March 17, 2010 4pm -7pm Cocoanut Grove
How To Santa Cruz is both the title of this year’s business fair and a social media marketing initiative the Chamber has developed to give members the opportunity to engage in a rich social media experience. Each Business Fair participant has been invited to contribute to a collection of online articles on how to survive and thrive in Santa Cruz… information to their potential customers, visitors, and other businesses can find and contribute to.
Each article (text, video, or PowerPoint) utilizes the emerging marketing power of “authentic” communications and makes use of integrated social media – connecting the Article to related Facebook and LinkedIn sites and a Twitter feed. More importantly, the article becomes a searchable object that will return the information that users a searching for when they a looking for it.
The articles are designed to provide information necessary to answer questions and solve problems that face consumers and businesses in Santa Cruz.
For consumers articles focus on shopping, recreation, apartments and real estate, schools, and events. For example, under the topic Succeeding at Eating In and Eating Out, some of the suggested topics include: fine dining in Santa Cruz County, equipment essentials for Chinese cooking at home, how to read a Vietnamese restaurant menu, picking Santa Cruz wines, and what makes Santa Cruz pizza great.
Articles that businesses might use a sorted into broad topic areas such as starting a business, leasing real estate, banking, and advertising. Under the broad topic of marketing in Santa Cruz, suggested topics include: sources of market research information about Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz consumer demographics, resources for evaluating competition in Santa Cruz, and ideas for marketing the construction trades in Santa Cruz.
The goal of the How to Santa Cruz initiative is to connect local vendors with potential customers using the rich resources of social media. By consolidating these articles in a singles site, with many links and connections and the high traffic generated by the Chamber’s website, the search return on these articles can significantly improve the search ‘presence’ of participants.
Watch for more on How to Santa Cruz in the coming months. And, connect with the first authors of How to… articles at the Chamber’s business Fair and visit the How to… site at www.santacruzchamber.org
Highlights of the 2010 Business Fair
The 2010 Business Fair features nearly 100 exhibitors highlighting new products and services, scrumptious food and drink, and new ideas. The How to Santa Cruz theme emphasizes access to the best, the most interesting and creative, the most cost-efficient, and the most fun. Each exhibitors will invite you to “ask me how…”: how to get the best deal on a car loan, how to build the most traffic on your website, how to take the best care of your knees, pick-up truck, driveway, iPod, 9 year old, or how to find a great place to relax.
We’ll have a great raffle, with lots of prizes from exhibitors. A new feature of the Fair will be projection of live twitter feeds from the site including raffle prize winning numbers. And we’ll have five different projections going on throughout the Grove displaying various parts of the show.
Social media is a prevalent theme at the Fair. We’ll have a live Twitter booth set-up with local social media scholar Seana Norvell there to help you figure-out how to use it. Hear the Call of Music will be uploading UTube shots of each of the exhibitors throughout the evening. Several of the exhibitors will feature social media including the widely-acclaimed Lisa Orrell, a national presenter on the effective use of new communications in marketing and a presenter whose five sessions with the Chamber have all sold out.
There will people with interesting stories about how they are building a business presence in our new economic environment. Talk with Marty Collins at the Digital Media Factory booth about their development of the movie industry in Santa Cruz or the booths for Dominican Hospital and Palo Alto Medical Foundation about their cutting-edge use of integrated medical records. Check in with Ecology Action about new environmental programs and products available in Santa Cruz County or with Fox Racing Shox about the latest in mountain bike technology.
Our sponsors, Bay Federal Credit Union, Valley Yellow Pages, Rabobank, City of Santa Cruz Redevelopment Agency, and Palo Alto Medical Foundation – Santa Cruz, have expanded booths and lots to talk about. And, our media sponsors will be there to show you how their marketing and promotion efforts can benefit you – The Good Times, KSBW-TV, KWAV and Buckley Broadcasting, Times Publishing Group, M-Press Digital, Santa Cruz Weekly, and the Santa Cruz Sentinel.
The Business Fair is always one of the great networking events of the year. You’ll join hundreds of people exploring, appreciating and learning How to Santa Cruz.
The Business Fair Goes Virtual
We definitely don’t want you to miss the Business Fair next Wednesday, 4-7 p.m. at the Cocoanut Grove. It is the only place you’ll get to taste the food and wine, play with the gadgets, meet up with the hundreds of people attending the event, and connect with the 100 exhibitors.
But you’ll be able to return to the fair and ‘visit’ the exhibitors any time over the next nine months at the Chamber’s 2010 “Virtual” Business Fair.
Each participant will have their own virtual business fair page. It will include a brief video from the live Business Fair, shot by Hear the Call Music, and will feature the same information, products and services, presented by the exhibitor at the event.
Designed to retain the energy of the fair and provide a continuing communications resource for each exhibitor, the pages will be index and searchable to help exhibitors be “found” by search engines and potential customers.
Each exhibitor’s virtual presence will include links to their website, their How to Santa Cruz article and other photos, logos, text, links. The exhibitor’s page will also be indexed on the Chamber website, be web-search optimized, and distributed accessible, and indexed in Chamber marketing advertising for the Business Fair.
So, plan on visiting the business fair twice, first on March 17 from 4 to 7 p.m., and again at the virtual Business Fair, on line Click Here >
The Business Fair Exhibitor’s List
Banking & Finance
Bay Federal Credit Union
Rabobank
Financial Resource Associates
Santa Cruz Community Credit Union
Business Products
Best Buy
Home Depot
KBA DOCUSYS
Konica-Minolta Business Systems
Pacific Coast Business Machines
Palace Art
Parrot Cellular
Prime Landscape
The Maynard Group
Business Services
AA Safe & Lock
Cocoanut Grove
Commute Solutions/SCCRTC
DeeZign
Digital Media Factory
Ecology Action
Graniterock
Hear the Call of Music
KBA DOCUSYS
Konica-Minolta Business Systems
Kelly Services
Michael’s Handyman
Mission Linen
Monterey bay Office Products
Mpress Digital
Mr. Rooter Plumbing
Pacific Coast Business Machines
Real Color
Santa Cruz Redevelopment Agency
Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce
SantaCruzJobs.com/Santa Cruz Staffing
Sarah Blade Photography
Satellite Telework Centers, Inc.
Supportive Solutions
UCSC Conference Services
UCSC Internships
University Inn
Business Services – Consulting
Camille Smith/Lisa Orrell
SCORE
Business Services – Marketing
Real Color
AlikeList, Inc
Bond Marketing/Melody Sharp Web Design
Buckley Broadcasting / KWAV
Camille Smith/Lisa Orrell
Digital Media Factory
Hear the Call of Music
KSBW-TV
Mpress Digital
Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce
Good Times
Santa Cruz Sentinel
Santa Cruz Weekly
SCORE
Scott Design
Times Publishing Group
Valley Yellow Pages
Yellow Book
Web and IT
Bond Marketing/Melody Sharp Web Design
Scott Design
Community Services
Dominican Hospital/Dominican Foundation
Palo Alto Medical Foundation
Salud para la Gente
Symphony League of Santa Cruz County
United Way
Santa Cruz Redevelopment Agency
Second Harvest
Consumer Products
Best Buy
Fox Racing Shox
Home Depot
Palace Art
Parrot Cellular
Prime Landscape
Good Times
Santa Cruz Sentinel
Santa Cruz Weekly
The Maynard Group
Times Publishing Group
Valley Yellow Pages
Yellow Book
Consumer Services
AA Safe & Lock
Cocoanut Grove
Commute Solutions/SCCRTC
Ecology Action
Graniterock
Kelly Services
Michael’s Handyman
Mr. Rooter Plumbing
Santa Cruz Core + Fitness
SantaCruzJobs.com/Santa Cruz Staffing
Sarah Blade Photography
Santa Cruz Whale Watching
Supportive Solutions
Symphony League of Santa Cruz County
UCSC Conference Services
Consumer Services – Health
Carol Shwery, DCCCN
Companion for Life
Dominican Hospital
/ Physicians Medical Group
Dr. John Baron, DDS
McCollum Wellness Center
Palo Alto Medical Foundation
Radiology Medical Group
Salud para la Gente
Santa Cruz Core + Fitness
Second Harvest
Take Shape for Life
United Way
Visiting Angels
Western Dental
WomenCARE
Zygone
Food and Catering
Alexandra Catering
Fresh Choice
Hollins House
Starz Cupcakes
Table in the Garden
Surf City Vitners
Tony & Alba’s Pizza
University Inn
Vina Tabi
VIVAs Fresh, Natural & Organic Mexican Food
Woodstocks Pizza
