The Virtual Meeting Coach

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Just watched a SelfGrowth.com live-streaming TV show and I have to say I’m impressed with the courage and creativity of David Riklan!

David is the CEO and rabid advocate for his website which aggregates the work of thousands of self-help teachers and authors. SelfGrowth.com has an enviable traffic flow and I’m predicting that David’s latest experiment using UStream’s live feed plus Twitter is going to ramp up his traffic even further!

The stage setup for the show had David behind his desk with a speaker-phone co-host whose presence was made “visible” by having the phone displayed prominently, upstage, on David’s desk. David introduced one of his staff members, the onsite “Twitter manager,” who mostly remained off-stage tracking participants’ live tweets, but made an appearance every so often behind the desk with David, too. Other staff members made personal appearances – sitting next to David behind the desk – throughout the show, as well. The team seemed to have someone juggling the IM/chat window on UStream, too, although I couldn’t get it to take my input.

David collected some questions ahead of the show, using an online form he circulated to his list. He answered some viewers’ questions live and punted some to his telephone co-host to answer throughout the show.

He used a very smart giveaway strategy, encouraging real-time Twitter participation (now incorporated into UStream as the “social stream”). Asking participants to tweet a “commercial” message for him made them eligible for a live drawing of a multi-piece CD/DVD set he showed. The commercial feel of that strategy felt more than a little tacky to me, but it certainly demonstrated an interesting way to incentivize others to broadcast your message  on Twitter if that’s something you want to do with Twitter.

The experience reminded me at lot of the early days of Access TV. And, of course, the value of Access TV shows always hinges on the creativity and mindfulness of the show host. David has been developing his community for quite awhile and he’s a pretty fair show host. I look forward to seeing where else he takes this approach…

Interesting experiment! Is this Access TV on the internet… or a new kind of Virtual Meeting?

Did you attend? If so, I’m curious to hear your thoughts about the experience. Did you feel like you were in a virtual meeting with David…or was this a second-tier version of the new ABC Nightline Format (that includes Twitter participation)? What do YOU think?