The business and affairs of Social Media Club are managed and controlled by an interim board of directors consisting of 10 professionals that span non profit, technology and education markets: 

Chris Heuer, Chairman and Co-Founder 

• Twitter: @ChrisHeuer
• Linkedin: Chris Heuer

Chris Heuer has been engaged in interactive communications since 1993, and launched his first agency, Guru Communications, out of South Beach, Florida in 1994. Over the years he has helped numerous startups with go-to market strategies, product design, web site development, online marketing campaigns, ecommerce and what is now widely referred to as Social Media.

Seeing similarities between the rise of the Web as a vital communications technology and the current rise of Social Media, Chris formed Social Media Club in March, 2006 to help more people understand the greater significance of what it means to be social and how media production/consumption has changed. To this end, Social Media Club is promoting media literacy, encouraging the sharing of lessons learned, promoting industry standards such as Creative Commons and discussing questions of ethics.

In 2011, Chris joined Deloitte as a Specialist Leader in the Social Business practice where he works with clients and partners about key issues with regards to social business for market facing issues, enterprise 2.0, innovation and holistic business strategy. In addition to his direct endeavors, he serves as an advisory board member for Buzzlogic and My6Sense. He is a frequent speaker, workshop leader and a trained facilitator and has organized numerous unconferences for the community and private organizations of all sizes.

Kristie Wells, Co-Founder and President

• Twitter: @KristieWells
• Linkedin: Kristie Wells

Kristie is Co-Founder of Social Media Club, and currently serves as President of the not-for-profit organization. Over the last 25 years, Kristie has helped organizations understand, engage and support their customers to strengthen their brand, improve their products and create better experiences for all stakeholders, internally and externally.

Kristie’s professional life has been spent in and around technology companies with an emphasis on bridging the gap between technology and people. A versatile generalist, Kristie has worked as a senior-level Marketing Executive, Community Manager and Customer Advocate, most recently with Swipp, Joyent and Ribbit (acquired by British Telecom). While her roles and titles have changed over time, her passion to connect people, ideas and resources remains at the core of all she does. You can find more information on Kristie at http://kristiewells.com.

Anders Abrahamsson

• Twitter: @Sliceonline
• Linkedin: Anders Abrahamsson

Anders Abrahamsson loves building communities for a better world – and views Social Media Club as one of those communities. He founded the first formal Social Media Club Chapter in Sweden – SMC Östergötland (situated in the East Sweden region) back in 2009 in Norrköping. In dialogue with SMC Global, a federative body intended to support local chapters and their development in Sweden (those in becoming, and the existing), was founded later same year with Anders as one of the founding members – Social Media Club – Chapter Support Association – Sweden / Sverige , where he is secretary of the national board. From 2010 in December and onwards, Anders also is a part of the global Social Media Club Editorial Team , and was one of the founding team members, contributing with topics related to Global Digital Participation , Communities , Social Business , and l aunching a vision of #OPPP (One Pad Per Person). And, last – but not least – serving an explorative article series on a society in profound transition – #TheFlowSociety . In this article series, he has launched ideas on Flow Communication, Flow Working and Flow Trade to name a few. These articles are now separately published and collected at http://flowsociety.org. These editorial pieces will be forming the base of publishing a book during 2012 – “Understanding Flow Society – Where are we heading? Facilitating a Conversation about a Society in Profound Transition”.

His goal in general is to give even more leverage to forces moving us to a full fledged Flow Society – a vision of an Open World, a “world re:loved”, as his personal vision reads. In the position of Programming/Curation Director, he will build a team of global curators to continuously monitor what is talked, reflected and thought about in the global social media club community, in order to leverage the postion of SMC as a global thought leader within the related conversations and interactions in the name of the Social Web – and its social, economical and technological aspects and implications. He also views it as important to provide educational material in support for those who want to “share what they got” – maybe using Wikibooks? His life is overall devoted to his family, practicing japanese budo in the name of aikido, DJing, and entrepreneurship for sustainability – ‘sustainopreneurship’. All of which has contributed to the understanding of a Life In Flow. Follow Anders Abrahamsson at http://andersabrahamsson.org – his Personal Community Hub.

Ari Herzog

• Twitter: @AriHerzog
• Linkedin: Ari Herzog

Ari Herzog is a digital media strategist and principal of Digital AH, providing services as a social media auditor and marketer. He is an adjunct faculty instructor of digital marketing courses at several colleges. A former columnist at Mashable and the Huffington Post, Ari
explores new and emerging media on his 5-year-old blog at AriHerzog.com which has led to interviews over the years in online publications including TechRepublic, Poynter, MSNBC, Fast Company, and Federal Computer Week. He manages a LinkedIn group on social media strategies comprising over 2,700 members. His introduction to Social Media Club occurred 2009ish and Ari currently serves as President of the Boston chapter.

Aside from the digital world, Ari is also passionate about civics and communities. He used to work in senior management roles in state and local government; and is currently an elected city councilor in Newburyport, Massachusetts, a position he’s held since 2010. He is involved with numerous boards including the Massachusetts chapter of the American Society for Public Administration. Ari holds a Master in Public Administration from Suffolk University and a Bachelor in Sociology from Worcester State College.

Basil Puglisi

• Twitter: @BasilPuglisi 
• LinkedIn: Basil C. Puglisi 

A Self-motivated and resourceful digital professional with ability to develop new business, increase public awareness, maintain existing relationships and drive profitable sales growth. Ability to develop and implement strategic plans to ensure brand growth.
Basil Puglisi began his exploration of the “Digital Age” with a philosophy of “Read, Write & Share”. The content, which was based around digital and social media became his initial source for professional development.

Basil Puglisi has also sought out traditional learning methods by attending the top conferences like the Search Engine Marketing Expo, New Media Expo, Social Media World Forum, SxSW, Internet Week and more. Additionally, he has also received professional training from Google, Microsoft, AOL, Constant Contact and others in his role as a Partner Agency. These conferences, expos and training sessions help contribute to his professional development which he shares with his followers and colleagues.

Basil Puglisi has been a moderator for panels that include professionals from NBC News, Crain’s Communications, BQE Media, Dragon Search Marketing, Klout, StumbleUpon and also a featured Speaker or Presenter for events like Social Media Week, NYXPO, NYBizExpo, TradeBrooklyn, #140Conf and even a Guest Lecturer for Dowling College, Stony Brook University and Suffolk County Community College. 

Ben Smith

• Twitter: @BenASmith
• Linkedin: Ben A. Smith 

Ben Smith is principal of Social: IRL, a boutique social and new media agency based in Lawrence, Kansas. Social: IRL works with brands across the US to integrate social media in to all aspects of their daily operations through strategic business goals first based solutions. He is also host of the Social: IRL conference series, working with some of the most respected names in the industry to provide in-depth training and education in a format that goes well beyond typical keynote presentation. Ben regularly speaks on social media related topics to national and regional audiences, and guest lectures to journalism and communications students at area colleges and universities. He founded the Lawrence, Kansas, chapter of the Social Media Club and is also an active member of the Kansas City chapter. You can find him on Twitter @benasmith.

Golden Ashby 

• Twitter: @GoldenAshby
• Linkedin: Golden Ashby

Golden is the Social Media Director/Founder of GO 2.0 (http://goldenopps.com/). He leads GO 2.0 in managing new media, online marketing, public relations, web technology, customer service, drive engagement, develop communities, establish measurements, manage content calendars, educate employees and direct social media campaigns/strategies from start to finish for their clients. He lives and breaths social media in both his professional and personal life and loves helping other do the same.

Golden is a seasoned social media marketing professional with over ten years experience in defining/executing strategies that influence repeatable campaigns in social media, public relations, web technologies, market research, creative writing, and execution of online and offline marketing strategies to drive adoption for over fifteen major corporations. Including but not limited to Seagate Technology, Union Bank, VISA, H&R Block, the San Francisco American Marketing Association, Bauer’s Transportation, Capital/Virgin Records and the San Francisco Giants. He holds an MBA from San Francisco State University and a Bachelors of Science in Marketing from Portland State University.

Kathy "Kat" Mandelstein 

• Twitter: @KatMandelstein
• Linkedin: Kat Mandelstein

Kathy (Kat) Mandelstein is the Director of Social Business in the Austin office of Ant’s Eye View. Until recently, Kathy oversaw worldwide marketing programs, web and events as the Director for IBM Collaboration Solutions in IBM Software and for Social Business for all of IBM. Kathy contributes to BtoB Magazine’s BtoBlog. She also serves on the Board of Directors for Social Media Club (http://www.socialmediaclub.org) and is the President of the local Austin Chapter.

In the spring of 2011, Kat served on the IBM Executive Corporate Service Corps in Rio de Jainero. Previously, Kathy led the IBM Rational marketing team focused on the business value of effective software delivery.

Kathy has been a pioneer in launching successful web and social media marketing efforts, as well as developing dedicated web communities dating back to the time that she led http://www.ibm.com/developerWorks and http://www.ibm.com/alphaWorks in addition to marketing programs to developers for IBM. Her past history includes leading various marketing, digit, channel and business development teams in IBM.

Before joining IBM, Kathy managed one of the earliest successful retail Web sites, http://www.jcpenney.com. Kat holds a B.S. in Advertising with Minor in Marketing from the University of Texas at Austin and a Global Leadership MBA from the University of Texas at Dallas. She lives in Austin, Texas with her husband and pomeranian, Luna.

Kemp Edmonds

• Twitter: @KempEdmonds 
• LinkedIn:  Kemp Edmonds

Kemp Edmonds works for Vancouver-based HootSuite as the lead Sales Engineer. HootSuite is the world’s leading social media management system. Kemp was recently named to the Board of Directors for Social Media Club International, the largest professional trade group of it’s kind in the world.

Kemp independently provides consulting, training and recruitment services to aid organizations. Through talks and appearances in the media, Kemp discusses the politics of social networks, online communications, the law and digital culture. He can be found blogging on kempedmonds.com, chopping wood on small islands outside of Vancouver and documenting life through social media.

Serena Ehrlich 

• Twitter: @Serena
• Linkedin: Serena Ehrlich

Over the last 20 years, Serena Ehrlich has worked closely with public and private companies providing guidance on investor and public relation trends. Serena has implemented local, national and international social media campaigns for a wide range of brands including Kraft, Scion, Kohl’s, Avon, Mattel and more.

Serena started her career in advertising where she developed an understanding of branding from a large scale perspective, but it was her 14 years in the newswire industry that placed her squarely at the forefront of a technical, sociological and influential revolution changing the face of customer communications. In 1994, Serena was part of a small team who introduced the communications industry to the internet via a series of first-ever conferences, Her love of technology based communications hasn’t stopped since.

Currently, Serena participates in and oversees the creation and implementation of mobile and social strategies designed to meet a wide-range of customer goals, from brand awareness to customer appreciation and service, to driving potential new fans into the marketing funnel. Serena creates relationships within core and affinity audiences to create 360 degree awareness for brands.

As the director of Marketing for Mogreet, Serena has a unique perspective on the future of mobile marketing (and it ain’t plain text). In addition, Serena serves as the Corporate Secretary of the international Social Media Club board of directors, President of Social Media Club Los Angeles, as well as an Communications VP of the National Investor Relations Institutes’ Los Angeles chapter. She can be found on Twitter (@serena) as well as a wide range of emerging platforms.