John heads up the 360° Digital Influence team – Ogilvy PR’s global, digital word of mouth marketing practice designed to manage brands at a time when anyone can be an influencer and we are all influenced in new ways. His team has developed and executed social media strategy for clients as diverse as Intel, Lenovo, Kraft, Unilever all the way to the federal government. The team’s focus is on engaging through conversations, outreach to new influencers and word of mouth marketing.
John is a Web 1.0 graduate. As Creative Director at Discovery Communications, he transformed a single web site into 14 Web communities and services from DiscoveryKids.com to Animalplanet.com and more. In the early nineties, when interactive television was imminent, John headed up the creative studio for the joint ITV venture between Viacom and AT&T.
Currently, John serves on the board of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association. He teaches graduate studies in Digital Influence at Johns Hopkins University.
His blog is: The Digital Influence Mapping Project – http://johnbell.typepad.com
His twitter name is : jbell99
Beth Laing is the project manager for iFOCOS, which organizes the We Media conferences, awards and community. Prior to working with We Media she worked in a variety of new media roles with Knight Ridder, Infonautics and Access Atlanta. She is currently on the board of the Atlanta Women’s Alliance (AWA), Community Advisory Board for Junior League Dekalb and a Leadership Dekalb 2010 class member.