Chamber of Commerce Welcomes New Faces

A hugely successful event for a number of local Chamber of Commerces was held at the Clinton Inn in Tenafly early Thursday. The Fort Lee Chamber of Commerce  joined together with the Westwood and Tenafly chambers to host a Joint Chamber Speakers Breakfast that included delicious treats and two ingenious speakers. The event was called “Downtown & Beyond: Getting Feet in the Door & What To Do When They Get There,” and it focused on engaging new customers and keeping them as loyal consumers.

The first speaker was Gene Sower, President and Founder of Sampson Media, an Internet marketing company that helps business owners keep in touch with the world of social media.

Sower gave an organized, thorough lecture on social media marketing, the importance of tapping into the mobile phone market for business owners and how to put all these ideas together.

“I don’t want people to be afraid of technology, or be bogged down by it,” Sower said.

Sure enough, by the end of his presentation, the commerce members present not only seemed interested in learning more, but seemed surprised by all that they didn’t already know.

A large part of Sower's power point presentation focused on how useful Facebook pages could be for many business to consumer (or “B to C”) companies. He stressed that the pages aren’t really for selling, but more for connecting with the customers. It’s important to get their pages “liked” by Facebook users, so word travels fast.

“It’s really about engaging and creating a conversation,” Sower said.

He supplemented his suggestions with startling facts, such as how Amazon increased it’s traffic 328 percent in 2011 due to referral traffic from Facebook.

The “mobile marketing” part of his speech focused on free services that not enough business owners are taking advantage of, namely Google Places, Facebook Check In and the now renowned “Foursquare” program that tells you, via Facebook, where all your friends are. Sower described these programs as “free, low-hanging fruit.”

The second speaker, Rich Goldberg, founder and president of Enriched Communications, delivered a heartfelt talk about making a personal connection with customers and finding ways to manage stress as a business owner while increasing productivity. Using humor, a personable demeanor and an ebullient personality, Goldberg shared  anecdotes and showed everyone in attendance how a positive attitude is everything.

“Are you managing your stress, or is it managing you?” Goldberg asked, offering a startling fact: “This country is 6 percent of the population of the world, yet we consume 33 percent of the anxiety pills.”

Goldberg talked about the magnitude eating well, rest and exercise has on a person and made the connection that a healthy person is a healthy business owner.

Goldberg also touched on the famous “it costs more to get a new customer than to keep an old one” business adage and provided facts about the substantial impact customer loss can have on a company.

”[You have to] make it worth their time to deal with you,” Goldberg said.

Some of his suggestions about engaging customers and making them feel welcome were offering questionnaires, asking your most loyal consumer out to lunch or setting up a suggestion box “without a hole on the bottom.”

Goldberg ended his speech with a beautiful quote:

”Life isn’t about surviving the storm, it’s learning to dance in the rain.”

Margaret Maclay, Program and Event coordinator for the Fort Lee Chamber of Commerce, was ecstatic over the turnout for this year’s joint-chamber, new member breakfast. This was the second year that the chambers did this, but the first time the focus was so “social media” heavy.

”Last year we focused more on branding, and communications,” Maclay said. “This year we really wanted to introduce the whole idea that technology is here to stay.”

Maclay liked Goldberg’s approach as well.

“He takes humor and friendliness and breaks down the barriers of all the serious, frustrating things we deal with on a day-to-day basis,” she said.

A lot of new faces showed up, and Maclay has social media to thank for it.

”Almost everyone here came because they either got constant contact, an email or some kind of communication through all the various [social media] vehicles we use," she said. "It was on Facebook, it was on linked in it was all over the place.”

Alan Thomas, chairman of the Tenafly Chamber, was the emcee of the morning’s event and was in agreement with Maclay about how well the breakfast turned out.

“I thought it was a tremendous success,” he said.

Thomas said he thought Sower’s speech on social media was a big victory for the commerce, considering the feedback and questions during the Q&A session.

“I’m going to go try a few things when I get back,” he said.

The Fort Lee Chamber’s next event will be in June. Check their website for details.