What is Ozzy Osbourne like in person? Is Lance Armstrong arrogant? What about Michael Jordan, Regis Philbin or George W. Bush?

PilmerPR is helping launch iFollo.com, a new social media community to offer a broader view of what celebrities are really like beyond the screen, camera, and field.

There are more than 100 million celebrity fan Web sites out there, but the majority are created and written by professional editorial staff. Tabloid magazines often cover the same the sensational gossip and incriminating photos as their counterparts. iFollo is unlike anything else available. The Web site bases all of its content on real experiences from real people.

iFollo allows people to do the following:

• Post stories about their celebrity encounters
• Read content generated from the stories of real people and their experiences with celebrities
• Rate celebrities based on looks, smarts, arrogance and more
• Upload photos and video in addition to their celebrity story
• Personalize iFollo by choosing what celebrities they want to follow

The site just launched this morning, and already has dozens of stories. It is also creating buzz across the Internet.

Try it out at www.ifollo.com.

Read more about it at Investor’s Business Daily.

Alan Ashton & Lt. Gov Gary Herbert address UVEF

Fox News: UVEF Top 25 Under 5

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Today, Lt Gov Gary Herbert keynoted a terrific awards program by the Utah Valley Entrepreneurial Forum (UVEF). 160 attendees. 25 top companies under five years of age were honored. Representing $80 million in combined 2008 revenue, the winners created 840 jobs last year. ZAGG, Imagination Learning, and OrangeSoda came in 1, 2, & 3.  Emcee, Rick White, co-founder of rising startup Fusion-io kept the event light with ample humor and insights into the healthy state of entrepreneurism in Utah.

According to soon to be Governor Herbert, 50% of jobs in Utah come from small business.  The Wall Street Journal reported this past month that more than half of the Fortune 500 in 2009 launched in recessions or bear markets. Speakers at the event credited Utah’s relatively resilient economy is due to great startup companies like those honored today.

The Daily Herald honored Alan Ashton, founder of WordPerfect, with a special “Founding Fathers” award for his quarter century of contributing to Utah business and the community.

Media for the event:

YouTube highlights video

Business Wire coverage

Daily Herald coverage

Daily Herald special section on Utah entrepreneurs

Deseret News coverage

Utah Pulse coverage

Wasatch Digital IQ coverage

Fox TV News coverage

Tomorrow, UVEF will announce it’s 2009 “Top 25 Under Five” award winners in the company of Utah’s Lt Gov Gary Herbert*, Fusion-io CMO Rick White, and a who’s who of business leaders and VC types. They will honor the great entrepreneurs of our day. This year’s winners produced $80M in 2008 revenue and created 840 jobs. With Utah’s nationally leading business climate, entrepreneurs will likely have far more to do with economic recovery than Washington’s stimulus packages.

In June, Wall Street Journal cited a study revealing that more than half of the 2009 Fortune 500 launched their companies during a recession or bear market. My experience serving on a number of boards for startups, business incubators, and mentoring organizations shows me that recessions push would be entrepreneurs to take the bold step into the unknown. We are the beneficiaries of such risk tolerant, brave leadership.

*soon to be Governor Herbert, once Jon Huntsman is approved as US Ambassador to China by the U.S. Senate

In today’s business environment, success may seem very elusive to some CEOs. Businesses that have been around for years either have closed their doors or find those doors creaking shut. Bank empires have crumbled like an old cookie, and the well of money has all but dried up for some.

Yet, amid failure we see new ideas and businesses emerging. So, what is failure? In a recent workshop led by Garrett White exploring our “Soul Purpose,” I felt compelled to consider the role of success and failure in developing leaders. The faithful dictionary defines failure as “an act or instance of failing or proving unsuccessful; a lack of success.” But, is failure really all that bad?

Continue reading at Utah CEO Magazine

“PilmerPR is pleased to announce the garnering of yet another honor for exceptional public relations results. Thank you to a great client, ElectraTherm, for accepting sound PR advice and thanks to skilled staff that holds up the standard of communications excellence at PilmerPR.”  John Pilmer – President and Founder

EarthTimes covers this Green PR news.

Serving the public relations needs of America’s startup companies is fulfilling work. So, I was especially interesting in attending today’s UVEF event for entrepreneurs.

A large crowd filled the Novell facility for today’s UVEF luncheon. They heard from  Brock Blake, CEO at Funding Universe who addressed his company’s recent survey of 60 Utah angel investors. Utah Angels was the largest group in the sample, but several groups were represented. Here are some key findings.

While recent months have seen about a 50% drop in angel funding activity, Brock is convinced things are “picking back up” in Q2 of this year.  The average Utah angel takes a 14% ownership position with total ownership for all angels per funding round is 34%. Brock counsels entrepreneurs to accept less than 45% angel ownership when seeking funding. He says angel investors do not usually seek to take controlling interest in a company. They want influence, but want others to manage the business day to day.

Angel investment most commonly takes the form of preferred stock (65%), but can be common stock (16%) or other intruments such as stock warrants. Angels take a board member postion 47% of the time or take an advisory board postion 11% of the time.

In Utah, the most active industry sectors using angel investment are Internet/Web (including SaaS) – 55%; Live Sciences – 18%; and Consumer Products – 11%.

85% of angel funding rounds are less than $1 million or less.

Do these numbers match your experience?

For new startup public relations tips see PilmerPR Small Business PR

The immense amount of advertising these days is simply astonishing. Instead of watching American Idol with a few commercials, you now end up watching commercials with a few sprinkles of American Idol.

Although there is a large amount of advertising, some businesses are not getting the best bang for their buck with their limited budgets. Check out our latest blog post on Utah Business Blog about “The Weakening Aroma of Advertising .” Advertising still holds value in certain applications, but if your brand it not well-established you may consider alternatives .

We also recently wrote about text messaging. The language with many characters, but yet void of face to face interaction. In fact, interaction has been reduced to emailing, texting, tweeting, and on it goes. Personal conversations and written letters have given way to voicemail, which has given way to email, which has now given way to texting. While the speed and frequency of communications has made the leap to light speed, the quality of the interaction has not.

Would you trade face to face communication for texting?

Yesterday, master communicator Rick White drove straight from the airport to make a date with UVEF and giving back to entrepreneurs just like him. Well, not just like him. Fusion-io, co-founded by White, is rising faster than a meteor streaking across the sky. Just check out their online press room for the evidence of more than savvy public relations. The reason being is they are providing the fastest data storage technology on the planet and everyone from Michael Dell and Steve Wozniak are in on the game.

However, in his presentation Rick spoke about Fusion-io only in his Q&A. On this day he shared insight into how he thinks as an entrepreneur. He counseled marketers to distill their messages down to the “syrupy goodness” ala iPod – “1000 songs in my pocket.” Most of his time was spent counseling entrepreneurs to stop living their fears and to live their dreams instead. Rick spoke about how to change one’s reality by changing one’s perception.

Here’s a YouTube video of Rick summarizing his recipe for the “brocolli principle” and other cool insights for entrepreneurs.

3 weeks left to get nominations in for the UVEF 2009 Top 25 Under 5 awards.

OREM, Utah – April 22, 2009 – Celebrating its 20th year, Utah Valley Entrepreneurial Forum (UVEF) today announced that nominations are now being accepted through June 1st for the 2009 “Top 25 Under Five” Awards. Top 25 Under Five spotlights outstanding Utah entrepreneurs and emerging companies from across the state. Award recipients will be recognized at ceremonies on July 9th with sponsors including Daily Herald and InnoVentures, among others.

UVEF’s Top 25 Under Five Awards have recognized the development of more than 200 individuals and companies, including Utah success stories like Agel Enterprises, Interbank FX, Seastone, Altiris, Omniture, and Xango among many others. Companies throughout Utah, five years old or younger, are invited to apply electronically at www.uvef.net. Applicants are judged based on revenue and job creation.