Today I received a call from a friend that I’ll call, “ValleyCEO,” that started something like this, “I’d like your advice. I’m not sure what I should have the PR agency doing for (insert company name.)”
I knew where this was going.
Advice for Graduating PR Students
@UCSantaBarbara had reached out to me asking what advice I’d have for graduating seniors. I don’t want to repeat the same things everyone else says — Make sure and network! Attention to Detail! – so I thought about what I would say to a student if they were sitting in front of me. This is what came to mind…
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July LA Tech Event Calendar
Happy July everyone. For it being summer there sure is a lot going on and Thursday, July 16th seems to be the most popular day. As always, check back throughout the month because new events and opportunities pop up all the time.
Two events of note: Twiistup 6 is bigger and badder than ever in Universal City at the end of the month and Fortune Brainstorm Tech gets out of SV and comes to LA. Awesome line-up with serious power hitters. Serious reg fee too - $3,500. It ain’t cheap to hang with Diller, ya dig?
Have a great month and see you out and about…
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June LA Tech Event Calendar
Happy June Everyone! A pretty nice selection of events going on this month, including the hefty Social Networking Conference 2009 in Beverly Hills later this month.
Also of note, Twiistup 6 early-bird tickets just went on sale. You’d be smart to snatch some up. They make good bargain tools as the always-sold-out-event gets closer. This time around there’s a two-day conference schedule attached that’s focused on innovation and entrepreneurship — sounds like an area SoCal excels at. So, save the date (July 30th and 31st at the Universal Hilton) and get your shop on.
And one small house-keeping item…if you’d like to get this event listing mailed to you when it goes live, and hear about opportunities in LA (press looking for sources, potential partner and promotion opps, and who knows what else) then join the LATechConnect FB group. I started it almost two years ago under the “SoCal Tech Geek” name, before I knew what was doing with it. Since then, a purpose has emerged so the name is changing.
That’s it. Have a lovely June and see you out and about! - Nicole
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RECURRING WEEKLY:
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Tuesday’s with Exectec
7:30 PM @ D’Amore’s Pizza Connection on Westwood
1136 Westwood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90024
ThursdayLunch
12PM @ Santa Monica/ 3rd
Santa Monica Promenade
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JUNE EVENTS
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Wednesday, June 10th
DealMaker Media LA Presents: Partnering with the Big Dogs: Walk Softly & Carry a Big Stick
6:00-9:30pm
Manatt Phelps and Phillips
11355 W. Olympic Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90064
Big and powerful companies have something you don’t: time. While the dream of scoring an outrageously successful partnership with a market goliath is enticing, the odds are, it ain’t gonna happen. From unequal bargaining power to rights of first refusal, partnership land mines are one of the most misunderstood and underrated topics in the startup world.
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Clients and Agencies Need Couples Counseling & a Translator
Last December, Jennifer Leggio (@mediaphyter) was conducting a survey aimed at in-house professionals that managed an outside PR agency. The goal was to delve into client satisfaction and spotlight areas of disconnect that would expose areas PR agencies could improve or adjust their business to keep up with shifting demands.
I remember thinking, “How nice it must always be for clients and press to share their opinions about how much their agency/agency people suck. How come the PR agency side never gets to have its say? Aren’t there two sides to this discussion?” (The answers to those questions are: 1) Because no one cares if the PR person is disgruntled and 2) Sometimes but not often enough.)
Jennifer and I decided to do the follow-up survey, (read it, it’s fascinating) in large part, to give agency people an opportunity to share their viewpoint. We know it’s not scientific or perfect or even worded the best way, but we did it to try and help. To help further uncover areas agencies can grow stronger and to expose the areas the client-side can improve so they are more satisfied with their ROI.
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MAY LA TECH EVENT CALENDAR
May event calendar now updated to show 5/18-5/30 events. Have fun!
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RECURRING WEEKLY:
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Tuesday’s with Exectec
7:30 PM @ D’Amore’s Pizza Connection on Westwood
1136 Westwood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90024
ThursdayLunch
12PM @ Santa Monica/ 3rd
Santa Monica Promenade
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MAY EVENTS
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Saturday, May 2nd – Sunday, May 3rd
Barcamp LA
10:00am-5:00pm
OTX Research
10567 Jefferson Blvd
Culver City, CA 90232
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Does PR = Executive?
I recently attended a very successful trade show with several members of my company. Our booth was constantly overrun with people and I was able to catch up with an impressive amount of partners, customers, prospects, influencers and press. It was a very active couple of days as far as my long-term PR strategy goes. The connections and plotting that started happening there are small lynch pins in my master plan. This is the part about PR that I love- having a master vision of where you want to take the company and then gathering all the necessary pieces and putting them in place to take you where you want to go.
But this is not the side of PR that most people will ever be exposed to. [click to continue...]
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APRIL LA TECH EVENT CALENDAR
It’s gonna be a busy month… And with so many out-of-towners coming in for TechKaraokeLA.
To name a few: @brett (NY,) @ericaogrady (TX,) @gregarious (SF/NY,) @jessberlin (LV,) @jennicricket (SF,) @rabeidoh (MO,) @jeremyj (NY.)
And I can think of a whole mess of peeps from SF who should roll in as well…Ahem. You know who you are.
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RECURRING WEEKLY:
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Tuesday’s with Exectec
7:30 PM @ D’Amore’s Pizza Connection on Westwood
1136 Westwood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90024
ThursdayLunch
12PM @ Santa Monica/ 3rd
Santa Monica Promenade
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APRIL EVENTS
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Monday, April 13th
Mixergy Presents: Learn PR
12:00-1:00pm
(Watch the one and only Mr. Warner interview yours truly with PR questions from the community.)
To help you get more out of my upcoming interview on “How Startups Can Do Public Relations Well,” I’m trying a couple of new things: 1) taking your question before the interview, and 2) inviting you to watch live
Submit questions here.
Watch it live at noon on Monday, here.
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Monday, April 13th
Webdev/SEO Meetup
7:00-9:00pm
Yahoo
2450 Broadway Ave
Santa Monica, CA
Come learn about how to build search-friendly code from Vanessa Fox, a former Googler and Nathan Buggia, with Microsoft Live Search. We’ll cover the biggest issues search engines face in crawling, indexing, and ranking web apps, and how to write code that eliminates these issues. We’ll also have lots of time for questions and networking.
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Smart PR Examples: Sportgenic & Vitamin Water
While scanning my morning newsletters I noticed a story in AdWeek about Sportgenic, an ad network traditionally helping sports-related advertisers reach a sports-minded audience through online content sites such as Camping.com. In order to further expand revenue within the niche segment of sports, Sportgenic is beginning to offer a blend of offline and online campaigns. The article cites “… the ability for its advertisers to run placements in traditional media, pairing a slate of Web ads on running sites, for instance, with a print campaign in Runner’s World.”
I think this is brilliant and a new way of thinking that PR people need to begin integrating into their planning. That blend of offline and online to feed each other for the greater good of driving traffic, leads, branding, whatever the goal is.
In a discussion at SXSWi interactive someone brought up seeing a Vitamin Water commercial on TV that didn’t say much but pointed to the company’s Facebook fan page. Offline driving online interaction. Taking passive and turning it into action. For those motivated enough to go to the website and join, they’re now connected to the company to receive any number of communications that (hopefully) furthers their interest in the brand and products.
Now that’s PR.
Read one sport fan’s take on joining the Vitamin Water Facebook page.
Read the full AdWeek article: For One Ad Net, the Web Isn’t Enough; Sportgenic looks to old as well as new media for growth
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SXSWi ‘09 = #EPIC #FTW
No #FAIL here.
I’ll first warn you that I am exhausted and exhausted in a way I never have been before. I feel it in my body, my eyes are crossing because I badly need sleep, and I’m on total mental sensory overload so it’s amazing I’m even cognizant enough to write this post. As the astute @stephdub said:
I honestly do not think I should have operated a motor vehicle this morning, nor should I be at work right now. #sxswaftermath #exhausted
I knew it was going to be crazy with sessions and events and conversations but I was not prepared for my first SX. It should be illegal to have that many intelligent, thoughtful, driven and fun professionals in one location, especially when steeped in endless opportunities to engage.
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