- Pivot Communication has been named agency of record for St. Louis-based healthcare management services company Peak PACE Solutions.
- Metzger Associates has been retained by Waxing the City, a Denver-based group of exclusive waxing salons devoted solely to the art of hair removal.
Month: July 2009
McAfee to Acquire Englewood-based MX Logic
104 West client MX Logic has agreed to be acquired by McAfee for $140 million.
Keeton PR Adds Spatial Technology Company to Client Roster
Keeton Public Relations has been retained by Aiken, S.C.-based Bradshaw Consulting Services to help increase awareness of the company’s spatial technologies.
CPR Names Schenkein VP of Marketing
Bob Schenkein, who founded and later sold now defunct Schenkein Public Relations, has joined Colorado Public Radio as vice president of marketing. Schenkein is promising to improve classical music’s fuddy-duddy image in Colorado, and cited his multi-colored bow-tie as proof that he’s the man for the job.
Threats, Mommy Bloggers and Crocs
The Washington Post may be bearish on Crocs’ future, but that isn’t enough to stop mommy bloggers from doing whatever it takes to get a free pair.
‘The Latest Word’
I’m not sure if it is jury duty, vacation or court-ordered community service, but Michael Roberts appears to have taken a brief hiatus from Westword’s “The Latest Word” blog, and Joe Tone is filling in. You should check it out; Joe is definitely one of the funnier/more sarcastic writers in town.
Denver PR Jobs
Among those hiring this week are the National Endowment for Financial Education, CaridianBCT, Children’s Hospital, JANUS, Make-A-Wish Foundation of Colorado, Navarro Research and Engineering, The Broomfield Enterprise, KKTV (Colorado Springs), KOAA-TV (Colorado Springs), Black Hills Energy (Pueblo) and Festivals, DC Ltd. (Washington, D.C.).
Dovetail Promotes Miller
Dovetail Solutions has promoted Gordon Miller to Senior Partner of Strategic Services. Miller will continue to direct the firm’s Executive Leadership Strategies practice and will manage “strategic client solutions and connections.”
Bob Kendrick Update, Sponsored by Moosehead
My seventh favorite philosopher/theologian Desiderus Erasmus famously said, “In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.” And in that spirit, charisma-challenged former 9News anchor Bob Kendrick has made the move to Canada. Kendrick, whose professional obituary by Westword’s Michael Roberts described him as “steady, reliable and dull,” has landed as a reporter and occasional weekend anchor at CHEK News in Vancouver.
KMGH’s Awards Haven’t Translated to Audience Share
Joanne Ostrow at the Denver Post throws a little love at the highly regarded yet lowly rated KMGH/Channel 7 news team:
“Despite having a newsroom staff 20 percent smaller than that of Channel 4 and Channel 9, and having notably less marketing muscle, Channel 7 has emerged as the station to beat in terms of content and quality.”
It Can’t Be Good When it Takes Danny Bonaduce to Make You Seem Normal
If you were in Denver in the late 1990s, you likely remember the train wreck that was Jamie White of Alice 105.9’s “Frosty, Frank & Jamie” morning show. So although it is not that surprising to learn that White has been charged with a felony, it is somewhat surprising that it took a decade to finally happen. Bill Husted at the Denver Post has the details.
Pro Bono Opportunity – Colorado Ovarian Cancer Alliance
The Colorado Ovarian Cancer Alliance is looking for some pro bono public relations support for its Second Annual “March on the Capitol” as part of this September’s National Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month. If you or your firm are willing to help, please contact Dianna Hemphill via email or phone (970.690.3214)
Open for Debate
Was Barack Obama “the first presidential candidate to move beyond traditional PR tactics?”
Are Your HARO Responses Making the Cut?
Freelance journalist Pam Baker shares what she is looking for in – and how she weeds out – PR responses to HARO postings.
Social Media a Reliable Marketing Tool for ‘Mom & Pop’ Shops
The New York Times profiles a new breed of small business owners who are turning to cost-effective social media tactics to make up for a lack of marketing budget.
Linhart PR Launches Fogo de Chao
Linhart PR launched the Denver location of Brazilian steakhouse Fogo de Chao last night with a pre-opening party that included everyone from Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper to Nuggets Forward (and Brazil native) Nene to my gal pal Penny Parker. The restaurant, located downtown at 15th and Wynkoop, officially opens tonight.
(Photo by Lori Midson/Westword)
Great Moments in Journalism XVII
This is what happens when you replace every seasoned reporter you have with inexpensive 22-year-olds who may or may not be experiencing ‘roid rage.
Denver News Channels Unveil ‘Pool Coverage’ System
It’s no secret that the news resources of local television affiliates are stretched thin. Layoffs have hit every station, and the Fox31/WB2 “marketing agreement” looks to be the future of local news. But it was still surprising to see the details that Pete Webb of Webb PR shared of a new “pool coverage” system that Fox31, 9News, KMGH7, CBS4 and Univision are implementing.
Starting today, the five stations will pool coverage of up to three events per day. The pool is on a rotating basis with each station responsible one day a week. The assignment desks will join a conference call each morning at 8:30 a.m. to determine which events will be covered by a pool representative, and the resulting raw video will be sent to all stations at 3 p.m. According to Webb, the arrangement “is intended for newsworthy events that all the stations would customarily cover on their own, such as gubernatorial news conferences, the Mayor’s State of the City, product launches, events.”
Says Webb, “My fervent hope is that we’ll see more enterprise reporting, now that crews are being freed up, but I’m not holding out much hope. More likely, viewers will see more of the same, with identical footage on each broadcast. That doesn’t reward creativity, enterprise, or just good old fashioned newsgathering, and it doesn’t reward the viewer.”
Who Hates United Airlines More than Metzger’s Doyle Albee?
I assumed no one. Then I read about Dave Carroll.
Denver PR Jobs
Among those hiring this week are The Colorado Health Foundation, Arrow Electronics, University of Colorado at Boulder, Professional Bull Riders (Colorado Springs), Smuckers (Orrville, Ohio) and the NASA Kennedy Space Center (Orlando, Fla.).
ESPN Targets Local Sports
If the Denver Post is planning for local sports coverage to be the silver bullet that retains subscribers, then this has to be a scary thought.
Washington Post Article Slams Crocs’ Future
Ok, so maybe Crocs will make it, maybe it won’t. But who woke up Washington Post reporter Ylan Q. Mui so he (or she, I have no idea) could piss all over the Niwot company this morning? Seriously, Crocs’ stock dropped from roughly $75 to about $0.95 from November 2007 – November 2008, and Mui decides now – seven months later with the stock up about 340 percent since the lows – is the time to write this story? Quite a scoop. Perhaps tomorrow’s follow-up will be that oil is unlikely to sustain a price of $144/barrel. Regardless, Crocs CEO John Duerden used the company blog to respond to Mui’s article.
NBC vs. NBC?
I’ve often wondered why NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox don’t simply bypass their cash-strapped local affiliates and offer programming directly to viewers via cable and satellite. If ESPN can charge cable and satellite companies $2.50 per month per subscriber, imagine what the Big 4 could charge (they currently receive nothing). Certainly enough to make up for the 12 percent of the population that they would lose because they still view television via over-the-air signals.
Along those lines, Local Newser takes a look at an interesting trend – NBC purchasing “local” Web site domain names in cities such as Denver where NBC does not own a station. Local Newser’s question: Does NBC intend, perhaps, to use its domain “NBCDenver.com” to compete locally against 9News/KUSA?
F@#&ing RFPs
If you haven’t found a reason to hate RFPs yet, here you go.
(Hat tip to Elaine Ellis)
Fox31 Lays Off Six More
Meteorologist Chris Dunn and reporters Audra Ensign and Charlie Brennan were among six laid off at KDVR/Fox31 yesterday. Joanne Ostrow at the Denver Post has the details.
MGA Lands Two More Awards with Rocky Mountain Arsenal
MGA, with its clients at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal,was awarded the IABC’s Bronze Quill Award and the AMA’s Gold Peak Award for its campaign for the Refuge Roundup 2008. The communications program for the event is credited with doubling visitation over the previous year.
Guttau Honored by Kidney Foundation
Congratulations to Guttau’s Jim Guttau, who received the Mission Champion Award from the National Kidney Foundation of Colorado, Montana and Wyoming for the agency’s efforts to expand awareness about kidney disease to a generation of young adults who otherwise would know very little about kidney disease.
Dovetail Looking for a Manager of Client Services
Dust off the resume: Dovetail Solutions is interviewing for a Manager of Client Services position. The agency requires three years of public relations experience (agency or in-house), and the position comes with full health benefits paid. Resumes and other materials should go to alexis@dovetailsolutions.com.
Interview with Deirdre Breakenridge, Author of “Putting the Public Back in Public Relations”
Metzger’s Doyle Albee has an interview with author Deirdre Breakenridge, who with Brian Solis wrote Putting the Public Back in Public Relations: How Social Media is Reinventing the Aging Business of PR. Here is an excerpt of that interview (you can read the entire interview on Metzger’s “Media in the Millennium” blog):
Doyle Albee: What one common PR practice would you like to see stopped immediately?
Deirdre Breakenridge: For too long, public relations professionals have been accepting corporate broadcast messages that are pushed from the top down. We’ve also contributed to taking these messages and crafting news releases riddled with hype, spin and industry jargon that doesn’t make sense to anyone except for the executives who approved them.
There’s a much better approach; it’s a bottom up strategy that consists of listening to customers and other stakeholders in their web communities and then providing the story and information that is customized to their needs. Today, PR professionals must help brands to see that they can have direct conversations with their customers, if and only if they stay away from the meaningless broadcast messages. Brands must focus on helping people to gather, share and organize information to make informed purchases. I would like to see PR professionals put the public back in public relations and that means abandoning a broadcast message mentality and truly taking a one-on-one approach that lets you listen and engage with people to build a strong relationship.
DA: What positive practice do you see many practitioners still doing too little of?
DB: There are PR professionals who are solely relying on Internet and social media communications rather than picking up the telephone to talk to the media or other important influencers. Technology makes it so easy to forget about the human voice connection. However, it’s critical to take all of the digital connections and turn the virtual into physical reality. After all, the best outcome of social networking is a meeting with a blogger or influencer, whether it’s on the telephone or in person.
Human interaction will always be the most important means to truly build a relationship, which takes time and commitment. Sure, a lot of progress can be made via the Internet. For example, Brian Solis and I wrote our entire book without ever meeting in person. There was a lot of email and IM back and forth as well as social networking. But, the bottom line… when we met in person that’s when the relationship grew and reached new heights. Today, Brian and I are on the telephone, at conferences presenting together and working both online and offline to promote our book.
So, as practitioners, although we have to keep up with our Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn status updates, it’s imperative that we move these interactions forward. Pick up the phone or meet in person; that’s the point where the friendship is validated and it becomes even stronger.
Former 5280 Editor to Offer Pitching Tips at PRSA Event
Former 5280 Deputy Editor Cara McDonald will share writing/pitching tips in a special PRSA “Lemonade and Learning” session from 4:00 to 5:30 pm on Wednesday, July 17. Details are here.
Denver Post Raises Newsstand Rate 50 Percent
The Denver Post announced this morning that it will increase the cost of newsstand copies to 75 cents, which translates to a little more than 37 cents per business page on Mondays.
NYT Article Starts the PR Dominos Falling
Metzger’s Doyle Albee analyzes tech/business blogger Dave Taylor’s response to TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington’s rant about a New York Times profile of publicist Brooke Hammerling.
(If you feel like you need a scorecard to keep it all straight, let me see if I can help: Hammerling represents the social/flitty/vapid approach to PR that infuriates Arrington, who is a cranky purist who thinks that PR [and perhaps all marketing] interferes with the natural selection that should determine whether products succeed or fail. Meanwhile, Taylor is a realist who thinks Arrington needs to acknowledge that there is a role for PR to play, and Albee thinks we shouldn’t extrapolate too much from this Hammerling scenario because one example of ineffective PR doesn’t mean all PR is ineffective.)
Denver PR Jobs
Among those hiring this week are The Children’s Hospital, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services, Mercy Housing, the Society for Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration and the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.
Guttau Picks Up Education Awards
Guttau Public Relations picked up two Colorado School Public Relations Association (COSPRA) awards with its client, Colorado Springs School District 11.
Is Twitter Ultimately Doomed?
Scatterbox makes the case that “engagement” eventually will give way to noise and a relentless bombardment that will cause the “the hottest social media thing since the one before it” to collapse under its own weight.
Nuggets PR Director Takes Memphis Position
Denver Nuggets public relations director Eric Sebastian is leaving to accept a job as director of basketball operations for the University of Memphis.