So I just ‘broke’ this news over on the Voce Nation, thought I’d share it here too, the short of it is this: 1) Voce has scooped up the entire cnp_studio team, a group of web developers that specialize in social media design and development work; 2) We’ve formed a combined (social media marketing + web development) service team within Voce that’s now called “Voce Connect;” and 3) We’ve been quietly working together for months now, winning a mix of social media marketing and web development projects with some of the biggest consumer and business brands in the world, much of which we’ll be showcasing and sharing on our new company site which we rolled out today too. Our press page has all the details, and I’ll be posting more on this shortly, but suffice to say, it’s a big day for our company and a good measure of how our firm’s thinking about the changing landscape for marketing and communications. There’s much, much more to come.
Updates from April, 2009
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Voce Adds Web Dev Team, Forms “Voce Connect”
mike manuel
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Voce’s Sponsoring WordCamp SF
mike manuel
So over on the Voce Nation blog, I just posted the news that we’re sponsoring WordCamp SF (it’s taking place later this month, get on it!) As far as I know, we’re one of the few PR firms to get behind a WordCamp event in this sort of way, at very least, we’re one of the first to get behind the SF event. Regardless, it makes a *ton* of sense for our business right now, both in terms of how we’ve been using WordPress and related tech with clients like eBay, PlayStation, Yahoo!, and others, but maybe more importantly, with publishing and networking platforms like WordPress MU and BuddyPress now gaining momentum, the ways we can bend and stretch these platforms for communication and marketing programs feels at times damn near limitless. Anyway, we have some very cool WordPress-related projects in the works, some of which the team may be sharing at WordCamp, others we’ll be talking about later this summer. Hope to see you there later this month.
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Integrated Programs Are The “New Normal”
mike manuel
Alright, the need to integrate marketing and comms work these days makes a world of sense, trust me, I get it, but you know, when that need requires competitors to come together and work directly with each other, perhaps in ways they might not otherwise, it really forces you to rethink what were once comfortable business boundaries. Case in point, I’m spearheading a social media program and working with an ad firm (that offers social media services), a PR agency (that offers social media services) and a web shop (that, yes, offers social media services). It’s unique for sure, and yeah, at times, it tests an already unhealthy paranoia most service folks have over their IP, but it’s also becoming more common, especially in this market, so maybe in an odd sort of way it’s just slowly turning into the new normal?
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Welcome to Voce Chris Thilk
mike manuel
So my colleague Josh Hallett just posted the news that we’ve hired Chris Thilk, and yeah, to say the least, everyone on our team is very fired up to be working with him.
Chris was one of the early social media strategists at MWW Group, working with folks like Tom Biro on the Nikon and Samsung accounts and really helped shape what became the DialogueMedia digital division. For a long time now, Chris has also been the guy behind the guy blogging at Movie Marketing Madness. I think Josh said it best with:
“[We've] always had a list of folks in the industry that we really respect. Folks that walk the walk, more than they talk the talk, and Chris Thilk is one of them.”
It’s true. While there’s no shortage of social media experts these days, finding people who actually have solid experience managing both the strategic and tactical parts of big brand social media programs, is, well, almost impossible to find. With Chris, we found both. And he’s already busy working on Comcast, Intel and a few client wins we’ve yet to talk about.
The addition and news of Chris marks the first in a sequence of announcements we have quietly in the works. More to come…
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Why Blogging Has Become Harder
mike manuel
So I spent some time over the holidays looking back over my blog, my tweets, my status updates and the like, basically, reviewing all the places I’m active online and, well, it turns out I’m really not that active at all. Or at least I’m less active than I used to be.
Am I surprised? Nah, not really.
The truth is, last year was an amazingly good, but challenging year for me at Voce. We won several big accounts. We grew our team. We formalized partnerships (and forged new ones). We innovated. And where we could, we shared what was working. And amidst all of this, I must admit, I felt an increasing need (really, a responsibility) to focus whatever extra attention, energy and know-how I had on my projects, my clients and my teams.
As a result, I went dark online.
But here’s the other truth: My insularity was also influenced by my frustration with the signal to noise ratio, especially around social media consulting. When everybody’s talking and acting like they’re the experts, the last thing I wanted to do — really, the last thing I could do — was to try and show my expertise by shouting the loudest or talking the longest. That doesn’t help anyone, plus, you know, I don’t want to be that guy. Also, it bears mentioning, after reading stuff like this, it just begs the question:
Who’s *really* benefiting from what I share here?
That answer used to be “me,” it was a place where I could kick around my own actions and ideas and either through reflection or dialogue, I could learn something. Maybe share something too. And while I haven’t exactly given up on that, nowadays, I look at my site metrics, and the comments and the links and I see an awful lot of my competitors here. Fortunately, I see a lot of my colleagues, my partners, my clients, my business prospects and my recruiting candidates here too, which is motivating.
So, am I giving up on this blog?
Nah. This year marks my 5th year blogging and there’s much I’m still admittedly learning, and much still I’d like to explore further here — be it with my colleagues, clients, competitors or otherwise. I think the reality of the economy we’re in and the responsibilities I have will just dictate the frequency of things. I’m gonn’a try, however, to get a couple of posts up per month and be a little better about up leveling the discourse and debate in this industry — including calling bullshit when I see it…
In between, I’ll be right here, oh and here, here, here, here, here, here, and here, so, you know, easy enough to find.
So with that I’ll just say…more to come. Happy new year, folks.
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PlayStation’s This Week’s PRWeek Cover Story
mike manuel
Aarti Shah with PRWeek pens this week’s cover story (PDF) on client Sony PlayStation. The piece is a bit of a case study that recounts some of the company’s fairly well-known missteps over the years, but more importantly, it digs into PlayStation’s rebound and recovery efforts the last 18 months — and how their social media strategy is leading the way.
“After a huge misstep in the blogosphere, Sony PlayStation has come back with a plan to engage consumers and win back trust.”
If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll know I’m a big believer that our industry *desperately* needs more case studies. I started to talk about this program for the first time earlier this year at the NewComm Forum. This cover story peels back another layer, and we’ll continue to share more leading into the fall at a handful of industry speaking gigs including the PRSA International Conference in October.
And yes, before you ask, that’s exactly how I sit in all my client meetings. Enjoy.
Related Links:
Submit Now! 2008 SNCR Excellence in New Communications Awards[Photo credit: PRWeek - Cross Posted to Voce Nation]
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PlayStation Shares “Lessons Learned” Blogging
mike manuel
The case study chat with the new media team behind Sony PlayStation’s blog went well yesterday afternoon at the NewComm Forum, we actually covered a lot of ground - everything from content development and technical design to community management tactics and measurement. By the end of our session, the PlayStation guys had shared 15 “lessons learned” over the last year. I won’t re-hash all those here, I think some of them were fairly obvious and well documented, but there were a few lesser known/lesser discussed tips that shook out that are worth mentioning, here are three:
Sorry, Your Clever Blog Name Doesn’t Matter
Well, it matters less than you think, especially for big brands, big companies like PlayStation. Fact of the matter is that most people are typing “playstation blog” or a simple variation thereof in the search engines to find the blog. A lot of referral sites are also attributing/linking to the blog with the same simple terms, so, you know, if you’re working on a blog right now, don’t kill yourself over-thinking the name. There’s a good chance people won’t remember it or use it anyway…
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Welcome, Josh Hallett…Officially.
mike manuel
The matching hat, keychain and drink holder are in the mail.
I’ll post more on this here in the days to come, but for now you can read my post on the Voce blog and of course, Josh’s blog.
Much more to come, much more to say.
Technorati Tags: hyku, josh hallett, voce communications
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Sigler Joins Voce Nation
mike manuel
I’d be remiss and a crap coworker if I didn’t extend a quick welcome to my new Voce compat and new media comrade in arms, Scott Sigler. If you don’t know Scott, you’ll find plenty of bits and bytes about him online, not least of which is that he was the first author to podcast-publish a full novel (EarthCore), and now he’s going “all hollywood” on us as of this week with news that his stuff’s being scooped up by the movie studios. Congrats and welcome, Mr. Sigler, I’m looking forward to working with you, dude.
Technorati Tags: scott+sigler, voce+communications
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Weckerle Joins Voce Nation
mike manuel
For those who have already picked up on the trail of breadcrumbs, this’ll come as no surprise, for everyone else, a quick welcome here for my new Voce colleague and blogger chum, Andrea Weckerle.
Andrea gave up a successful new media consulting gig and the comfort of her east coast roots, to come join us here in Kalifornia as I and others inside Voce continue to groom and grow our own new media expertise, along with new clients and a new office.
It’s a big win and I’m fired up we’ll be working together, there is much to share and learn.
Welcome Andrea!
Technorati Tags: andrea weckerle, voce communications
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Coffee’s For Closers
mike manuel
I submit evidence that Matt Podboy has had his sights on my MarketingSherpa Best Blog coffee mug for some time now…
Exhibit A, his desk.
Congrats Active Voice, glad to see we’ll be keeping this one in the family.
Coffee’s for closers;)
Technorati Tags: awards, Blogging, marketingsherpa, matthew podboy, PR
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NewComm Forum Approaches
mike manuel
The new media marketing universe, or at least what looks to be a good chunk of it, is set to descend on Palo Alto the week after next for the second annual NewComm Forum. The speaker lineup looks sick, as does the schedule, so my hat’s off to Elizabeth Albrycht, Jen McClure and their team for pulling together what I expect will be another kick-butt conference. If you can peel away from things to attend either the pre-conference boot camp, and/or the day sessions it’ll be well worth your time and money — in fact, I was given this promotional code (NCFR200) last week which apparently shaves $200 off the registration (more here).
On day two of the conference, I’ll be leading a panel talk with the influencer marketing team at Yahoo! (”Engaging the Influencers“), who are also my clients, and we’ll share and discuss how the combined Voce/Yahoo! team is actively listening to and engaging with influencer communities, as well as reviewing some of the tools and tactics we regularly use, and finally digging, I hope with help from the audience, a little deeper into some real-world examples of how this program works *with* marketing and PR inside the company. If there are things you’d like to hear us discuss, leave a comment here or send me an email.
Two more conference-related things worth pointing out here:
First, my “esteemed” colleague and now two-time NewComm speaker, Matthew Podboy (Active Voice), will be leading a discussion the afternoon of March 3rd, entitled “New Marketing Case Studies,” with Dave Parmet and DL Byron, which from what I hear, should be very interesting.
Finally, and most important, Voce’s teaming up with the SNCR, BlogHer and Girls for a Change to host a dinner fundraiser the evening of March 1st to support non-profit organizations pioneering the use of new communications tools. It’s a good cause with some great entertainment lined up, so I wanted to simply call it out here and encourage folks to RSVP.
See you at NewComm next month!
Technorati Tags: Bay Area, Events, PR, puppy, puppy, SNCR, Social Media, Voce
