Karen Richards

Background

About Karen Richards

Seeking consulting and contract projects.* I have 20 years experience in marketing and communications with 15 years specializing in social media, word of mouth marketing and community building. I am passionate about connecting people, businesses, and communities for mutual success through meaningful partnerships and experiences, social media and Word of Mouth Marketing. I was fortunate enough to create one of the first established roles in social media and carve out my own career which has allowed me to be a leader in the industry, experiment, be wildly creative and embrace changing technology. I fundamentally understand how social media is reshaping internal and external communications for large organizations and have been at the forefront of shaping policy, employee education and training. In my recent role as Senior Social Networking Strategist at Mount Royal University, I was responsible for enhancing the reputation and profile of the institution through social media with expertise in the development and the knowledge management of the university's social media guidelines, protocols and process, content creation, issue and crisis management, and data analysis. I am an Instructor and a Curriculum Developer in the Faculty of Continuing Education developing and teach courses on marketing strategies, social media and word of mouth marketing for marketing, communications and public relations professionals. In collaboration with MRU and the Diversity Institute and Advanced Digital and Professional Training (ADaPT) at Toronto Metropolitan University I created the Building an Inclusive Brand course, a Marketing for Business course and a Personal Branding workshop. I founded an organized an annual foodie brand that ran successfully for over a decade as a Word of Mouth Marketing experiment called Poutine With Purpose in support of Canadian charity, Mealshare. Over poutines were sold during Poutine With Purpose - the buy one give one model of Mealshare mean this provided over meals to youth in need.