RSA Conference is the biggest and most prestigious IT Security conference in the world, and has held that lofty title for almost two decades.  They’ve been a SHIFT client for 4 years, and each iteration of the event challenges us to up-our-game in terms of media coverage and “new media thinking.”

This past show, in April 2009, was no exception.  “Social Media” has become an ever-bigger component to our planning.  Last year I wrote about our Blogger Relations component.  This year, it was all about the tweets.

Whereas in 2008 Twitter was somewhat of an experiment for RSAC, in 2009 the SHIFT team worked with our client colleagues to more substantively build out their Twitter following and activities.

Among other tactics, we used Twitter to keep the IT Security community connected and informed before, during and after the conference.  Ultimately, we gained lots of invaluable insights — and generated enough goodwill to see the # of followers rise by over 1,500% from the previous year.

As the 2009 event approached, we spent a lot of time promoting the #RSAC hashtag to a number of influencers and other security-minded folks.  We wanted to be sure to differentiate between RSA Conference’s “official” tweets (primarily focused on announcements, troubleshooting, etc.) with conversations about the show.  In fact, a handful of security acolytes used the hashtag to arrange some unsponsored tweet-ups, tangent to the show venue.

The hashtag effort proved successful: we saw about 7,500 tweets during the show using the #RSAC tag! This allowed our RSAC client contacts to answer a range of logistical questions from users and to take a pulse on the crowd’s reaction to everything from showfloor amenities to speakers’ performances.  If we noted rave reviews (or pans) of individual speakers, it was also duly noted for 2010 planning.

At each step, across the last few shows, RSAC’s embrace of users’ content and feedback has been rewarded with greater knowledge about its audience and a closer relationship with attendees: an object lesson for conference organizers across industries.

It also seemed to help on the “traditional” PR side: coverage in mainstream journals such as the Wall Street Journal increased 83% over our 2008 coverage results!

I wonder what challenges and lessons the 2010 show will bring?

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