End of an Era at IndustryWeek

It's worth noting that John Teresko, senior technology editor of IndustryWeek magazine retired this week after 50 years. Consider that number. FIFTY YEARS! The big 5-0! John started covering technology and the manufacturing industry when TV was black and white with just three channels, America was the manufacturing center of the world, commercial airlines flew planes and not jets, America's Big 3 ruled the automobile market and rock n' roll was just taking hold. It's mind boggling when you consider...

Your 'friends' don't need to know your business

That sounds exactly like something my mother would have told me while I was growing up. She might have used the term "neighbors" instead of "friends." She was very big on privacy and believed the less information you shared, the better off you were. Apparently Mom should be a social media consultant these days. Mike Musgrove of the Washington Post pointed to a story in the San Francisco Chronicle about an Arizona man whose house was robbed after he had...

Content marketing: For B2B companies and taco trucks

This is the second part of my conversation with Lois and our client Ed Brice of Lumension Security. In part one, we discussed the impact that social media is having on B2B marketing. Our conversation started with a look at short-term vs. long-term thinking, then explored how marketers should start thinking about social media as a way to enhance the identity of a company. In this podcast, we discussed the importance of creating content that is personal and conversational in...

How B2B marketers should think about social media

We are pleased to bring you the latest episode in our Beyond the Hype podcast series. For this podcast, I sat down with Lois Paul and Ed Brice, SVP of Worldwide Marketing for Lumension Security, an LP&P client, to discuss the impact that social media is having on B2B marketing. Ed is a big believer in social media and blogs regularly about how it is changing the game for marketers. Our conversation started with a look at short-term vs. long-term...

Advertising vs PR -- amazingly, the debate continues

One of my colleagues pointed out a piece in CNN Money.com answering a question about which of the marketing elements -- advertising or PR -- would be more effective for a smaller company during the recession. If you really boiled down all of the answers and the comments to the posting, the answer would be "it depends." But I found a few nuggets that I thought would be good to share. First of all, the person posing the question received...

Sustainable social media starts and ends with listening

It's been great that more and more of my conversations with clients have moved from, "should we do social media", to, "how can we make it sustainable, create momentum and achieve measurable results?" For us, this means it's time to roll up our sleeves and have some fun. We've helped many of those clients start blogs, Twitter channels and Facebook pages, which is followed by the challenge of building a following. There are tools available to take short cuts to...

Collaboration and social media are good, to a point

I've been noticing a phenomenon with my college age children -- both are very different, but very bright and independent people -- to text their friends and roommates and even my husband and I before making decisions. Instead of doing the research up front, they practice an iterative approach to many aspects of their daily lives. Shopping for college memorabilia during graduation weekend, my daughter texted one of her friends for counsel on what to choose. Determining which local sandwich...

It's all about your people

Over the past couple weeks some of the best and brightest of LP&P represented us well as we won Best Places to Work awards both in Boston, MA and Austin, Texas. This is a very meaningful award to me, as it represents our employees' view of our agency in both locations. It is particularly gratifying -- and humbling -- to have these great people vote our agency one of the best places to work during a year in which the...

"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." Mark Twain

Those of us who run or work for public relations agencies can definitely relate to Mark Twain's famous comment to a reporter. I actually thought the rumors that PR is going the way of the Ark had subsided for a while, but they seem to be surfacing again. One of my clients, Ed Brice of Lumension, was kind enough to ask me to do a guest blog post about PR and social media and the first question he asked me...

The new rules of marketing require new company DNA

Ben McConnell published an excellent post today on the "roots of word of mouth". This got me to thinking about a planning meeting I was in recently with a client that has been pushing forward with social media for over a year now with nice small wins along the way. The purpose of the meeting was take a step back and look more deeply at how it could build on its initial experience. A question posed to me and my...