Last week, my friend Jason Baer said on Twitter, "People are going to freak out when they see the 8-part Art of Social Media webinar series that @marketingprofs has cooked up. Amazing lineup."
Well, prepare to freak.


Or at least be psyched that this week we launch an 8-week Social Media Summer Series that we believe really connects the dots between Marketing and Social Media. The brilliant Charlene Li kicks off the series this Thursday, July 16, with The Art of Social Media, a 90-minute session that sets the tone for the sessions to follow. Charlene calls Social Media an "art," in fact, because she goes beyond the tools and platforms to get at the often artful application of them.
"The excitement around social media often centers on the technologies – Facebook, blogs, Twitter, etc.," Charlene will explain in her online seminar. "But this is the wrong approach. The power of social media is that it's about the relationships it builds and supports, not the technologies.
"Rather than think about crafting a strategy around social technologies, marketers should be pondering how they can use social technologies to support a customer relationship," she adds.
Jason Baer follows Charlene on July 30, after which come Chris Brogan, Brian Solis, Amber Naslund, CC Chapman, Beth Harte, and John Gerzema.
I'm particularly excited about this series because it's one of the few I've seen that is geared toward supporting, extending and strengthening customer relationships. And did I mention that the series is included as part of a $249 annual Premium-Plus membership? (That means you get ALL of the seminars in our library, in addition to the eight that are part of this series this summer.)
Check out the full lineup here, and prepare to create your own masterpiece come fall.
Follow the #summersocial hashtag on Twitter for updates on the speakers and series.