Events

Music industry focused PR and online marketing agency Shore Fire Media sent out invites to their annual holiday party today. Appropriately, they riff on the Kanye West MTV Awards fiasco meme. We've removed date and location info so all you grubby PRNewser readers don't go attacking their open bar. We kid. We love our readers, but we just can't spread this invite to the entire Internet.

Shore Fire current and recent clients include Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello, Paul Simon and Diana Krall. The company also has branched out into corporate work with companies like TuneCore, Toyota, Heineken, Dunkin' Donuts and Sirius Satellite Radio. PRNewser attended and covered the agency's holiday party last year.

RELATED: PRNewser Interview: Mark Satlof, Shore Fire Media VP

This PRNewser walked into the office today only to find a massive holiday wreath had been hung in the lobby. What a great day to send out our holiday party invites, we thought. So, here it is, folks. The holiday party of the season has been officially announced, and we hope to see you all there!

Jason and I will be hosting, and we'll have complimentary appetizers and great drink specials, as the invite suggests. Please RSVP in advance and spread the word.

How much of an agency's revenue should come from digital? Did social media win Barack Obama the presidency? How will the financial industry remake itself in the midst of massive scandal and meltdown? These were just some of the questions debated last night at "The Business of PR" panel discussion hosted by The Economist at the 92YTribeca in New York.

The panelists, Burson-Marsteller CEO Mark Penn, Rubenstein Communications President Steven Rubenstein and Ruder Finn CEO Kathy Bloomgarden were joined by moderator Mathew Bishop, American Business Editor and NY Bureau Chief of The Economist.

"Your life is more and more on the record if you're someone of interest, and that's just a fact of life," said Penn, in regards to new media. "There is much more engagement than ever before with bloggers, journalists," he said. In terms of CEOs or politicians who once thought that they could ignore one or two detractors, "that just can't exist in this environment."

Ruder Finn's Bloomgarden disagreed, and stated, "You can ignore people."

Click continued to read the complete recap and view PRNewser's video interview with Burson-Marsteller CEO Mark Penn.

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We're covering the 2009 PRSA conference from afar today through sources and the #prsa09 hashtag, and the message seems to be tools, tools, tools. Firms need them, and sponsors are there to schmooze and sell them. Among the tiers of sponsors are six of the press release wire services, and measurement, monitoring, and database tools from big to small including Cision, VMS, Moreover and BlueVision. The controversial paid social media facilitator Izea is on the scene too, giving out merch.

Tension and trepidation over social media and the corresponding tools is alway palpable at PR conferences, though much has changed since PRNewser launched in 2007 in time to cover PRSA Philadelphia. According to PitchEngine founder Jason Kintzler, "I think it's been very telling. The people we've met are past, 'what is social media' - now, they're asking for what's next."

Still the big trade organization for the industry has some learning to do itself. We're told that nowhere within the conference is the Twitter stream displayed, and wi-fi isn't readily available.

Sarah Evans--Kintzler's TweetUp co-host tonight--reported that wireless access in the exhibitor area is a whopping $250.

The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival is the most prominent advertising festival in the world. This past year, the festival added a PR category for the first time, and awards were won by Weber Shandwick, MS&L Worldwide, Taylor and Ketchum.

Tony Burgess-Webb, Chief Marketing Officer and Executive Vice President, Hill & Knowlton, told PRNewser that PR submissions "were low" with 450 entries. "The number of the PR category entries that actually came from PR agencies was less than 43%, and the winning entry came from a Sydney-based ad agency," he said. "So from point of view of panel of judges - Hill and Knowlton had two judges on panel - it was pretty disappointing."

Burgess said that the Cannes team asked what they could do about the low turnout in regards to PR. In response, Hill & Knowlton hosted an event with the PRCA - PRSA's equivalent in the UK - and invited 100 agencies to come in and hear about how they can win a gold at Cannes next year. "The fact is it's not an advertising festival, it's a marketing communications festival. Why not drop the whole title," asked Burgess-Webb. "I certainly think they should," he said.

Asked if the festival is dropping advertising from the title this year to appeal to a broader audience, Philip Thomas, CEO of Cannes Lions said, "No, that's not correct" and did not elaborate further.

Rob Flaherty, President and Senior Partner, Ketchum delivered the opening remarks at today's sold out Critical Issues Forum, hosted by the Council of PR Firms. The theme of this year's event was, "Aftershock: Restoring Confidence and Trust in 2010," and Flaherty pointed out that 80 years ago today was Black Tuesday, which led to the stock market crash of 1929.

"Statistics on drop in trust are incredible, like nothing we've seen our career," said Flaherty. "Are we willing to anticipate stakeholder expectations and push companies to change? Are we willing to step up to the plate and shape corporate character, not just words?" he asked.

Following Flaherty's remarks was a panel discussion that got contentious at a few points, mostly between James Wiggins, Executive Director, Corporate Communications, Morgan Stanley and Susie Gharib, Anchor and Senior Strategic Advisor, Night Business Report.

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"I use trust to move revenue," said Chris Brogan at an event held at the Harvard Club in New York this morning. Brogan was joined by his Trust Agents co-author Julien Smith, alongside David Maister and Charlie Green, authors of The Trusted Advisor.

The panel discussion examined how trust, one of the basic human qualities, can be earned and developed within communities not just for marketing or business purposes, but because, "people trust people, people don't trust companies," said panelist Charlie Green.

Smith added that the concept of trust hasn't changed, but "the megaphone has changed," referring to new media. Brogan took things one step further when he asked, "What if you made your most disgruntled customer your CMO? What effect would that have on your business?"

However, Brogan isn't one to be vague when it comes to the end goal of building trust. He kept getting back to revenue and concrete business goals when asked how he measures his work with clients. "Yield over time" and "driving awareness into the sales funnel," were two specifics he mentioned. Does this sound shallow? Perhaps, but Brogan and the panelists all insisted that businesses must move profitability from simply an "objective" to a "sideways outcome." Meaning: make good stuff, treat people right, and the profits will follow.

In the wake of FTC clampdown on blogger payola, and just plain bad offers to buy coverage, Thrillist and title sponsor Jet Blue are doing it right, flying 70 bloggers and journalists to an undisclosed location for a 3-day party.

The mystery weekend in summer 2008 to Las Vegas earned coverage in Elle.com, CoolHunting, PRWeek, HuffingtonPost and others. This time around the party will amass alot of hashtag love and re-tweets from both Thrillist and from JetBlue (3.5 million followers), and make Director of Communications Flavie Bagnol dozens of media contacts for life.

We know from #jetmystery that Mashable COO Adam Hirsch, Newsweek's Kurt Soller, PSFK blogger Dan Gould, and RandomNightOut blogger/photographer Nick McGlynn will need a release form, swimwear and something to wear to a "white party".

We don't see a booze sponsor this time, though Starbucks promises in a press release to keep them all buzzed on VIA.

PRNewser was invited to this year's Blog World Expo in Las Vegas - possibly the second largest gathering of social media cool kids outside of SXSW. Unfortunately we couldn't attend, but it looks like all everyone is doing is getting drunk and having hamburger eating contests and stuff. Kidding. We know there is some (a lot?) of learning going on too.

Do you have a story to tell? We're all ears.

SideBAR was packed last night for PRNewser's latest happy hour party. Thanks to everyone for stopping by and enjoying the drink specials, complimentary appetizers, and of course, the good company.

We chatted with newly appointed dna13 Vice Chairman and former PRNewswire President Dave Armon. "We'll be expanding in North America this year," he said. Lane Buschel, President of Morris + King's digital division SeisMK talked to us about some recent successes with client Glam Media. We asked him if he had any agency news, to which he said, "no." [Update: It turns out M+K does have some news as they announced a new client, LBi IconNicholson US, in today's Spin the Agencies of Record.] Rob Manfredo let us know he just landed at Beckerman Group this week, an agency that was in the news recently for their acquisition of Wise PR. Matt Caldecutt and Scott Rosenblum of TrylonSMR were in attendance, perhaps toasting to the agency's new client win: LocateTV. Matt also posted a brief recap on his blog. Alyson Campbell of AMP3 PR looked more at ease after a big week managing client Grooveshark and their deal with record label giant EMI.

Kaplow VP Chaim Haas has been busy keeping things running smoothly on the Skype account and was Tweeting away throughout the night. Waggener Edstrom account manager Jeremy Bridgman was busy mingling and reminded us that he is not on the Microsoft account. PRNewser's favorite couple, Converseon's Paull Young and M Booth's Alyssa Galella were enjoying beer and wine, respectively. Tiffany Winbush let us know that she landed at Bridge Global Strategies as a Senior Account Executive. The Dowd Agency publicist Laura Dempsey told us that she runs the agency's Twitter feed. They're up to 450 followers. Not too bad.

The most telling sign was that despite the economy, about 90% of attendees (rough estimate) seemed to be employed. Were there job seekers in attendance? Sure, but they were the minority.

There were also a few journalists that snuck in, and some racy ones at that. Playgirl editor-in-chief Nicole Caldwell told us that she is consulting with the magazine on some projects including the Levi Johnston photo shoot. That's about as far as we got on that one.