classes and graduate into the business community.  At some point he can trust alumni to evangelize the Sessions.edu product and he does not find that they need to scrub or moderate content.

Community members come to the Sessions presence on Facebook, he has to be sensitive that they may all come for different reasons; some are prospects and others are graduates – it’s why the Facebook audience gets a cultural message in that channel and not a selling message.  They do then migrate the graduate user base to another social network, one more business oriented.

What does Scott identify as key tactics to designing a successful social media presence? 

• Quality vs. quantity needs to be a central objective 
• Sincerity is important
• It’s called social media for a reason, business need not abuse the trust the consumers gives you 
• Be persistent – social media is not a set and forget proposition
• Tactically, don’t over think it – get the content out there, do a soft launch and get started

Play / Download Scott Chappell / Session College Episode 2 Podcast Here

You can find Session College at Sessions.edu and Scott is available at scott@sessions.edu.

This is the final episode of the two part podcast with Scott Chappell.  Guy Powell and I want to thank him; we appreciate his perspective and taking the time to share it with us in our podcast interview!

Here are links to material related to the interview that you may find useful; the entire conversation in one extended recording and soon, a transcript of the conversation

Play / Download Scott Chappell / Sessions College Entire Episode Podcast Here

Read / view the Scott Chappell / Sessions College Podcast Transcript at Scribd.com

We’re very interested in your perspective on the topic and, if you have a favored presenter or person who can add to the conversation, please let us know – we’re looking to interview him / her and put it up here!

Thank you again to you our listeners – hope you enjoyed the effort and work we put into it!

The Podcast and Credit For Where Credit is Due – This transcript was developed from a live interview on Wednesday, February 3, 2010 between Scott Chappell, Guy Powell and Steven Groves using FreeConferenceCall.com.

The podcast interview was downloaded and processes in Audacity, which is available from SourceForge.com, and with ‘4toFloor.wav’ music loop from member ‘Rooks’ and posted at SoundSnap.com.

The transcripts are provided courtesy of Institute for International Research, the organizers of the MeasureUp Conference.

The Introduction Voice Talent is Ms. Cynthia Propst.

Related posts:

• Increase Touch and Engagement Using Social Marketing – Scott Chappell / Sessions College Podcast Interview
• The ROI of Social Media Series – Marcel LeBrun CEO of Radian6 Podcast Episode 3
• Managing Hundreds of Millions of Messages – Microsoft Marketing in AsiaPac

Scott talks about how social media is used by Sessions.edu and how it has supported an almost 10 fold expansion of the number of monthly ‘touches’ with the Sessions Design College audience of prospective student, current students and graduated alumni.  Scott explains how he has embraced the premise of Marshall McLuhan in that “the medium is the message”, but he cautions that too many contacts to an audience can cause them to disengage.  In Sessions case, while social media has allowed them to dramatically increase the number of messages, the reality is that there needs to be quality and sincerity otherwise you run the risk of turning off the audience.

The biggest understanding that has come from the use of social media is that a successful launch has to be gradual and that he needed to segment the conversation to be able to increase the touch points.  Sessions.edu established messaging in three different categories – Culture, Industry & Sell.  With this segmented messaging schema, Scott talks about how each has a particular characteristic and supports a conversation or connection in a specific area of the relationship with the audience.  The recipients have been very open to the connections because each communication is about something different and Scott says it has ‘enriched the conversation’ and allowed the brand to flourish.

Under lessons learned, he cites trying to use every social tool for everything – he’s come to recognize that the content has to match the discussion and the relationship you want to have with your audience.  He suggests that your listeners, followers, and community members need to get something from the conversation and that is a more a function of the quality of the conversation and message than the quantity of messages delivered.

Play / Download Scott Chappell / Sessions College Episode 1 Podcast Here

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To support the effort in uncovering the ROI question in social media, we’ve set up a Fan Page at Facebook, and a LinkedIn Group.  Come join us and let us know what the pressing issues are in your efforts to determine an ROI in your social media presence!

Related posts:

• 5 Key Tactics to a Successful Social Presence – Scott Chappell / Sessions College Podcast Part 2 of 2
• How to Give Consumers All They Want From Your Social Presence – Ellen Stone / Bravo Networks
• Why Social Media is Not Just a Gimmick for Dell SMB