Just a quick note to remind everybody we are not having a user group meeting in November or December, mainly because of Dreamforce coming up next week. I'll be there, as will MANY of you so that is almost as good as a meeting. Right? Feel free to drop me an email or tweet me to grab a drink at one of the events or sit together at one of the breakout sessions...

We'll be back in February after the holidays and year-end settle down. In the meantime, I am presenting at one of the break-out sessions next week and sitting on the panel at onother one, and at least one of our members is presenting in a third so here is the lowdown:

Lead Management 101
Do you understand your entire lead lifecycle? The experts at salesforce.com are here to help! This session features best practices for lead management, such as how to route leads to the right sales teams, build effective qualification and conversion processes, capitalize on workflow automation, and plenty more.
Speaker: Matthew Reznick, 3n Global, Inc
Speaker: Alex Zarowny, SALESFORCE.COM
Speaker: Jason Stewart, Demandbase Inc.
Date: Monday, November 3
Time: 2:15 p.m. - 3:15 p.m.

Marketing Panel: Secrets to Email Campaign Success
Dont waste your marketing dollars -- or your credibility -- on email campaigns that dont produce results. Our panel of email marketing experts shares the secrets of success and answers your questions on list-building techniques and email marketing. Hear the latest trends, evolving opinions, and newest strategies -- and take home tips for improving your email response rates today!
Date: Tuesday, November 4
Time: 2:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.

User Group Member Tricia Reilly is presenting here, in a topic close to my heart as a start-up marketer...

Salesforce CRM Marketing for Small Business
Tired of presentations made by companies with big teams and even bigger budgets? If you're the VP of Marketing, Salesforce CRM admin, or Web developer at your small business, then this session is for you. Join us for practical tips to help you appear larger and compete more effectively -- without spending another dime. We'll also give you a three-phased approach to evolving your marketing operations and show you how to evaluate Force Platform AppExchange vendors to find cost-effective solutions for your marketing needs.
Speaker: Tricia Reilly, Bluebird Marketing LLC
Date: Monday, November 3
Time: 11:45 a.m. - 12:45 p.m.

If any other user group members are presenting, let me know and I will post it to the blog!

May the Dreamforce be With You...

Jason Stewart
Senior Manager, Demand Generation
Demandbase, Inc.

SALESFORCE.COM SAN FRANCISCO USER GROUP MEETING ON SEPTEMBER 18th

Thursday, September 18th from 8AM to 10:30AM
LOCATION: Salesforce.com, Oahu Conference Room, 4th Floor
One Market Street, San Francisco, CA

We'll be getting back in to the user group routine in September, ramping up to Dreamforce and talking a lot about the AppExchange. The specific theme this time will be "GUERILLA" SALESFORCE.COM and I am still looking for feedback... I want to know about your favorite AppExchange downloads and add-ons, but (and here's the catch) only if they are completely and 100% free! So, nothing you can install for free and pay for later, nothing that is so cheap it "might as well be free."

We're looking for your favorite free stuff from Salesforce Labs, you're favorite free dashboards, your favorite Apps. Please shoot me a note, and I will be pulling together the suggestions and organizing them to share them with the group.

Here is the detailed agenda:    

• 8-8:30AM -- Welcome, Coffee, Networking
• 8:30 to 9:15 -- Guerilla Salesforce.com       - The best and most useful 100% free stuff you can find on the AppExchange. Share your favorites!    
• 5 minute break    
• 9:20 to 9:45 AM – Word from our sponsor, Informatica.       - Keeping the spirit of the FREE STUFF going -- Informatica has just released a free new tool on the AppExchange that they claim does everything the Data Loader does, only better. They'll be demonstrating that free tool and offering a summary of their overall services.    
• 9:45AM to 10:30AM - Let's Talk About Dreamforce       - Dreamforce is coming. Unfortunately, it's not free (like everything else we talk about today) but we do have the home team advantage. We'll be comparing notes on sessions and scheduling, looking at the new attendee portal and more with the ultimate goal of making sure everyone who goes to Dreamforce in November gets all they can out of the experience. Alumni, share your stories!

Jason Stewart
Demandbase, Inc.
jstewart@demandbase.com

Thursday's meeting at Salesforce.com was a great success, with 40 people joining us to learn about the summer release with Ly Townsend from Salesforce.com (thanks, Ly!). Thanks also going out to Cast Iron Systems for sponsoring the event.

Our next meeting will be in late September/early October and we'll be sharing your feedback on the absolute best free applications on the AppExchange, as well as discussing the breakout sessions at Dreamforce in November so that you will know what not to miss...

Please comment here on the blog if you have any recommendations for great downloads you have made off the AppExchange. Apps, dashboards, report suites are all fair game. The only requirement is that they be free!

A few links that came up at the meeting for you...

• Summer Release Notes
• Idea Exchange
• Ideas we discussed in the meeting are here and here and here.
• Help Create the Conference: Dreamforce Idea Exchange.
• Facebook Group

Thanks again, and I'll get back to you when we have a date set for the September meeting.

Jason Stewart
Demandbase
jstewart@demandbase.com

___________________________________

Our next Salesforce.com San Francisco User Group Meeting will be on Thursday, July 10th at 8:30AM.       

LOCATION: Salesforce.com
One Market Street, San Francisco, CA
Noa Conference Room, 9th Floor

The theme this time will be "What's new?" and will feature Ly Townsend, a customer success manager from Salesforce.com sharing details and insights into how to capitalize on new features in the summer release.

Our sponsor, Cast Iron Systems, will also be raffling off an 8GB iPod Touch to someone in attendance.

In other news, our group has passed the 300 member mark and is still growing! We are the fifth largest SFDC user group overall, and we're still growing fast with increasing attendance from meeting to meeting. Thanks to everyone for your support, and spread the word to friends and colleagues so we can continue growing and teach New York, Boston and Chicago a lesson! (Just kidding!).

On a side note, I have also created a San Francisco User Group listing on Facebook. If you're into that sort of thing and have a Facebook profile you can join here.

Here is the agenda for the 7/10 meeting:

• 8:30AM - 8:45 -- Welcome, Coffee, Treats
• 8:45 to 9:05 -- Summer Release Overview
• 9:05 - 9:25 -– Word from our sponsor, Cast Iron Systems.
  - For more details on Cast Iron Systems and how they help their customers integrate Salesforce.com with other applications, see the bottom of this email.
• 9:25 - 9:50 -- Idea Exchange Overview - What is it, how do I use it?
• 9:50 - 10:00AM -- Q&A, Raffle, Wrap up

Thanks! Hope to see you there!

Jason Stewart
Demandbase
jstewart@demandbase.com

___________________________________       

Description from Cast Iron Systems:

Cast Iron Systems, an AppExchange partner providing an appliance-based solution specifically for integrating Salesforce with other applications will be our sponsor. Dan England, Marketing & Sales Operations Manager will be available to answer any questions you might have about their products and to get your feedback on how to make their product offerings better for Salesforce users. www.castiron.com

Did we mention Cast Iron will Raffle off an iPod Touch (8GB)?    

Well, if you do, Salesforce.com would like to hear about it.

SFDC has created a Dreamforce portion in the Idea Exchange, in order to solicit input from the community on content at this November's event. You can vote on the presentations you would like to see, or if you have an idea for a presentation you want to deliver (that is not simply an advertisement for your product or services) you can out it up there and see if anyone votes for it.

One idea I particularly like was Salesforce Marketing for Small Businesses, although I think it is something that deserves an entire track as opposed to a single session. I actually wrote a bit about just that after the last Dreamforce on my other blog, in a post called Five Things to Make Dreamforce Better. Here's an excerpt:

"Create a new track: Guerilla Salesforce.com -- Bigger does not necessarily mean more interesting. At the keynotes, at the awards, and in the breakout sessions the customer references and case studies are overwhelmingly dominated by big customers. I understand -- big customers are cool. But last time I checked, the vast majority of customers (heck, the vast majority of partners) all have less than 100 employees. I was in one marketing track where the speaker asked how many attendees worked in marketing departments with less than five people in them. Most of the room raised their hands. Here's what you do. Create a track dedicated to best practices and creative ways to use Salesforce.com without a lot of extra development, and without a single App off the AppExchange that you can't download for free....and create an Appy Award that a customer with less than 100 seats has a shot at winning. "Most Creative Use of Salesforce.com Without Spending a Penny."

Check it out here.

The May meeting was a great success, with approximately 35-40 members joining us for breakfast and some great discussion about Sales Operations and Salesforce.com. A special thanks to Xactly for sponsoring the event.

As we discussed at the meeting, the topic for the next meeting will be both new features in the summer release as well as the Idea Exchange. Save the date! We'll be doing it in July, before we take the summer off and then reconvene in the fall.

Thursday, July 10th
8:30AM - 10:30AM
Landmark Building, One Market Street, San Francisco (SFDC Offices)

Here is some housekeeping from the last meeting...

Andrew from Fortinet hunted down the answer to the default lead assignment question...the default lead owner is set using: Setup > Customize > Leads > Settings. The default to the default lead owner is the System Admin. This can be changed to any user (such as a marketing user or customer service user). Thanks, Andrew!

I had mentioned a blog piece about hitting the growth phase in your organization where you are challenged with growing your sales team quickly. It was called The Ramp Phase, Jack Welch and a Coin Flip from the Altos Ventures blog and can be read here.

Thanks again, and look for a more detailed email on the July meeting closer to the end of this month.

Regards,

Jason Stewart
Demandbase, Inc.
jstewart@demandbase.com

We have a location for our next meeting now...

Time: May 15th, 8AM -10AM
Location: Salesforce.com
One Market Street, Atrium Lobby (If you enter from Market Street, it's on your left hand before you get to the food court)
San Francisco

We'll be talking about best practices for using Salesforce.com for your Sales Operations.

Hope to see you there!

Jason Stewart
Senior Manager, Demand Generation
jstewart@demandbase.com
(415) 683-2677
Demandbase, Inc.

Breakfast went so well last time, we are doing it again! Save the date ... Thursday, May 15th from 8AM to 10AM.

We are having trouble finding a location for this meeting, so if you have any recommendations for restaurants that have a good meeting space or if your office has space that can accomodate 40 people please let me know.

This meeting will be sponsored by Xactly, and we are going to use the new format that worked very well at our last meeting. With instruction and tips for both beginners as well as experienced users, we will focus (this time) on Salesforce.com's sales operations functionality.

Here's the agenda:

• 8-8:15AM      -- Welcome, Coffee, Treats
• 8:15 to 8:35 -- SFDC 101: How to set up automated lead assignment rules
• 5 minute break
• 8:40 to 9AM – Word from our sponsor, Xactly
• 9AM to 9:15 - Salesforce.com User Experience Team
• 5 minute break
• 9:20 to 9:45 – Salesforce.com “Deep Dive” – Best Practices for Sales Operations (Productivity and Data Quality)
• 9:45 to 10AM – Questions, Answers, Discussion and Networking

TIME: Thursday, May 15th from 8AM to 10AM
LOCATION: TBD, but in San Francisco

Also, feel free to forward your questions for discussion in the group, and possible topics for future "how-to" discussions. Hope to see you on the 15th!

Regards,

Jason Stewart
Senior Manager, Demand Generation
jstewart@demandbase.com
(415) 683-2677
Demandbase, Inc.

The first ever San Francisco Salesforce.com User Group Breakfast was a huge success, with about 40 of our members in attendence...many of them new faces!

One of our fantastic speakers, Tricia Reilly, actually posted a nice summary of the meeting (as well as her slides and some pictures from the event) at her blog, here.

There was some interest coming out of the meeting in using "hidden" values in web-to-lead forms, so there is a link to a recent webinar I did with Andrea Wildt from Salesforce.com (our other speaker, thanks again!) which starts with an introduction to Salesforce.com Marketing but then goes into more detail with some best practices on incorporating web-to-lead and hidden values into your landing pages. Check it out here. 

And of course, thanks again to Vertical Response for hosting!

I plan on pulling together a survey soon to gauge the group interest in meeting times, topics and more so keep an eye out. Otherwise, thanks again for your participation in the user group community!

Regards,

Jason Stewart
jstewart@demandbase.com