Convergence 09: any marketers in the house?

What do these jobs have in common?

- fashion/event manager/photographer

- editor/publisher

- chief evangelist, all things mobile marketing

- host/correspondent for CBC TV

- digital marketing and technology leader

- PhD and sessional instructor, school of Communication

- managing editor

- barrista

- currency trader

- product design manager, CBC

- social, search and viral 'scientist' (former Web developer)

- senior manager, communications and marketing

- communications manager

- lawyer/video game producer

- content generator for SEO

- head of community relations department

- veteran marketing connecting consumer products with their markets

... these are the posted job titles of every speaker at Convergence 09--Cossette West's "forum for Digital Marketing thought leadership".

I find it curious that out of the 17 presenters, only 4 use the word marketer in their job descriptions. It does help me understand a key issue that kept surfacing for me during the day. A good, 'old-school', marketing conference would be using the brand word in every other sentence. And the direct marketers would be constantly poking on response/ conversion/ ROI of marketing efforts. But there was really none of that talk in the sessions. Attendees were buzzing about social media tactics: tweeting and texting, blogging and vlogging. And I kept thinking about the stresses of my every-day in trying to prove return on marketing spend.

I had lunch with an old friend of mine: someone who I'd hired into a digital company in the 90s, and who now works as the head of digital marketing for a very large provincial utility. I asked him if they were heavy into social media. His response, "we spent a lot of time in Facebook and other things, but really, I've got huge marketing programs I've got to move through and I can't afford the time and resources at this point."

I guess this means that social media might not be about digital marketing right now. I see PR people and communications managers rushing toward social media because of this really new and cool way of 'conversation.' I'd hoped to have gained from the conference the ways that this conversation was translated to wider and stronger brand engagement that knocks on to more and better business. Nothing yet.