Over 35 people attended the January meeting which took place on the 5th floor of the Art Institute of Colorado at 1200 Lincoln, Denver CO.
The January meeting consisted of a PR and Marketing panel moderated by Dave Thomas of the Denver Post and Buzzcut.com. Panelists included:
Erica Yenni Thomas
Erica has worked in PR for nine years, the last seven in the video game industry. She currently works as a consultant for Electronic Arts (EA), the world's leading developer and publisher of video games. Prior to consulting, Ms. Thomas worked as a senior PR manager for CHEN PR for four years. She managed several video game accounts including EA, Infogrames, SquareSoft and Her Interactive. Before joining CHEN PR, Ms. Thomas held in-house PR manager positions for both Electronic Arts and Sierra On-line. Ms. Thomas graduated from Kansas State University in 1990 with a B.A. in Journalism and Mass Communications.
Kelly Pascal Gould
Kelly has worked in corporate PR for ten years. She experience in working with clients across a broad collection of industries, including retail, restaurant, real estate, entertainment, hospitality, insurance, education and the arts. Some of her clients include Hard Rock Cafe, Fresh Produce Sportswear, Downtown Boulder, Inc., University of Colorado at Denver, Warner Bros., 20th Century Fox, MGM, Sequel Venture Partners, Executive Women's Alliance, Ms. Foundation, Cherry Creek Arts Festival, Futurekids, Wallaroo Hat Company, Noodles & Company, and Denver's Tabor Center. She currently runs Pascal Public Relations where she specializes in public relations program and campaign development with such critical elements as communications auditing, research, audience targeting, key messaging, positioning, tactical planning and budgeting. She is adept at brand building as well as reputation, issues and crisis management using such tools as media relations, speaker's bureaus and personal appearance tours, events strategy and management, sponsorships and strategic partnerships, promotions, product launches, community relations, word-of-mouth programs, awards programs, employee relations, analyst and shareholder relations.
Eric Elkins
Eric is the Youth Content Editor at the Denver Newspaper Agency. In that role, the edits the Colorado Kids section where he oversees a group of 60 local youth reporters. Eric also works as a freelancer, producing film and video game stories for the post and various online outlets.
David Thomas (Moderator)
David writes about video games weekly for the Denver Post and Denver Post Online.
He has covered the electronic entertainment industry for seven years. He has written for a variety of newspapers, magazines and Websites on art, music culture and video games.
Tips touched on by the panel and discussion group included:
General:
PR is one of your best business weapons. It can make or break a company.
When using marketing gimmicks or "swag," consider the message that the item conveys.
Good PR relationships with the press and public takes time.
Don't rush into marketing. Waiting until you can use high-quality marketing is often worth the wait.
"Press is free." This is usually a misconception: there are always costs of one sort or another.
Always make sure any text you use in marketing is well written and easily communicated.
"Any press is good press." This is definitely not always true, especially for a start-up company.
Good press usually won't cover up for a poor product.
Develop and maintain a good, focused image.
A small company can, with patience and good relationships, develop excellent PR.
A PR specialist is always a good investment.
On working with the press:
Know the journalist you are working with. Be sensitive of their deadlines, and what kinds of stories they enjoy covering.
If you have some information a friend reporter might find interesting, pass it along even if it has nothing to do with you. They will remember!
Treat everyone with professionalism and kindness. It may seem like an obvious tip, but not heeding this advice can often permanently damage beneficial relationships.
Landing a feature is far more effective press than a review.
Never expect a friendly-reporter to cover your product.
"Hooks" or interesting angles are often what sells press.
Being able to offer a reporter a variety of hooks or angles is worthwhile and can often result in more and better coverage.
Never answer a question like "What kind of game is it?" with a response like "Well, it's kind of hard to explain."
The next meeting will be on February 9th at 6:30 PM at the Art Institute. The topic is TBA.
Pictorial
January's meeting on the 5th floor of the Art Institute of Colorado.
The PR/marketing panel (from left to right): David Thomas (moderator), Kelly Pascal Gould, Eric Elkins, and Erica Yenni Thomas.
