Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Snowpocalypse 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Promoting Safe Happy Holidays
While it’s easy to be lighthearted about holiday decorations, here at PCG we’ve have had holiday electrical safety on the mind. We’ve been helping the Electrical Safety Foundation International (ESFI) and electrical experts from local Home Depots provide safety tips to TV audiences across the country. We have arranged appearances on more than 20 local TV stations and an interview with ESFI’s President, Brett Brenner on CBS’s Early Show.
Let’s be honest – everyone has a story to tell about holiday decorating gone wrong. It must be the excitement of the season, but people seem to disregard basic safety for the perfect decorative display. ESFI and Home Depot have provided some easy tips to keep us all safe. For example, use LED lights instead of incandescent lights. They are safer, resistant to shock, more energy efficient, allow more strings to be connected together and can last 50 times longer.
So, on behalf of PCG, please be safe this holiday season and remember electrical safety. For more great tips from ESFI, visit its holiday site, www.holidaysafety.org. Below, is Brett Brenner’s appearance on the Early Show.
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- Potomac Communications Group
Watch CBS News Videos Online
Monday, December 14, 2009
Investigative Journalism Version 2.0
Peter Orszag, director of the Office of Management and Budget, did his part for the future of journalism last week. Is this an unlikely advocate for the free press? You bet. But many reporters are too busy being their own writers, copyeditors and photographers to do much investigative journalism anymore. Last week, Orszag made this kind of reporting possible again.
Orszag’s “Open Government Directive” will create a host of new tools that make government the public’s business and give time-strapped reporters fewer excuses for not having the facts at their fingertips. The recondite ways of “computer assisted reporting” are going away. Reporting on government activities, even those some agencies would rather avoid seeing covered, will become easier than ever.
Orszag issued a directive to federal agencies that is designed to add teeth to the Presidential “transparency memo” issued on President Obama’s first day in office. The OMB’s directive provides guidance to all federal agencies on how to become more open, participatory and collaborative. It itemizes tasks and deadlines. More significantly, it requires that information be distributed in downloadable files that can be retrieved, indexed and searched by web search applications like the one you’re using to read this post.
Public records have long been tools of the journalism trade. Soon, news organizations will have much easier access – as will their readers – and we’ll come to expect new, more detailed reporting and coverage. Consider how corruption was routed out of mayor’s office in Detroit by the Detroit Free Press. The newspaper’s investigations of public records disgraced former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick for his deception and led to jail terms for two officials. The paper’s dogged reporting won a Pulitzer Prize. It also required a vast amount of paperwork, lawyers, court appeals and a whole lot of waiting that could be eliminated with the OMB’s new directive.
The Open Government Directive may reinvigorate news organizations’ commitment to their 4th estate responsibilities. Maybe that will help keep journalism, as we have known it, alive.
– Potomac Communications Group
Thursday, December 10, 2009
The Best Magazine Covers of the Year
How? One reason: If they can’t compete on speed, they’re competing on creativity. And doing it well.
Here’s some evidence. Time has named the top 10 magazine covers of the year. And the creativity is amazing. One of them – The New Yorker cover, below – was even developed on an iPhone app, called Brushes.
Personally, I was pleased that half the winners came from my three favorite magazines – The New Yorker, New York and Texas Monthly. (Does that indicate a certain amount of schizophrenia?)
Check out all 10, here.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
A "Surprising Solution" to Critical Challenges
In his new book, The Surprising Solution: Creating Possibility in a Swift and Severe World, Bruce, a long-time PCG client and friend who has studied the subject for more than 25 years, says the world’s largest multinational
Hence, corporate giants will play a greater role in solving critical social problems like climate change, energy security, health care and poverty through innovation and response to social market forces. Those that do it best, he says, are the ones that will enjoy the greatest success.
Some multinationals are already stepping forward to address some of our most pressing problems, and are scoring big in the marketplace, he notes. General Electric, for example, is spending billions to develop wind power and other green technologies as part of its “Ecomagination” campaign. Toyota pioneered the efficient hybrid power train and is now the world’s largest auto maker. And Walmart, the behemoth that serves more than 175 million customers each week, is implementing a sustainability program focusing on such things as reduced packaging and more efficient transportation, not only for its 7,400 stores worldwide but for its entire supply chain as well.
We believe that Bruce – who also wrote In Search of Environmental Excellence and Corporate Environmental Strategy (for which our founding partners wrote the introduction – has made another important contribution to our understanding of the role of corporations in an environmentally sensitive world. Check it out.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Leveraging the mainstream & social media convergence
I had the pleasure of attending and co-presenting at the meeting. The attendance has historically been very strong and this year, the turnout was double that of 2008.
Melissa Meinzer, managing editor at Military Spouse Magazine, and I discussed effective ways in which DSA's member companies can leverage social media to help with their media outreach. For example, I shared stories on how I’ve used LinkedIn to pitch

Other tips we shared: Take advantage of the media convergence. It allows greater visibility and reach, increases search engine optimization and has interactive components to help engage your audience. Look at social media as a supplement and not as a replacement… for now at least. And lastly, start today… literally. Share links to coverage via Facebook or LinkedIn. Embed videos of recent coverage (from news sites that allow you to do so) onto your own corporate Web site or blog.
A few years ago, who would have thought that a marketing conference would devote two full days to social media and Internet marketing? Times are indeed changing, and I’m glad I had the opportunity to learn about DSA member companies’ use of new media – and to share some of what we’re doing at PCG to leverage social media on behalf of our clients.
Friday, December 4, 2009
And Now: Reporters Reporting to Salesmen?
The weekly Dallas Observer just published an internal memo to the Morning News staff from the editor, jointly signed by the senior vice president of sales, announcing the restructuring. It divides the newsroom into 11 “business and content segments,” with each segment reporting to a newly created “general manager” whose responsibilities will include sales and business development. The rationale: “to better align with our clients’ needs.”
An Observer blog features an interview with the News’ editor, Bob Mong, who insists that the paper is still a “journalism-first company” and that the lines between advertising and news content will not be crossed.
Let’s all keep an eye on the News. Will this experiment be a model for other newspapers to follow? Or will the relationship between news and the business needs of the paper become so evidently cozy that others will be scared off. Stay tuned.
(Full Disclosure Dept.: I’m from Dallas, and in college I worked as a reporter for the Dallas Times Herald, which was then the afternoon competitor to the Morning News. So don’t expect total objectivity . . . )
Thursday, December 3, 2009
After the Pardon, This Turkey Flies High

NTF has presented turkeys to commanders in chief since Harry Truman started the tradition, and for more than 50 years the event has generated hundreds of press clips. CNN provided live coverage of President Obama’s first pardon.
“It’s always a lot of fun, and a big media event,” said Sherrie Rosenblatt, NTF’s vice president of marketing and communications. “This year, ‘Courage’ was a very good tom, but that’s not always been the case. In 2002, the pardoned bird pecked at President Bush in a very, uh, inappropriate way.”
“Fortunately, the president was a good sport – and we did make the front page in dozens of papers that year,” she added.
For the last five years, Disneyland has provided the pardoned turkeys with a home. Sherrie has had the privilege of escorting the turkeys to California aboard United Airlines Flight “Turkey-1” several times. The photos posted here are exclusive from Courage’s trip.
“It’s always amazing to see the strange looks and questions we get from other passengers on the plane, but they all want to get their pictures taken with the birds” she said. “The turkeys are great conversation starters.”
Courage served as the honorary grand marshal of Disneyland’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and now he and his alternate, “Carolina,” will live out their days at Big Thunder Ranch in Frontierland.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Former Senator Pete Domenici Talks Nuclear at National Press Club
“We can continue to pursue a long-outdated policy and try to avoid real participation in the new global nuclear reality. Or we can seize the opportunity to act now,” said Domenici. (Click here for a full transcript of his speech)
Especially interesting was his position that the Obama administration is pro-nuclear. He noted the administration has hired several high-profile pro-nuclear executives at the U.S. Department of Energy.
Domenici also discussed the recent resurgence of natural gas as the fuel of choice for energy generation. He said that natural gas is a good bridge to the future, but most utilities understand that nuclear energy is a better long-term investment.