New Orleans update: The revolution will be blogged, tagged, syndicated and globalized.
25th June 2007 by Angelo Fernando
Walk through the networking area at the IABC International conference here in New Orleans, and you’d be forgiven if you thought you had mistakenly stepped into a new media event. Flat panel screens display models, hubs, portals, feed rooms, and video products that all promise to engage audiences more, track marketing better, and simplify PR and media relations.
In one analysis, this is the fork in the road for communicators wrestling with the trusty old tools of engagement and the spanky new ones. Topics range from “Is corporate communications a thing of the past” to “Be Heard. Bringing a brand to life.” to Building brands and community via e-marketing” to “The good the bad and the unethical.” The booths for Melcrum and Ragan Communications, the American and British contenders for social media communicators’ hubs are strategically located at different parts of the room. Everything you hear or see seems to have an ‘e’ factor, a global dimension, or a PR-meets-marketing angle. The lines are blurring. The oxygen of new media fills the room.
Terrific stuff. Invigorating to say the least. The coffee pots aren’t conveniently located close to the meeting rooms, but even at 7.30 am, people seem incredibly alert.
Alan Scott’s session on “The Blogging Explosion” had that kind of energy. Scott, the CMO of Dow Jones‘ Enterprise Media Group laid the usual groundwork with references to the Cluetrain Manifesto etc. The four trends we should be aware of are:
* Commodization & Competitiveness
* The New Message Battleground
* Buyers Reward Authenticity
* Markets are global conversations
What was interesting, and telling, was that the presentation turned into great participation. Questions posed by members of the audience were being answered by others. When Scott referenced Bub Lutz’s blog he was corrected by someone from GM.
The blogging explosion, Scott maintained was humanizing the corporation; better, it was providing insight via text mining –gold for CSR, corporate intelligence, PR, HR, Marketing, product groups, and Sales. The disruption (or it it upheaval? Or revolution?) is easy to see because you could buy a camera or car tires without paying any attention to the carefully crafted communications from the marketing, PR and web folk at those companies. You know, folks like us…
It reminded me of the words from song The revolution will not be televised:
The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver’s seat.
And our seat belts are fastened, too.
June 28th, 2007 at 6:30 am
Is this it? 100 percent of the IABC conference info sent out from New Orleans?
I certainly can’t find any hints on the IABC web site directing me to anything else, except some podcasts. And podcasts require me to stick through to the end to find out if anything interesting in contained therein, whereas with print, you can skim down the page looking for value.
I was expecting IABC to embrace “social media” but it has not even posted any “election” results.
BAK
June 28th, 2007 at 8:15 am
Brian–
If you look on IABC’s homepage, you will see “In Session,” that includes the podcasts that Shel Holtz did from conference.
Maybe the reason that there was not a lot of communication coming from conference is that attendees were busy attending sessions, networking with other communicators, visiting exhibitors, working on Habitat for Humanity, and oh, yes, enjoying all that New Orleans has to offer. Sometimes in-person contacts are more compelling than online ones.
Today most people are recovering from a very full few days–including me. More news about what happened later.
Julie
June 28th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Angelo, thank you for two interesting posts. Your post regarding the sports journalist/blogger who was ejected because of live blogging could launch many discussions.
This New Orleans update points out a big advantage of attending conferences in person, rather than relying on bloggers or reporters: you can get a richer perspective when many voices discuss together. That can happen on a blog over time, but we had so many experienced communicators in New Orleans that the odds were good that an exchange like the one surrounding the GM blog could occur.
Brian, IABC set up the In Session blog to offer commentary regarding the 2007 International Conference. Because I wasn’t one of the 12 volunteers set-up to blog the conference, I won’t even try to answer your question. I will say that I only posted a couple of times on my personal blog and podcast, because I wanted to enjoy the conference as a “regular attendee.” I will post on my blog, but since I leave Saturday for vacation, it may be a little while longer.
I’ll send you an email when I’ve posted anything based on the conference.