MEETINGS
E-Marketing: Interactive Innovations Keep Customers Coming Back
Imagine: No more e-mails blasted into web oblivion. No more 3 percent return on direct mail. Now that the internet is infused with successful marketing strategies, communication pros must leverage them to maximum advantage. Blue Marble Media principal (and ex-IABC chapter president) Lori De La Cruz promises a spirited presentation at the July meeting -- note the new day -- on how to utilize interactive features and e-mail to not only drive viewers to your web site, but keep them there. And all the while you're perfecting that e-mail marketing program.
De La Cruz develops marketing initiatives for print and web applications. Down a completely different path, she also is an environmental consultant specializing in waste minimization strategies. She earned her Recycling Systems Manager certification from the Solid Waste Association of North America in April.
Time & date: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Tuesday, July 26
Place: Petroleum Club, Carter-Burgess Plaza, 777 Main St., 39th floor
Parking: $2.50 in parking garage at Seventh and Commerce streets
Cost: $20 members, $25 nonmembers
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More Ruffles! More Flourishes! And Everywhere the Republicans
Former deputy press secretary Peter Roussel, author of "Ruffled Flourishes," a behind-the-scenes novel about the White House, will recount his D.C. experiences at the July meeting and show that solid PR practices still work -- even at the lofty levels of national government.
Roussel has more than 30 years experience in business, government, politics and the media, including two White House tours of duty and service as an assistant to Presidents Ford, Reagan and George H.W. Bush. He is now a communications consultant, public speaker and television commentator based in Houston.
Time & date: 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Wednesday, July 13
Place: Petroleum Club, Carter-Burgess Plaza, 777 Main St., 39th floor
Parking: free valet in parking garage at Seventh and Commerce streets
Cost: $20 members, $23 nonmembers, $18 students
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Anchors Aweigh
Think of the best time you ever had at one of those SPJ bashes in Max Faulkner or Gary Hardee's back yard, then add "underground Texana" singer/guitarist Jeff Prince for dinner music, a beautiful setting with a green hill for kids to roll down, and water. Enough water to swim in (tree-shaded pool by the Fort Worth Boat Club patio), fish in (off the dock) or breeze around in on Amon Carter's still-sleek 38-foot cabin cruiser -- wait, did he say Amon Carter's boat? -- and there you have the SPJ season-ending come one, come all aqua-soirée.
The legendary publisher's legendary Chris-Craft, on which he entertained a young politician named Lyndon Johnson, show-biz types Sid Caesar and Victor Mature and top military brass such as Gen. Dwight Eisenhower -- Eisenhower appeared to first contemplate a bid for the White House while on the West Texan; "Ike," Carter said, "you'd make a damn good president" -- will be SPJ's from 7 to 10 p.m., thanks to arrangements made by current publisher Wes Turner. Put on the memory shades and the time-warp 'phones, feel that lake spray in your face and pretend you're Somebody.
Time & date: 5:30 p.m. 'til sometime later, Saturday, July 23; eat at 6:30
Cost: $20
What to do: first, sign in on the covered patio at the one-story building adjacent to the parking lot (down the hill from the clubhouse); then fish off the dock, enjoy the pool, get a ride on Amon Carter's boat or go sailing with Paul King and Gayle Reaves-King -- wear non-skid shoes -- relax at Carolyn Poirot and Jack Strickland's cabana, etc.
Dinner: fajita buffet, soft drinks and tea, music by Jeff Prince, all on the upper patio between the pool and clubhouse dining room
Drinking rules: cash bar at the clubhouse, SPJ-provided beer at the cabana, and never the twain shall meet; due to TABC statutes, alcoholic beverages may not be brought on clubhouse grounds, which includes the lawn, so ... beer/wine/mixed drink with dinner, buy it at the clubhouse bar ... beer before and after, free at the cabana, to be consumed there
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STRAIGHT STUFF
Covering Chaos, the story of reporters who reported on the Kennedy assassination, opened the first week in July at the Sixth Floor Museum in downtown Dallas. Historic film footage, photos, artifacts and highlights of the museum's oral history collection painstakingly narrate the four days of continuous news coverage, Nov. 22-25, 1963. Featuring two videos specifically designed for the exhibit, Covering Chaos gives voice to the more than 300 reporters present in 1963, among them Peter Jennings, Dan Rather, Bob Schieffer, Robert MacNeil and Jim Lehrer. Another segment of the exhibit compares the technologies of 1963 and today, helping visitors visualize the amazing feat that these journalists undertook with large bulky equipment that took time to warm up and use. ...
The annual conference of Capitolbeat, the Association of Capitol Reporters and Editors, will be Aug. 19-21 in Seattle. The meeting overlaps with the National Conference of State Legislatures, and the groups will share facilities and speakers, including Randall Pinkston of CBS News, Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire and Spokane Spokesman-Review editor Steven Smith. See capitolbeat.org.
PRSA local update: The Education SIG purely-for-fun social happens from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 26. Expect such discussion topics as: Is summer really a slower time in education communications offices? Buy lunch downstairs at Central Market, Hulen Street and I-30, then gather upstairs in the nonprofit meeting room. More from chris.smith@tccd.edu.
PRSA local update II: Members and associate members who join a professional interest section during July and August save $20 off first-year dues of $60. More here and here. Offer is limited to one bonus-priced section per member and may not be used to renew an existing section membership. Still want someone to beg you to get involved? Starting June 5, a telemarketing company will phone members who dropped out in 2003 with an offer to rejoin and get their chapter dues covered by national.
SPJ national update: Karl? Surely not Karl; think how much good this could buy; hiding the truth; and are you better off? With one of its writers facing jail, Time magazine handed over documents concerning his sources to a grand jury investigating the disclosure of the identity of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame. The Supreme Court on June 27 rejected appeals by the magazine and its reporter, Matthew Cooper, as well as New York Times reporter Judith Miller. Among the items surrendered are e-mails that apparently show that Cooper's sources included White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove. More here and here. ... The world's wealthiest people have $11.5 trillion -- 10 times Britain's GDP -- in tax havens offshore, concludes a study conducted by Tax Justice Network, a group of international accountants and economists. According to the study, these mega-rich earn $860 billion a year from their assets and avoid paying at least $255 billion a year in taxes. More here. ... David Sirota lists some of the government info President Bush has scrubbed. If it looks bad, don't publish it. More here. ... U.S. real wages are falling at their fastest rate in 14 years, according to data surveyed by the Financial Times. In the last three months of 2004, real wages fell 0.9 per cent. The last time salaries fell this steeply was at the start of 1991. More here.
