Silicon Valley Watcher - reporting on the business of technology and media: PR Watch Archives

PR Watch: No downturn down here as PR companies scramble for bodies

From a Wall Street vantage point the tech sector doesn't look that good right now. Earnings season is coming up and there are unlikely to be many positive surprises from Silicon Valley's public companies.

However, things are cooking in the private company sector, and Silicon Valley's PR companies are scrambling to fill new positions.
One large PR agency, which I'd rather not name...

Continue reading "PR Watch: No downturn down here as PR companies scramble for bodies" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on September 22, 2004 9:48 PM | Permalink

PR Watch: A pontification of priests...let’s bring back the concept of the salon

Sunday evening was a lot of fun because I had dinner with Susan MacTavish Best and a couple of dozen of her friends. And I also bumped into a few people I hadn’t seen in a while.

The food was delightful, but it was the people and the conversations that made the evening. Yes, Susan is a PR professional, but this was not a public relations event. It felt more like a family and friends Thanksgiving dinner, as we sat on chairs borrowed and begged from neighbors, and sat scrunched together in her modest apartment.

Continue reading "PR Watch: A pontification of priests...let’s bring back the concept of the salon" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on October 4, 2004 9:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

PR Watch: The place to be on Wednesday evening was Outcast's 3rd annual CEO dinner at the Clift...

There was a who's who of industry luminaries, top journalists, and excellent conversation. And I picked up a ton of great gossip and items that I'm dying to share with my loyal readers.

But--it will have to wait for Friday because I have to run out and be a reporter. I'm off to yet another glittering event. This one is in San Jose, the annual Awards banquet hosted by SEMI, the trade group. The event celebrates the massive--but long suffering--chip equipment industry.

Posted by Tom Foremski on October 21, 2004 1:40 PM | Permalink

PR Watch: The Outcast CEO dinner party part 1: The Silicon Valley Hack Pack turns up...

Outcast Communications, the public relations agency, has been doing very well lately and that showed clearly at its 3rd Annual CEO dinner at the Clift on Wednesday evening. The place was full of Silicon Valley luminaries, including much of Silicon Valley's Hack Pack of leading journalists. I picked up some great stories, (however, I also picked up a hangover and forgot some of them!)

Continue reading "PR Watch: The Outcast CEO dinner party part 1: The Silicon Valley Hack Pack turns up..." »

Posted by Tom Foremski on October 22, 2004 6:12 AM | Permalink

PR Watch: Outcast dinner party Part II -- bits and bites…

Continued from Part 1

Let me rush through the dinner highlights:

Margit and Caryn took the stage to welcome the guests, and they both looked fabulous. They attempted a joke about how Margit, being from Germany, did not know the term “home plate” and thought it was a type of food plate. It’s quite understandable—Margit seems to be on some kind of super Atkins—so she might get a little hungry occasionally.

Continue reading "PR Watch: Outcast dinner party Part II -- bits and bites…" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on October 22, 2004 4:33 PM | Permalink

Friday Watch: San Francisco flacks flocking south of Market

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Much of San Francisco’s PR community seems to be moving to offices down by the SBC ballpark. Bite PR are celebrating the opening of their new office there soon. Outcast Communications are in the middle of moving to that area. And I recently heard that Sterling Communications is moving there too.

And it is not because Cnet’s News.com is near by—it’s simply because the rents are dirt-cheap. “We can get great office space for under $2 per square foot, compared to $30 or more elsewhere,” says Elke Heiss, vice president at Sterling Communications. “Also, it has easy access for our clients coming up from the valley, and cheap $6 all day parking.” She adds.

With so many other PR companies already in that neighborhood—it’s reader suggestion time! In the early 1990’s with the CDROM and multimedia “revolution” we had an area of San Francisco called “Multimedia Gulch.”

Maybe it could be called the “Flack District” ala the Garment District.

Or how about “Spin City?”

Your votes and suggestions please.

Posted by Tom Foremski on October 29, 2004 2:49 AM | Permalink

PR Watch: PR companies and their tech clients are starting to notice bloggers

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

I had an interesting chat with Christina Armstrong the other day. Christina has been working in the valley for many years and is one of the best PR professionals around. She said that the blogging phenomenon has left many PR companies and their clients baffled about what to do.

Continue reading "PR Watch: PR companies and their tech clients are starting to notice bloggers" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 3, 2004 2:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

PR Watch: The British invasion of the Silicon Valley PR sector continues

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Bite Communications hosted a party Thursday evening to celebrate its new offices on 345 Spear Street, a neighborhood that is attracting a growing community of PR professionals. Bite is a British PR company and has become a major player in Silicon Valley over the past year or so, especially following its acquisition of Applied Communications.

The usual Silicon Valley Hack Pack showed up -- Quentin, Don etc. I arrived with my former colleague at the Financial Times, Louise Kehoe. Louise, by the way, is doing some interesting work as a media consultant. Louise has been around for a long time and she knows a lot about the underbelly of Silicon Valley. I’m hoping to convince her to write an occasional guest column for Silicon Valley Watcher.

Continue reading "PR Watch: The British invasion of the Silicon Valley PR sector continues" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 5, 2004 4:25 PM | Permalink

The usual suspects at Text 100 event

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

"It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents--except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets..."
But we made it to the Text 100 office opening last week.

It gave me another chance to play in my three-dot journalism persona, chronicling the geek society. The party felt a lot like the Bite Communications party the previous week--a lot of the same people standing around and yacking.

Continue reading "The usual suspects at Text 100 event" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 15, 2004 7:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Silicon Valley is Back, Baby.......Dotcom

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

I've had lots of chats about Silicon Valley lately and I’m of the Bachman Turner opinion that you ain’t seen nothing yet.

When I arrived here November 8, 1984, Silicon Valley was going through the down cycle following the PC boom. A hundred PC companies wanted just 10 per cent of the market, wanting to strike it rich, as rich as the Apple IPO—the Google celebrity IPO of its day.

Hundreds of Apple staff became millionaires, including secretaries and the guy that ran the parking lot. The media coverage was massive. VCs rushed in like a herd and funded a huge number of PC companies and when the bubble popped, the down cycle was harsh. Stories about Silicon Valley’s death were constant and grinding for several years. I’ve seen several business cycles and the same thing happens in each down cycle, endless speculation about Silicon Valley’s future. What future does Silicon Valley have?

I think I can answer that question very easily—and I’ll accept any size bet on this call: when Silicon Valley comes back, it will be bigger than before. (Actually, it’s been back for a while--hence this venture.)

I was chatting with Ron Piovesan, from Cisco on this topic recently, and he says has also seen signs of improvement. He laughed when I said I own the dotcom name: SiliconValleyIsBack.com.

I said I’m serious, I do own it. I also have SiliconValleyisBackBaby.com! I'm going to set them up as headlines--heck, they were only $8 apiece. I bought SiliconValleyGarage.com for $8 too. Maybe I'll set it up as a tribute to HP?

Continue reading "Silicon Valley is Back, Baby.......Dotcom" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 15, 2004 7:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The time when Sabrina Horn almost table danced… PeopleSoft vows to innovate, and Sun says its software will be free

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

The Horn Group PR company held a dinner Tuesday evening featuring a panel on “Does Innovation Matter: The Silicon Valley Outlook” a topic dear to my heart.

The event was at Roe—a Burmese fusion restaurant next to Hawthorne Lane. I arrived late for cocktails and looked around and didn’t see any of the Silicon Valley Hack Pack, except for J. Bonasia, reporter at Investor’s Business Daily. The poor guy has been covering the software enterprise beat and if it weren’t for Oracle-PeopleSoft he’d have little to write about. I was asked how did I think the PeopleSoft/Oracle thing would turn out? I said I do not know, I have not even considered it, it just doesn’t feature on my radar screen.

That whole enterprise software sector seems like a bygone era, like some kind of Jurassic period. Yet that whole sector can continue living off the maintenance revenues for years—it isn’t going away. But there is nothing to write home about either.

Continue reading "The time when Sabrina Horn almost table danced… PeopleSoft vows to innovate, and Sun says its software will be free" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 17, 2004 1:22 PM | Permalink

Bloggers could become easy prey to standard public relations techniques

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

As companies and their public relations organizations ponder how to react to the “blogging” phenomenon, I’d like to point out some tricks of the trade used in the business of influencing media.

Forewarned is forearmed some say, and maybe some of the following will help bloggers who are not professional journalists.

I believe that some bloggers are in danger of losing their independence and their unique voice within the media landscape—if they become pulled into a sphere of influence. This is the “sphere” that professional journalists operate in every day and cannot avoid.

Continue reading "Bloggers could become easy prey to standard public relations techniques" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 29, 2004 6:30 AM | Permalink

Controlling access to top executives is widely used to influence media coverage

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

One of the practices used to influence media coverage is controlling access to a company’s top executives.

For example, a reporter for a large newspaper or magazine needs access to CEOs of important companies. However, before that access is granted, a relationship has to be developed to ensure that a reporter understands their business, their strategy, who their competition is, how they differentiate themselves, etc before they give access to the valuable time of their top executives. This is all perfectly reasonable.

But, this is also where there is opportunity for leverage, where there is potential to influence media coverage to a larger or lesser degree, because reporters need that access. Why? Because editors will scream at them if their competitor got an interview with the head honcho and they did not.

Companies can demand that questions must be submitted in advance, that final drafts of stories be approved by them, that some subjects cannot be mentioned etc. This varies from company to company and larger publications are able to refuse such demands and still get the interview.

I have to say at this point, that in my time at the Financial Times I was never subjected to such demands. But all journalists are aware of this point of leverage, and some have been denied access for good and bad reasons. The good reasons are that they might have been sloppy journalists with little understanding of the company or their sector. The bad reasons are obvious.

The value bloggers have in the media landscape is their vantage as independent commentators. If they are brought into the “system” they will be compromised.

Continue reading "Controlling access to top executives is widely used to influence media coverage" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 29, 2004 8:09 AM | Permalink

Should bloggers refuse advertising to maintain independence?

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Should bloggers avoid advertising as much as possible, because that is another potential route to influence their writing?

There are organizational structures within newspapers and magazines that create a separation of “church and state,” the separation between editorial and advertising.

Because bloggers are trying to do everything—write, edit, publish and canvas for advertising—they are in a very tricky position.

Continue reading "Should bloggers refuse advertising to maintain independence?" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on November 29, 2004 8:32 AM | Permalink

Prediction: Dotcoms will eat lunch this time around — the Reversal of the Internet Business Timeline. Part I

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Around about middle of 2003 something interesting happened. I can't quite put my finger on what exactly it was, or what caused it, but the internet business timeline started reversing.

Maybe it was talk about the Salesforce.com IPO that signaled the reversal. Anyway, it started to be increasingly clear we were going to re-run the last seven to nine years in reverse with a few twists.

I've dubbed what's coming as the Greenfield Enterprise Economy. The following will happen:

--Dotcoms will slowly start coming back into vogue, eat the lunch of the established companies, and go on to eat the companies themselves while spitting out the crunchy infrastructure legacy costs and sucking out the fatty stuff-- the IP and brands.

Some of the new Dotcoms will be web services vendors, currently acting in the traditional enterprise software model of "arms dealers," selling their technology to others. And some of these web services companies, while selling their technology to others, will begin using it themselves in new markets and in regional applications. Sometimes this will occur in partnership with other web services companies. For example, suppliers of say, e-commerce ASP services, will establish a regional shopping mall.

The logic will be clear: why spend millions marketing technology, trying to convince potential customers of the gain of large operational efficiencies when instead they can invest that money into establishing new ventures that take full advantage of the technology.

Such ventures would not necessarily compete with potential customers because they will be focused on specific regions or used to develop new types of services. The focus of most of the new Dotcoms will be on cracking the regional business market - currently the single largest commercial online opportunity.

With this strategy, sales to customers will be boosted because those ventures will serve as technology showcases, demonstrating how to combine technologies and business models to recreate profitable ventures in other regions or niches.

Also, those ventures can be flipped -- sold to customers. This generates new capital and sales at the same time.

The best business opportunities will come from the emergence of Greenfield Enterprises -- these will become the true new Dotcoms of the new economy (yes, the term new economy will return).

The Greenfield Enterprises will be absent most of the legacy costs of competitors. The correct application of technology combined with business model innovation will mark the successful Greenfield Enterprise.

The Greenfield Enterprise Economy Dotcoms will then eat lunch. I will explain how in Part II of the Reversal of the Internet Timeline...

cd1050

Posted by Tom Foremski on December 9, 2004 7:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

If you are not publishing to your community, you are not known to your community--send me a guest blog!

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

For at least a year, I’ve harbored ambitions of becoming a micro-media mogul. So much so, that I even bought the URL: MicroMediaMogul.com. This would give me the option of at some point, using Tom@MicroMediaMogul.com as my email address. I think it would look good on a business card. (I also have ThinkTankThinker.com, which looks great on a business card.)

Continue reading "If you are not publishing to your community, you are not known to your community--send me a guest blog!" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on December 16, 2004 7:27 AM | Permalink

Silicon Valley PR firm Voce is building a business around its blogging expertise

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Voce Communications is a PR company that likes to go against the grain--a quality that never fails to catch my attention. When its competitors were fawning over dotcom clients in 1999 (many accepting payment in shares), Voce was snapping up big enterprise clients. These were companies that already had a business model, rather than dotcoms in search of a business model.

Continue reading "Silicon Valley PR firm Voce is building a business around its blogging expertise" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on December 16, 2004 9:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Guest Blog/Letter to the Editor: Good Karma and Catch-22s in Tech PR...

Mark Coker, President of Dovetail Public Relations, tells SiliconValleyWatcher.com readers...

...I'd like to share a personal story about my agency that describes a dilemma I think many good tech PR agencies face...

Continue reading "Guest Blog/Letter to the Editor: Good Karma and Catch-22s in Tech PR..." »

Posted by Candida Kutz on December 27, 2004 3:38 AM | Permalink

Google muzzles the press: a report from inside the Googleplex holiday media party

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

I'd like to tell you about the party; but it was all off the record! Damn. I picked up so many great stories that it hurts not to write about them.

I think Google made the party off the record because it was Cindy McCaffrey's birthday (head marketing honcho at the big G), and she didn't want us reporting the number of candles on her cake (16).

Secret photo of Google ice sculpture--taken with Treo 600
(Jochen, our photographer, had to surrender all his kit).
It's difficult to see, but there are two "ice" penguins cunningly disguised as waiters. It's obviously a thinly-disguised salute to Linux--and a poke in the eye to Microsoft, which has ambitions in search.

Continue reading "Google muzzles the press: a report from inside the Googleplex holiday media party" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on December 27, 2004 6:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Google searching for top marketing honcho

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Cindy McCaffrey, chief marketing officer at Google, resigned just before the holidays. With about five years at the company and about 20 years in the PR business at Apple, 3DO, and E*Trade, she has handled a lot of high profile companies.

At Google, she’s credited with a very-low key marketing approach, in fact, hardly any. Veterans know that search engines are ALWAYS created by word-of-mouth. That’s certainly the way Yahoo took-off, and HotBot, AltaVista, and of course, Google.

Who will get the chief marketing job? There is already lot of veteran “parental supervision” in the top executives ranks (link to Google’s exec’s page) and those ranks could do with some young blood. Sergey and Larry must be feeling a bit bored hanging out with all those old folk.

Any votes for anybody? Let’s see………are there are any young-ish marketing/comms whiz kids around? None come to mind. Most of the industry seems full of gray-hairs, waiting for just one more bubble.

Google could promote from within -- maybe David or Raymond? Or maybe an outsider? Maybe yet another person from the Novell-Apple-Sun heritage that fills Google’s top ranks? Or maybe it should be someone with an international bent. After all, Google is an expanding global brand, and it needs to understand other cultures. Maybe it will even be someone from the media industry? Google is the only media company I know of that has NO media professionals in its senior ranks. None. (Eric, call me…)

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 3, 2005 5:45 AM | Permalink

SiliconValleyWatcher named as one of the most influential blogs by Bacon’s -- the media watcher bible

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com
(Our good buddy Tom Abate at the SF Chronicle brought this one to our attention.)

This is fantastic news because Bacon’s is the gold standard in the media industry. And we are barely three months old!

Check out the third paragraph in this story from Media Post’s Media Daily News (I added the bold type):

Bacon's To Track Blogs By Gavin O’Malley Monday, December 27, 2004
Bacon's Information, the provider of media research, distribution, monitoring, and evaluation services for public relations and corporate communications professionals, has endeavored to light the depths of the Blogosphere. In January, Bacon's MediaSource will begin sharing with its clients the names of what it considers to be the 250 most reputable blogs, the messages they contain, and the frequency with which client-relevant information appears on them.

Ruth McFarland, senior vice president and publisher for Bacon's, said she vacillated about the significance of blogs, but was sufficiently convinced this year to assign three of her 56 editors to monitor the Blogosphere. "We're adjusting our network because no one is accurately monitoring these guys as their influence continues to grow."

Bacon's is keeping tight raps on its blog list, which covers technology, politics, business, travel, and religion. The racy Wonkette, the Miami Herald's Dave Barry, and the Silicon Valley Watcher are three well-known blogs run by "reputable, credible professionals" that McFarland said will be on the list.

Full story is here.

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 4, 2005 5:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Glass skips town as PeopleSoft purge continues

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

While Larry has been busy purging the executive ranks of PeopleSoft, Jennifer Glass, vice president of communications at Oracle for nearly seven years has slipped away to become vp of communications at Sony USA.

I’m hearing that it’s not just Jennifer that Sony has snagged—it’s quietly building up a formidable comms and exec team and seems to be gearing up for a big push this year. And why not? Everybody is chattering about the digital home, digital entertainment systems, consumer electronics, etc. And the Sony brand remains a very strong brand, despite some missteps in recent years.

I’ve worked with Jennifer many times and she is very good. She’s had to leave San Francisco and move to New York, but's she’s from that part of the world anyway. Jennifer’s promised me an interview next time she’s in town.

I bet she’s got some interesting Larry stories to tell, but then again, who doesn’t? I didn’t register LarryWatch.com for nothing…it cost me $8…coming to a website near you very soon.

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 5, 2005 5:27 AM | Permalink

Old media buying new-ish media, will it make a difference?

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Last month Dow Jones bought CBS Marketwatch for about $520m and the Washington Post bought Slate, the Microsoft founded online magazine for an undeclared sum.

The question I have is: Why would two companies that have not made much/any money with online publishing make a success out of buying two online media companies that have not made much/any money publishing online?

One plus one never makes two in such cases, it usually just makes one. If you don’t know how to make money in online publishing, buying another company that hasn’t figured it out either, doesn’t improve your chances of profits. It just means you can lose more money at it than before.

On the Dow Jones/Marketwatch deal: What will be the branding? Will the new Marketwatch be WSJ-lite? Already, there is a wide cultural divide between Wall Street Journal editors and reporters, and Dow Jones wire editors and reporters. You’ll notice that there are few former Dow Jones wire editors/reporters at the WSJ and vice-versa. The pecking order for the Marketwatch staff is perfectly clear. Not a good prospect for staff retention, I would think.

Also, if people leave Marketwatch, how do you recruit reporters to a media publication so low on the Dow Jones internal cultural totem pole, especially with few career prospects to move up/across? Yes, online advertising is going through the roof right now, and that might paper-over a few problematic issues initially. It’s the longer term outlook for the Marketwatch business group that isn’t clear. Getting a decent return on that half-a-billion-plus investment is going to be tough.

Regarding Washington Post buying Slate? Compatible editorial, certainly. But, again, there is a two-tier structure in the making. AP reported that the Washington Post is looking for content for its online site.

Did you know that on the whole, print journalists look down on online hacks? And they will go to great lengths to avoid writing for their paper’s online site if the copy doesn’t also go into the newspaper? Newsprint staff consider themselves a notch or three above online/wire hacks. That is why many newspaper sites use separate staff for print and online.

At the Financial Times, we were the first to have an integrated news and feature desks where the page editors and copy editors for both print and online sat nearby each other. Even so, it took a while to overcome the internal cultural resistance to online news writing by the newspaper hacks.

Publishers of print newspapers and magazines have yet to show ANY prowess in the online media sector. And if they try, they will retreat in a hurry, because they cannot afford to expose their print business model to online.

Print advertising doesn’t have the type of metrics that online advertising possesses. You can't pin an ROI on print advertising the same way you can do it for online. If you offer advertisers a package of print and online advertising, you will gradually lose your print advertisers--unless they are large consumer brands. Why? Because the online advertising clickthroughs will be disappointing (and expensive.) Which means companies will conclude that their print advertising is not reaching their target group--and they will pull all of their ads, print and online.

That's why many print newspaper and magazine publishers risk the continued loss of print advertising if they expose their business models to online advertising. They are trapped within a crumbling business model, IMHO.

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 5, 2005 6:10 AM | Permalink

Are there more senior PR shakeups on the way at top Silicon Valley companies?

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

The New Year has brought in a clean broom at Oracle and Sun Microsystems as their top PR executives depart suddenly. Is this their reward for toughing it out at some of the most challenging jobs in the industry?

In an exclusive story on SiliconValleyWatcher, we reported late Monday that Jim Finn, Oracle’s head of communications is leaving. His replacement will be Jeff Lettes, the recent head of worldwide comms at Applied Materials. Oracle also lost Jennifer Glass just days ago -- she moved three thousand miles away to New York to work with Sony USA.

Andy Lark, head of Sun’s PR, announced his resignation late last week. Are we going to see more turmoil in the communications teams of other top Silicon Valley companies?

The departures from Oracle are interesting. It would seem that Mr Finn and Ms Glass are leaving after all the hard work has been done around the nearly endless PeopleSoft hostile takeover. Maybe a change is as good as a rest.

As for Mr Lark, he hasn’t said what he will do, but, reading his blog there are tons of clues. Here is my take: Andy is going to join a venture that will provide a variety of blogging and media services to corporates. (By the way, we’re going to do that too--as a side consulting business---more details will follow….)

I’m going to see Andy at the New Communications Forum conference on Jan 25 and 26. He is giving the keynote and I’ll be on a panel. You should come along, it’s in Napa and I can guarantee an interesting group of people. Local attendees (we hope lots of our readers!) get a special rate of $595.
dk1111015

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 11, 2005 1:35 AM | Permalink

Guest Blog: Symantec/Veritas deal could provide McAfee with an opportunity to regain lost markets

Mark Coker represented Symantec competitor McAfee for about four years from June 1993 to July 97. He says there are some lessons Symantec could learn from McAfee's attempts to grow by acquisition-Tom Foremski

by Mark Coker, President, Dovetail Public Relations for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Symantec's acquisition of Veritas risks paralleling a similar strategy pursued by McAfee Associates in the mid '90s that ultimately failed. In early '94, company management believed their annual antivirus revenues, which were then at around $15 million, would peak soon around $20-$30 million (yes, really), so they decided to use their cash hoard and strong cash flow to diversify their product line by creating an integrated suite of network security and management tools. As inspiration, they looked to Microsoft, who had obliterated its desktop productivity app competitors in the early '90s by coming out with Microsoft Office, an integrated suite.

McAfee made numerous acquisitions over the next few years, leveraging their high flying stock as currency. Acquisitions included network management, additional network security (encryption, firewalls, etc.), systems management, help desk and storage management products, and made an unsuccessful bid to acquire Cheyenne Software. (Cheyenne was then one of the three storage management leaders along with Veritas and Legato. Although the attempted Cheyenne acquisition failed to happen, the industry took McAfee seriously from then on). McAfee ultimately acquired Network General, the Sniffer company, and renamed the combined entity Network Associates. Most of the acquisitions languished or imploded, while anti-virus became the little-engine-that-could and exploded beyond anyone's expectations.

More recently, the company sold off or closed its distracting diversions, returned to its security roots, and changed its name back to McAfee.

Why did McAfee's strategy fail?

Continue reading "Guest Blog: Symantec/Veritas deal could provide McAfee with an opportunity to regain lost markets" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on January 11, 2005 6:40 AM | Permalink

Quick Notes from the New Communication Forum

by Tom Foremski and Candida Kutz for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

Here are some quick notes from the workshop entitled “Forming Communities Online: Group & Conference Blogging & Wikis,” on the use of wikis and blogs within corporations to create online communities:

+ When you use a wiki for a collaborative project you can quickly identify who the slackers are because it is very clear who is working and who is not.

+ There are some interesting social effects that take place within organizations when wikis are used, and you might be surprised at how it affects an organization.

+ There are so many legal issues to be determined around who owns content, and how it can be used, that it can quickly get very confusing. Suggestion: Create a separate company for each project, which then separates it from the company's content and thus protects them from potential legal issues.

+ A wiki can be used as a knowledge base; and it rewards people who share knowledge instead of hoarding it. Previous knowledge management systems have all failed.

+ Don't be ambitious with a wiki project. Start off using a wiki for just one project.

+ Think of a wiki as a "room" where the users make the rules. They will be the ones deciding how it develops and how it looks.

+ Find a wiki gardener, to help encourage people to use the wiki and nurture its growth.

+ A wiki does not work well within a hierarchical top-down organization. It encourages a flat organization and you should let it build itself.

+ Consider the wiki as an adjunct to the blog.

Links:

Elizabeth Albrycht

Dan Forbush

Constantin Basturea

As an entreprise application, check out Socialtext

An especially easy-to-use wiki engine is EditMe

cd2156

Posted by Candida Kutz on January 26, 2005 7:12 PM | Permalink

How to Pitch Bloggers: Quick Notes from the New Communication Forum

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher.com

I went to the workshop on how to pitch to bloggers, which I thought might be so bad as to actually be good; but, actually, it was good-good!

The workshop was presented by Alice Marshall, founder of Presto Vivace Communications. Presented to you here are some of her insights:

+ It is OK to pay bloggers to review a product; but you must disclose that fact, and not only disclose it, but brag about it very visibly on your web site. Make sure the blogger discloses it too.

+ There is an A-list, or what [I] call the "Box-Office" of blogs, and competition to reach them is fierce. It's better to look at who the box office bloggers are linking to; because that's who they are reading, and those are the bloggers you should pitch to.

+ [You can] tell a large newspaper that they should cover a story because several of the leading bloggers are covering it -- that is something that has worked for [me] in the past.

+ Do not lie. You will be found out and exposed.

+ Try to do some original reporting, because other bloggers will link to you. If you go to an event, write up a report. You will find out how difficult a reporter's job is -- making those deadlines. It takes [me] at least a week to write up a report on an event.

+ Offer exclusives and access to company executives to bloggers; but make sure that the information is exclusive. This is also a way to push bloggers into acting: by putting a deadline on the exclusive story.

+ Read the blogs and leave comments -- those are always appreciated and build goodwill.

+ Don't be afraid to make a mistake; a lot of this is new, and you will make mistakes. That's OK; but make sure that you highlight them.

+ Do not travel under false colors. It's a huge mistake and you will be found out.

+ Salespeople usually try to be direct and honest, and do not want spin. They want a happy customer, because referrals are so important to sales. Engineers can be worse, because they get religious about things.

+ Blogging is great, because it means we are no longer at the mercy of a small group of editors who control the news outlets.

+ Clients of PR companies do not pay for mentions on blogs; but I think that they should, and I think that will happen.

+ Keep your moral soul! Do not use underhanded techniques.

+ We have to remember that blogging is still new and there is so much more to discover. It's as if we discovered America, and have just landed on the beach and are trying to explain it to people back in Europe.

Links:

Presto Vivace Communications

Alice Marshall's Technoflak blog

cd2144

Posted by Candida Kutz on January 28, 2005 7:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (2)

This Week: Cisco’s Head of M&A —Exclusive Interview…plus BILL the new net.point.two conference (it comes before TED)…The Rooster Club's First Annual Blogger’s Ball featuring the Steel Wheels of OM [asiandubfudisco]

By Tom Foremski--SiliconValleyWatcher.com

+ Our top story this week is an exclusive interview with Dan Scheinman, head of Cisco’s M&A, Senior Vice president of Business Development. Find out why Cisco wants to talk to the venture capital community, and why it believes that media technologies are going to be a driver of the next business cycle.

+ While I was at Cisco, I found out more about Cisco’s online news operation which gets more hits than most business and computer trade news publications.

+ Does Google Adsense make sense for publishers of online news sites? We run through the pros and cons of mainstream contextual advertising networks.

+ The Purity of Search—how the next generation of search engines will prove themselves.

+ BILL-the super-cool-much-cooler-than-TED-not-to-mention-DEMO-and-PCFORUM-conference. Find out more.

+ SVW's the Rooster Club announces the 1st Annual Blogger's Ball featuring the Steel Wheels of Om-the Universal Sound of All that is Broadband. More details will follow.

+ Old media buys more not so old media—some thoughts about About.com and the tail-end of the Internet 1.0 consolidation wave…

+ Is Old Media threatening New Media? The Watcher investigates reported threats against the Blogosphere – (please remain calm…nothing to worry about yet…)

+ Google Foundation seeks head--can it compete against the formidable Bill Gates Foundation in the three Gs: Global Goodness Goals?

+ Fanatical fanatacism at web hosting service RackSpace--the straight-jacket is the only way out (limo and dinner included).

+ If a blogger blogs in the blogosphere does anybody blog it?

+ Solving the Google atom bomb riddle...

+ Wists.com rockets to the moon--no hockey stick for this flickr.iscious universal wishlist.

+ And more, such as where is the Flickr--Yahoo deal? And is it such a good idea for large new(ish) media companies buying up cool net.point.two companies? Let a thousand platforms bloom says we.

Posted by Tom Foremski on March 6, 2005 8:00 AM | Permalink

Interview: Dan Scheinman Cisco's head of M&A and corporate PR

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

It’s 11am and a sunny day but I'm in a small windowless room in Cisco building 10, with Dan Scheinman, head of acquisitions.

Interestingly, Dan is also head of Cisco’s corporate PR, a rare combination of executive responsibilities.

Dan is in a good mood, tells me he loves blogs, especially Wonkette. "When you find somebody that shares your sense of humor, it’s a rare thing," he says.

He talks about Cisco's M&A strategy in the post bubble years:

Continue reading "Interview: Dan Scheinman Cisco's head of M&A and corporate PR" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on March 7, 2005 6:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (2)

If a Blogger Blogs in the Blogosphere...

by Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

The rise of blogging has a nightmarish quality to it --if you are in the public relations or corporate communications fields-- because of the fact that anyone can become a blogger. And that means that anyone can become a journalist.

There are millions of bloggers, and thus the media landscape has shattered into a million pieces. Each blogger shares in the power attributed to journalists and the established media: the power to influence, and cause, change in society and markets.

And that means a public relations nightmare; because how can a public relations firm or corporate communications department manage its media relations?

Continue reading "If a Blogger Blogs in the Blogosphere..." »

Posted by Tom Foremski on March 8, 2005 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (1)

Do blogs and online forums make it easier, not harder, for companies to influence “market conversations”?

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

The blogosphere with its millions of blogs and bloggers prides itself on its iconoclastic and anti-establishment views and activities. This fragmentation of media into millions of blogs is deemed a good thing, and I agree.

But the blogosphere might not be as resistant to influence as people might believe. In fact, I could argue that the rise of blogging has made it easier than ever for corporations to target/influence people.

I came to this idea following a meeting with Doc Searls on Wednesday. We were on a panel and talking about, well, I think you can guess what we were talking about. . .

Continue reading "Do blogs and online forums make it easier, not harder, for companies to influence “market conversations”?" »

Posted by Tom Foremski on April 7, 2005 9:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (4)

Weber wins BEA…

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

The headline means more to some of our community of readers than it does to me. However, all I need to know is that it means the right thing :-)

I stopped in on BEA’s web site, wow. It just zips along, superfast loading of pages, and is easy to navigate. If that’s a showcase for the BEA platform, then let there be more companies using it; I’m fed up with my molasses-dunked Internet/PC experience.

Is anyone going to buy BEA? For the last three years, that has been the question, and I wish it would be answered. Larry is the obvious buyer; the patient praying mantis just needs to finish digesting a bit. Then he can take his time, talk down BEA valuation a while; after all, who could play white knight and rescue the middleware maiden?

Here’s my suggestion, and the obvious dream team: Sun-HP-BEA-MySQL-EDS. Plus a big business consultancy. That’s a lot of work; and IBM is already there ...but isn’t there room for three large companies in each market, as some studies have indicated?!
cd1455

Posted by Tom Foremski on April 14, 2005 6:00 AM | Permalink

Jeff Lettes has left Oracle as senior marcoms changes continue at top valley companies

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

Jeff Lettes, Oracle's communications chief has left Oracle just a few months after joining SiliconValley's largest software company.

This is the latest in an unprecedented number of changes in senior marcoms VPs at Silicon Valley's top tech companies over the last six months.

Here are some of the top changes: Jeff Lettes leaves Applied Materials; Cindy McCaffrey leaves Google; Jim Finn leaves Oracle soon to be followed by Jennifer Glass; Alison Johnson leaves Hewlett-Packard; Andy Lark leaves Sun Microsystems; Pam Pollace leaves Intel; Robin Stoecker leaves Tibco Software; and now Jeff Lettes leaves Oracle.

Is it over? Did I leave anybody out? Is this a trend and what does it mean? I’m not sure what’s going on, if anything. But, it does seem a bit odd and I'm hoping some of our readers might know of an explanation. Leave a comment here or ping me: tom@siliconvalleywatcher.com. And there is also the annonymous tip email on the side of this page.

Posted by Tom Foremski on April 30, 2005 4:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (2)

Scoop: Novell chooses Horn Group...

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

Novell, the enterprise Linux company, has chosen the Horn Group, one of Silicon Valley's largest PR companies, to handle its communications. It was a hotly contested contract and two bigger PR companies were on the final shortlist. Novell becomes the Horn Group's largest customer and is added to its stable of enterprise software clients.

Posted by Tom Foremski on June 13, 2005 4:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The British Invasion continues as OutCast is gobbled up by Next Fifteen

...will everyone in San Francisco PR eventually work for Tim Dyson?

By Tom Foremski for SiliconValleyWatcher

TDyson Hi Res bw.jpg San Francisco based OutCast Communications has been acquired by Next Fifteen, Europe's largest publicly traded PR company for an initial payment of about $6m and additional performance based payments that could reach $13m over the next five years.

From Next Fifteen:

Under the terms of the acquisition, Next Fifteen will pay initial consideration of £3.3 million ($

Silicon Valley Watcher - reporting on the business of technology and media

Former Financial Times journalist Tom Foremski and team reporting on the business of technology and media . Silicon Valley is becoming a Tech Media Valley.

PR Watch Archives

September 22, 2004

PR Watch: No downturn down here as PR companies scramble for bodies

October 4, 2004

PR Watch: A pontification of priests...let’s bring back the concept of the salon

October 21, 2004

PR Watch: The place to be on Wednesday evening was Outcast's 3rd annual CEO dinner at the Clift...

October 22, 2004

PR Watch: The Outcast CEO dinner party part 1: The Silicon Valley Hack Pack turns up...

PR Watch: Outcast dinner party Part II -- bits and bites…

October 29, 2004

Friday Watch: San Francisco flacks flocking south of Market

November 3, 2004

PR Watch: PR companies and their tech clients are starting to notice bloggers

November 5, 2004

PR Watch: The British invasion of the Silicon Valley PR sector continues

November 15, 2004

The usual suspects at Text 100 event

Silicon Valley is Back, Baby.......Dotcom

November 17, 2004

The time when Sabrina Horn almost table danced… PeopleSoft vows to innovate, and Sun says its software will be free

November 29, 2004

Bloggers could become easy prey to standard public relations techniques

Controlling access to top executives is widely used to influence media coverage

Should bloggers refuse advertising to maintain independence?

December 9, 2004

Prediction: Dotcoms will eat lunch this time around — the Reversal of the Internet Business Timeline. Part I

December 16, 2004

If you are not publishing to your community, you are not known to your community--send me a guest blog!

Silicon Valley PR firm Voce is building a business around its blogging expertise

December 27, 2004

Guest Blog/Letter to the Editor: Good Karma and Catch-22s in Tech PR...

Google muzzles the press: a report from inside the Googleplex holiday media party

January 3, 2005

Google searching for top marketing honcho

January 4, 2005

SiliconValleyWatcher named as one of the most influential blogs by Bacon’s -- the media watcher bible

January 5, 2005

Glass skips town as PeopleSoft purge continues

Old media buying new-ish media, will it make a difference?

January 11, 2005

Are there more senior PR shakeups on the way at top Silicon Valley companies?

Guest Blog: Symantec/Veritas deal could provide McAfee with an opportunity to regain lost markets

January 26, 2005

Quick Notes from the New Communication Forum

January 28, 2005

How to Pitch Bloggers: Quick Notes from the New Communication Forum

March 6, 2005

This Week: Cisco’s Head of M&A —Exclusive Interview…plus BILL the new net.point.two conference (it comes before TED)…The Rooster Club's First Annual Blogger’s Ball featuring the Steel Wheels of OM [asiandubfudisco]

March 7, 2005

Interview: Dan Scheinman Cisco's head of M&A and corporate PR

March 8, 2005

If a Blogger Blogs in the Blogosphere...

April 7, 2005

Do blogs and online forums make it easier, not harder, for companies to influence “market conversations”?

April 14, 2005

Weber wins BEA…

April 30, 2005

Jeff Lettes has left Oracle as senior marcoms changes continue at top valley companies

June 13, 2005

Scoop: Novell chooses Horn Group...

June 21, 2005

The British Invasion continues as OutCast is gobbled up by Next Fifteen