One line was changed in the original Rise and Fight to adapt to changing times. Which one?

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O Rise, all loyal Cougars and hurl your challenge to the foe.
You will fight, day or night, rain or snow.
Loyal, Strong, and True
Wear the White and Blue.
While we sing, get set to spring.
Come on Cougars, it’s up to you!

CHORUS:
O Rise and Shout, the Cougars are out
Along the trail to fame and glory.
Rise and shout, our cheers will ring out,
As you unfold your vict’ry story.
On you go to vanquish the foe
For Alma Mater’s sons and daughters.
As we join in song, in praise of you, our faith is strong.
We’ll raise our colors high in the blue,
And cheer the Cougars of BYU.

CHANT:
“Ra, ra, ra, ra, ra (3x) GO COUGARS!”

Four Steps for harnessing the power of the Social Media as a component of a well conceived public relations strategy:

1) “Listen Up” To The Conversation

2) “Join In” The Conversation

3) “Power” The Conversation

4) “Orchestrate” The Road Signs

In this video,  I discuss why focus on Social Media is imperative to avoid energy leaks from your company.

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Ellen McCarthy, talented writer for the Washington Post, recently published an article that got my attention big time. It discussed the power of Pop in today’s new media world. This article offers application for  strategic public relations. In this video, John discusses the power of PR Pop, especially in the world of Social Media.

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For Immediate Release

SALT LAKE CITY—August 26, 2010—PilmerPR today announced FundingUniverse’s rapid rise to the short list of companies served by PilmerPR and attaining the status of Inc. 500 Fastest Growing Entrepreneurial Businesses. FundingUniverse ranks #34 in the newly released 2010 list.

“We are pleased to say we put together the first launch event for Funding Universe (then FundingUtah),” stated John Pilmer of PilmerPR and chairman of the Utah Valley Entrepreneurial Forum (UVEF). “Since then we have provided services that assisted the company’s meteoric rise to success. They are a great company.”

Other Inc. 500 winners have also leveraged PilmerPR’s strategic communications expertise to accelerate success. These include Mozy, AdvancedMD, and Seastone. Emerging sector leaders served by PilmerPR, including Avamar, Mozy, Seastone, AdvancedMD, and Certiport, have achieved investor harvests topping $300 million.

“Our goal in to provide the most progressive public relations counsel, strategy, and tactical execution possible,” said Pilmer. “Our years of experience and business savvy empower our clients for success using the most advanced thinking in areas of new media, corporate responsibility, and ‘SEO’ online content.”

PR News, the Society for New Communications Research, and others have praised PilmerPR’s expertise for the firm’s work in areas like Blogger Relations and Corporate Social Responsibility. In addition to being honored with the recent awards, PilmerPR also added two successful energy related companies as clients. US Synthetic and Tasco Engineering contracted PilmerPR based on the firm’s extensive experience with Corporate Social Responsibility, clean technology, and green PR.

PilmerPR tips for emerging companies seeking to dominate their sector may be found on the company’s blog: http://www.pilmerpr.com/blog , YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/johnpilmer , and at twitter @jpilmer. Available on Amazon is John Pilmer’s new novel, Green Spin, a near future fictional account of the dangers of the 24-second news cycle and environmental extremism.

About PilmerPR, LLC
The PilmerPR team has decades of collective experience in marketing and public relations with specific backgrounds in social media, high-tech, cleantech, print journalism, search engine optimization (SEO), and the rapidly rising area of social responsibility. The team includes active PR professionals Accredited in Public Relations (APR) by the Universal Accreditation Board.

PilmerPR   801-369-7535

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Deceptive packaging really makes me crazy how about you? Comment.

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A recent article in the Moscow Times report 80% of the world’s largest companies now publish an annual report on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR; CR).  In the wake of this news we find that the believability of these reports is less than perfect with the public viewing internally created reports as biased.  The CSR 2.0 response to that is to recommend that such reports reveal the good, bad, and ugly truth, a definite trend towards transparency. Here are some “best practice” areas the experts now recommend for coverage in future reports on corporate citizenship:

• Principles for defining stakeholders, channels of engagement, feedback analysis;
• Criticism from key stakeholders and the company’s actions in response to that criticism; well-founded and honest presentation of company performance, including both positive and negative results;
• Ways of working with local communities;
• Relationship between corporate social responsibility and the company’s business strategy, integration of the social responsibility strategy in the company’s activities;
• Reporting boundaries as well as boundaries of the company’s activities;
• Both direct and indirect description of the company’s impact on society through the projects implemented;
• The company’s plans and objectives for future periods;
• External report assurance.

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I’ve worked a bunch in the technology field, so I’m used to seeing acronyms thrown around like toy footballs from cheerleaders in a college stadium at the season opener. Other industries use them as well. The military has a ton of them. As a Public Relations firm, we constantly remind clients to talk in “people talk” without the use of acronyms, unless they are ubiquitous like “TV” or “FBI” or “DVD.”

So, here’s a test. I make assumptions about the acronym “CSR.” What does it stand for? I think the majority of people have the same definition as I, but do you really?

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YouTube is now the 2nd Largest Search Engine in the World. That’s right, #2, ahead of Yahoo and everybody else except my former boss, CEO Eric Schmidt at Google.

A high impact video strategy doesn’t have to break the bank. It can get you seen in YouTube search results, but also help your business in the other ways:

• Increased sales conversions
• Increased organic rankings
• Help customers understand your product or service
• Testimonials that create a personal connection
• Drive traffic to your website and blog
• Rich Media Content
• Add followers, friends and subscribers

Here are more examples of our video projects:

• Green Spin News
• David Saedi – CEO
• PilmerPR
• US Synthetic
• UVEF

“I’ve had it” were the parting words of Steven Slater as he exited the JetBlue flight via an emergency chute at Kennedy Airport. The media is all over the story, but what is the unstated message here?

Thousands of fans are flocking to Facebook to swear allegiance. Are they expresssing collective disgust with the decline of the “friendly skies” over the past decade? Or, are they saying something bigger about their collective disgust with the workplace?

There is no doubt that the airline industry has become a tougher way to travel over the past few years. I’ve blogged on that before (United ; US Air). My own experience includes lost luggage, late or cancelled flights, rude attendants, and cramp seating (that last one may be more my fault).

The ongoing economic slowdown is stressing most people out, especially the underemployed, businesses…well, everyone. Customer service in this environment has never been more important if you want to stay in business. And, if you work for “da man” you recognize your dependence on your current job, even if it stinks.

JetBlue is the poster child for the bad PR ripple effects of a decade of declining customer service, but they are just one among many.

What do you think?

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This past week, Hewlett Packard fired their golden-child CEO Mark Hurd–no, he “resigned”– with a $28M diamond-studded golden parachute. Why? Some CSR experts will say it was the responsible thing to do. You could also say the simmering sexual harassment scandal had something to do with it (you think?!). And, a $28M payoff–um-”severance”–may be pocket change when considered in context.

HP executives were quick to point out that Hurd’s leaving the HP herd should not be heard as having anything to do the the business health of the company. No, quite the opposite. Previous news led one to believe Hurd was being heard as key to the HP solution for all that ailed them. So, why the quick exit?

As a communications professional, I have to see this through Investor Relations  and Crisis Management eyes. Every penny movement in HP stock is worth around $10M in valuation. The 8% drop in stock price (around $9B) in after-hours trading following the resignation had to be viewed by HP as short-term collateral damage compared to the potential damage caused by a protracted scandal. And, HP has been there before.

Remember the 2006 scandal in which Chairwoman Patricia Dunn was forced out for overseeing an investigation that involved spying on reporters’ and directors’ phone records to suss out the source of leaks to the media. Well, the head of HP PR told me at that time that around 2,000 negative stories swirling around that fiasco eroded a half century of HP goodwill. HP is not interested in letting this Hurd thing create a stampede of the investor herd.

I see the stock rebounding at end of day today, which is a good sign - if questions regarding the board’s fitness don’t begin stealing headlines over the coming weeks.

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