Live Blogging from the Cause Marketing Forum Conference - Day 1

It was a busy day here at the first full day of the Cause Marketing Forum Conference here in sunny Chicago. I joined Phil McCarty and Maureen Carlson in teaching the Hospital Corporate Development Summit. We had a great group of students and some great guest speakers.

One was Chicago's own Alice Archabal from Children’s Memorial Hospital. She runs a great local corporate partnerships program and had some invaluable insights. This didn't surprise me, however, since Alice cut her cause marketing teeth at powerhouses such as St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and Feeding America. But just as I thought I found a kindred spirit in Alice, tragedy struck. She's not active on my favorite social network, Twitter! Fortunately, Alice and I agreed to work together to correct that. (First order of business is to replace her old Blackberry!)

Another great speaker (who is on Twitter!) was Jeff Weness from Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota. He had lots of good, practical advice for starting and sustaining a regional cause marketing program.

My part of the presentation was a talk on the importance of social media, mobile technology and location-based services to cause marketing programs. My slides are attached.

The plan for the rest of today is a cocktail reception and dinner here at the hotel. Dinner includes a talk from one of my favorite people, Michael Hoffman of See3 Communications who will be doing a review in video of the past year in cause marketing