Christopher Barger was the guest author for the inaugural instalment of the FIR Book Club, hosted by FIR Book Review Editor Bob LeDrew.

Christopher is Senior Vice President, Global Programs for Voce Communications, a Porter Novelli company. Before arriving at Voce, Christopher was director of global social media at General Motors, building the company’s social media program and leading its presence across multiple social networks.

His work to repair GM’s reputation in the social web earned him PR News’ “Social Media Leader of the Year” award in 2010. Christopher also previously managed social media initiatives and corporate communications for IBM, where he was designated “Blogger-in-Chief.”

Christopher’s book, The Social Media Strategist, was reviewed on FIR.

This podcast was recorded live on BlogTalk Radio.

Get this podcast:

• Download the MP3 file (13.9Mb, 34:40)
• Get the show on iTunes
• Subscribe to the FIR Interviews RSS feed
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

Share your comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future reviews, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 222 2803 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To receive all For Immediate Release podcasts including the weekly Hobson & Holtz Report, subscribe to the full RSS feed.

This FIR Review is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

Intern Nation: How to Earn Nothing and Learn Little in the Brave New Economy, by Ross Perlin, is reviewed by guest reviewer Kris Gallagher. From the book description:

“Every year, between one and two million Americans work as interns. They famously shuttle coffee in a thousand newsrooms, congressional offices, and Hollywood studios, but they also deliver aid in Afghanistan, build the human genome, and pick up garbage. They are increasingly of all ages, and their numbers are growing fast – from 17 percent of college graduates in 1992 to 50 percent in 2008. A huge and increasing number of internships are illegal under the Fair Labor Standards Act, and this mass exploitation saves firms more than $600 million each year. Interns enjoy no workplace protections and no standing in courts of law – let alone benefits like health care.

Ross Perlin has written the first expose of this world of drudgery and aspiration.

In this witty, astonishing, and serious investigative work, Perlin takes the reader inside both boutique non-profits and mega-corporations such as Disney (which employs 8,000 interns at Disney World alone). He profiles fellow interns, talks to academics and professionals about what unleashed this phenomenon, and explains why the intern boom is perverting workplace practices in locations all around the world.”

Get this podcast:

• Download the MP3 file (3.69Mb, 9:12)
• Get the show on iTunes
• Subscribe to the FIR Reviews RSS feed
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

Intern Nation: How to Earn Nothing and Learn Little in the Brave New Economy by Ross Perlin

Publisher: Verso
Hardcover, 288 pages
Published May 2011
ISBN-10: 1844676862
ISBN-13: 978-1844676866

Purchase at Amazon US, Amazon Canada, or Amazon UK. (No Kindle editions available.)

Share your comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 222 2803 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To receive all For Immediate Release podcasts including the weekly Hobson & Holtz Report, subscribe to the full RSS feed.

This FIR Review is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

YouTube for Business: Online Video Marketing for Any Business, by Michael Miller, is the latest book to be reviewed by FIR Book Review editor Bob LeDrew. From the book description:

“YouTube’s 120 million viewers are a tempting target for any business, large or small. How can you tap into the potential of YouTube to promote your business and sell your products or services? YouTube marketing is easy enough that any business can do it. All you need is some low-cost video equipment – and a winning strategy. After you figure out the right type of videos to produce, you can use YouTube to attract new customers and better service existing ones.

That’s where this book comes in. The valuable information and advice in YouTube for Business help you make YouTube part of your online marketing plan, improve brand awareness, and drive traffic to your company’s website – without breaking your marketing budget.”

Get this podcast:

• Download the MP3 file (2.6Mb, 6:34)
• Get the show on iTunes
• Subscribe to the FIR Reviews RSS feed
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

YouTube for Business: Online Video Marketing for Any Business by Michael Miller

Publisher: Que
Hardcover, 368 pages
Published January 2012 (2nd edition)
ISBN-10: 078974726X
ISBN-13: 978-0789747266

Purchase at Amazon US (Kindle edition), Amazon Canada, or Amazon UK (Kindle edition).

Share your comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 222 2803 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To receive all For Immediate Release podcasts including the weekly Hobson & Holtz Report, subscribe to the full RSS feed.

This FIR Review is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

The Social Media Strategist: Build a Successful Program from the Inside Out, by Christopher Barger, is the latest book to be reviewed by FIR Book Review editor Bob LeDrew.

From the book description:

“In today’s fast-paced professional climate, large companies are learning that launching a website and taking a wait-and-see approach to engaging customers is not enough. Competition is fierce, and those who master the social media space are the ones who come out on top. There is greater urgency than ever before to establish a vibrant social media program – and it all starts with a key strategist who can best organize and leverage all of the organization’s resources to cut through the bureaucracy and get real-time results.

This is where The Social Media Strategist comes in. Before tackling specific social media programs, you first have to get your own organization – and everyone in it – on board with making social media a business strategy priority.

Christopher Barger, the award-winning former social media director at General Motors and IBM’s former ‘blogger-in-chief,’ describes all the challenges particular to getting a comprehensive social media program off the ground in a large firm.”

Get this podcast:

• Download the MP3 file (5.98Mb, 14:51)
• Get the show on iTunes
• Subscribe to the FIR Reviews RSS feed
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

The Social Media Strategist: Build a Successful Program from the Inside Out by Christopher Barger

Publisher: McGraw-Hill
Hardcover, 304 pages
Published January 2012
ISBN-10: 0071768254
ISBN-13: 978-0071768252

Purchase at Amazon US (Kindle edition), Amazon Canada, or Amazon UK (Kindle edition).

 
Share your comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 222 2803 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To receive all For Immediate Release podcasts including the weekly Hobson & Holtz Report, subscribe to the full RSS feed.

This FIR Review is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

Related post:

• First FIR Book Club meeting on Jan 27 with guest author Christopher Barger

Friday, January 27, 2011
2pm EST, 7pm GMT, 11am PST
Listen online

We’re returning to BlogTalk Radio for the meeting. FIR Book Review Editor Bob LeDrew will introduce Christopher Barger. They’ll talk for a few minutes, then open it up to your questions and observations. To participate, call +1 347 843 4882 during the program.

• Order the book now (Amazon: US | Canada | UK) so you can read it before the call! (That’s the idea of a book club, after all.)

Social Media Strategist Christopher Barger has spent more than a decade leading social media teams for some of the world’s most visible organizations, including IBM and General Motors.

Barger’s first book is The Social Media Strategist: Build a Successful Program from the Inside Out (McGraw-Hill). It promises to provide “the tools you need to meet all the challenges of building a social media strategy in a large company, which include corporate culture, legal barriers, and the kind of bureaucratic resistance that that are unique to large organizations. The Social Media Strategist explains how to get legal departments to say ‘yes’ to social media programs; get employees engaged without exposing the organization to risk; build ‘buzz’ that parallels business goals; and avoid the internal turf wars that can doom new initiatives.”

Join Christopher for a lively chat with FIR Book Review Editor Bob LeDrew and participate in the conversation! Details are on the BTR Book Club site.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

Related post:

• FIR Book Club starts in January 2012