Category: media relations

Notes from the National Association of Science Writers conference

If you missed the National Association of Science Writers‘ conference in Baltimore last weekend, you can read about many of the sessions on a conference blog of sorts. Lots of well written posts there. (Personal favorite: Adventures in Alternative Science Communication, which described a session on why talking about science need not be stodgy.) But what else should we expect from a writers conference?

You can also read the views of UMR staffer Lance Feyh, who posted about killer wasps, zombie cockroaches and other things he learned about at the conference on our science blog, Visions.

Three forces changing the face of PR — and an action plan for dealing with the changes

A new white paper from Cymphony — called The Changing Face of PR (PDF; free, but registration required) — describes three forces affecting the public relations business:

  1. Increasing overlap in marketing and public relations. PR is expected to do more product focused activities. Advertising embraces publicity-generating “buzz marketing” tactics to reach influencers. The growth of “social media” such as blogs gives PR more direct contact with the end users of their companies’ products.
  2. Improved measurement. The C-suite demands more rigorous performance and efficiency measurement from all functions. PR departments are under greater pressure to shift from measuring “outputs” like clip counts to “outcomes” like revenue and brand equity growth.
  3. Increasing importance of social media. The rapid proliferation of blogs and social media sites has created a new class of media influencers and new tools to deliver a company’s message to the market.

The white paper also offers a four-step action plan. No spoilers here, though. Download the document and read for yourself. It’s worth the time it takes to register.

Hat tip to EducationPR for the link.

The name game

So one reason I haven’t been posting much here lately is because I’ve been involved in some planning and discussions about changing our campus’ name from the University of Missouri-Rolla to something that better reflects our vision of becoming one of the nation’s top technological research universities. Yesterday, UMR Chancellor John F. Carney III publicly announced his desire to “enter into a discussion” about the name with students, alumni, faculty and staff. So now I, too, can talk publicly about it.
From the news release:

Soon after he joined UMR in September 2005, Carney set a goal of making UMR one of the nation’s top five technological research universities by 2010. While UMR’s marketing materials already carry the tagline of “Missouri’s premier technological research university,” the institution is not as well known as it should be in other parts of the United States, Carney says.

“The University of Missouri-Rolla is unique among the four University of Missouri campuses because of our focus as a technological research university,” Carney says. “We believe a more distinctive name would afford UMR several advantages in recruiting students on a national level.”

Exciting times ahead! A lot of branding and identity issues to be discussed.

But it also means less frequent blogging in the coming weeks. I’ll try to squeeze some thoughts out of my head and onto this site from time to time.

Related posts and news coverage:

PDF presentations from CASE conference

Karine Joly of collegewebeditor.com has uploaded PDFs of the two presentations she and Joe Hice gave at last week’s CASE Annual Conference for Senior Communications and Marketing Professionals. These are excellent both resources, and I thank Karine and Joe for making them available:

Liveblogging from CASE: some final thoughts and a request for feedback

My first adventure in liveblogging from a conference is now behind me. While it was fun — and challenging — to try to capture the immediacy of presentations in real time, it was also stressful. It didn’t allow me to soak up some of the knowledge that was shared, and since I couldn’t be at all of the sessions, the dispatches from Philly gave an incomplete picture about the conference.

(Also, for this old-school reporter used to scribbling down notes and quotes in a reporter’s notebook, trying to compose on-the-fly blog posts on the laptop wasn’t quite as easy as I thought it’d be.)

I hope the nuggets that I and Karine Joly passed along from the conference sessions were of some value to our readers who could not attend in person. Of course, there’s nothing like being there, and I would encourage anyone who missed this year’s conference to make plans now to attend next year’s.
This also was my first experience co-chairing a national-level conference for CASE. This, too, was a rewarding experience, because I got to work with and get acquainted with so many terrific folks in the advancement field. My conference co-chair, Lynette Brown-Sow of the Community College of Philadelphia, helped keep the energy level high throughout the conference (even as she had to deal with some brushfires — or maybe they were wildfires? — back on campus). Lisa Schooley, the educational programs manager for CASE, kept everything organized and on track, and was always, somehow, at the right place at the right time. Our faculty — the aforementioned Karine Joly, Joe Hice, Kathi Swanson, Larry Lauer, bloggers Dave and Dan, Rae Goldsmith from CASE, and all the rest — were top-notch. It was great, too, meeting so many of the conference attendees. I learned much from them in personal conversations and small groups. (I ‘ll stop now, before this post starts sounding too much like an acceptance speech.)

A request for input

To those who read this blog during the conference, and to those who attended the conference live, I would like to ask for some input, either in the comments to this post or via email (andrew DOT careaga AT gmail DOT com).

  • For the readers: How beneficial was this little three-day experiment in sharing information from the conference? Was there enough information? Too little? Too much? Was it relevant? Irrelevant?
  • For conference attendees: What did you like best about the conference? What suggestions do you have for improving this annual meeting?

I’ll be certain to share your thoughts with the folks at CASE. (Unless you request otherwise. Of course, if you post on this blog, then anyone who reads will see your comments. That’s one of the beautiful things about the blogosphere.)

Thanks for reading, and for sharing.