On May 20, Edelman Montreal co-hosted a Social Media Summit with a leading Canadian law firm and Edelman client, McCarthy Tétrault, titled “Bridging the Gap between Marketing and Legal.” VPs of both marketing communications and legal departments let loose on their concerns and the challenges they face in going digital. The roster of speakers included Edelman’s own Steve Rubel, David Armano, Sylvain Perron and Becca Young and on the legal side, Vanessa Grant and Véronique Wattiez-Larose, expert attorneys from McCarthy Tétrault.
The speakers all worked together to present the full spectrum of social media trends on the rise, case studies of both strong and weak social media programs, an overview of social media tools and tips for how to overcome implementation challenges from both a marketing and legal perspective.
Trends to pay attention to:
Edelman:
To stand out in the stream you need to embrace multiplicity and diversity of messages and stories…you need to hand craft your content and strategy for every single community that you are in – Steve Rubel
One of the trends I am starting to see is the idea of business itself becoming social … this is bigger than public relations, communications…it’s actually a business challenge – David Armano
Key takeaways:
McCarthy Tétrault:
Electronic commerce law doesn’t exist…its employment law, its contract law, its legislation … it’s all the facets of the law which are just addressed differently. – Véronique Wattiez-Larose
Key takeaways:
What to do in the case of Shamu…
Legal needs to be at the table early because they are not ever going to approve the content, or very rarely, what they are going to approve is the set of guidelines and principles and you all imagine the thinking required there is much deeper, more comprehensive – it’s really legal strategy. – Becca Young
The Social Media Summit will be brought to Toronto in the fall. Stay tuned for more great insights.
 Maria Huss Edelman Digital, Montreal Follow on twitter @MariaHuss |
 Stephanie Weinstein Edelman Digital, Montreal Follow on twitter @Edelgirl |
