Last week, a new angel investing network launched in the National Capital Region to support new business initiatives, mentor the next generation of entrepreneurs, and of course, generate great returns for investors.
The Capital Angel Network (CAN) is an informal network sponsored by the National Angel Capital Organization (NACO) where angels can view potential investments and discuss them as a group. The goals are to increase the quantity, quality, and success of angel investments in Ottawa, to create a greater pool of capital for innovative start-up companies and to complement existing angel groups.

Laurie Davis, a long time angel investor in the Ottawa area and a member of CAN’s board of directors, took a few moments to share his thoughts.

What was the impetus behind the creation of this new network?

Davis: I meet with entrepreneurs all the time and they tell me they have a great deal of trouble raising money. It’s always been difficult, but much more so in recent times for various reasons. It takes a lot time and effort to find enough angels to give you the amount of money you need. So if you can gather a number of angels together in a group, it saves the entrepreneur a lot of time and effort.

From the angel’s point of view, I enjoy working with others in a group and hearing their perspectives on things before agreeing to commit money.

What are your key objectives and goals?

Davis: Obviously this is only a useful exercise if companies get funded. In the end, the goal is to have people fund companies they find useful and interesting. We are going to track what happens and see if by the end of the year we have four or five companies that have been funded.

How is CAN different from other angel investor organizations that we have seen in Ottawa over the years, such as Purple Angel, Band of Scoundrels and the Ottawa Angel Alliance (OAA)?

Davis: I am a member of Purple Angel, a founder of OAA and friends with members of Band of Scoundrels. What are we doing different? We got some feedback when OAA wound down that there wasn’t much appetite for a formal organization. With OAA, you had to pay membership dues and commit to a certain level of investment. People didn’t like that level of formality. The bottom line is to try something different until you find something that works. The challenge of course, is to make sure you have real investors, as opposed to the room getting filled up with lawyers, accountants and other service providers looking for business. With the informal model that becomes a little harder, but we’ll be watching it.

Where do you think we have the most significant gap in turning great ideas into competitive commercial products that make it to market?

Davis: In general we have people who know how to go about building a product, but that whole go-to-market strategy, to know how to get a product to customers and to identify real customers – that’s the problem we have.

How will CAN help early stage companies overcome this hurdle?

Davis: We are not going to be tackling it directly. The key thing is, if you have a group of smart people in a room, the expectation is that someone will step up and help. The whole idea of angel investing is not to just provide money, it is to get involved and help where you can. We hope to see a lot of that.

What do you think of Terry Matthews’ recent announcement of his new commercialization fund?

Davis: It all helps. None of us are competing. There is a problem out there that needs to be solved and anything that can be done to solve it is a great benefit to the community.

What is the future of the venture capital model?

Davis: I wish I knew. It certainly is not pretty out there right now. If you look at it from an entrepreneur’s perspective, it is painful. And they are trying to address that by creating companies that need less capital. There are some businesses that you can launch with a few hundred thousand dollars, but others you simply can’t without tens of millions of dollars – and those are the companies no one wants to start right now. This is a huge problem and I don’t know how it’s going to be resolved. There is talk that institutional investors will invest directly in companies, as they once did – that would certainly help, but I haven’t seen this happen so far.

Technorati Tags: angel investor, angels, Purple Angel, National Angel Capital Organization, NACO, Capital Angel Network, Laurie Davis

The non-adventure of balloon boy last week got me thinking about the pitfalls, and potentially pointless expenditure of time and resources, of resorting to gimmickry to get media attention in the context of a marketing and promotional campaign.

And while companies that attempt to woo the media with whatever manner of promotional material is at their disposal are clearly not in the same category as someone who perpetrates a hoax as a publicity stunt, such an effort must nonetheless be held up to the harshest scrutiny to ensure value for money.

As a business journalist, I saw all manner of swag cross my desk: gift baskets, trinkets of varying practicality, cute stuffed animals dressed in First World War flight gear, even a quality pair of boxing gloves to illustrate a certain cellular provider’s “light weight” and ”heavy weight” service plans. Not to mention the VIP invites to rock concerts and hockey games. And this humble inventory pales before some of the antics undertaken by organizations with a true flair for showmanship, a la Sir Richard Branson.

But at the end of the day, did any of this sway my judgment as a journalist? Did a fluffy desk pet, or even a private box at a hockey game, ever compel me to pick up a story that I otherwise would not have? Nope.

What mattered most to me were the merits of the story articulated on the piece of paper or in the CD-ROM buried beneath the “gift” at the bottom of the box. Save the gadget or the toy for a trade show or Toy Mountain. Just tell me your story and articulate why it is of value and relevance to my readership. Therein lies the difference between a marketing effort to build awareness of your brand, and a PR effort to put yourself on the radar of the media that have the potential to move your market.

When it comes to garnering the kind of media attention that will support your business development objectives, it is the value of the story you bring, not the slick way that it is packaged, that will get the attention of the editors and beat journalists with whom you need to engage. Buttering the substance of your message with a  little style or constructive goofiness can be fun. And, I will admit, sometimes it can help make you stand out from the crowd with media that are suffering from attention deficit disorder. But such efforts must be backed up with something of value, especially if they are draining precious time and resources from a tight PR and marketing budget.

At a time when many organizations have made the questionable decision to scale back their marketing and PR efforts to conserve cash, it is vital to deploy the resources you have as effectively as possible to maintain profile in the market. Unless that cute company mascot is in fact your top customer with a compelling story to tell, it should not be the media’s introduction to your business.

Technorati Tags: balloon boy, publicity stunt, promotional material, promotional products, public relations, media relations, Richard Branson

A trip to the grocery store that inevitably ended up being an extended exercise in reading and comparing nutrition labels got me thinking about the importance of paying close attention to how you are perceived in the marketplace, what you consider to be your competitive differentiators and how they stack up against the offerings of your rivals.

It all began with soya sauce, or rather, the quest to find a sodium-reduced option, soya sauce being one of those things we sometimes like to apply liberally with little regard for the hypertensive consequences.

The first thing I saw on the shelf was VH, a well known brand for all manner of sweety and salty Asian condiments. One tablespoon of its regular soya sauce has a whopping 48 per cent of your daily recommended sodium intake. Beside it was VH’s salt-reduced alternative, still at 32 per cent.

Next was Kikkoman, the mainstay that seems to have the restaurant industry locked down. Its regular brew has 38 per cent, while its reduced-sodium alternative has 24.

And then there was the humble President’s Choice store brand. Its regular brew (there wasn’t a reduced option on the shelf) has a mere 22 per cent. It trumped both of the major brands with its regular offering.

And while the store brand is generally cheaper, when I saw that number on the label, I didn’t even bother to compare prices before dropping the PC soya sauce into the shopping cart. Neither price, nor brand prominence, was relevant to me as a consumer. What mattered was that the PC brand gave me the better option as a matter of course, rather than trying to pander to my health-conscious concerns with an alternative product that still didn’t cut the mustard upon closer inspection.

The moral of the story? At a time when at least some areas of the economy are starting to turn around and and prospective customers have begun to spend again, it is crucial to listen to your marketplace and invest the time and effort necessary to ensure you are giving it what it wants, not just on the surface, but deep under the hood. Because you can rest assured that your customer base will still hold any expenditures up to the harsh light of scrutiny for some time to come.

Your product or service must deliver what it promises on the label, not to your satisfaction, but in accord with the perceptions and expectations of your customers.

Technorati Tags: marketing, branding, food labeling, consumer awareness, customer feedback, soya sauce

“I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I did not have time to make it shorter.”

Whether this quote is more appropriately attributed to Mark Twain or Blaise Pascal is beside the point. What matters is that it aptly sums up the delightful, frustrating and fulfilling struggle that is the art of writing.

Whether you are an amateur writer of fiction intent on improving your craft, or a communications professional subject to the scrutiny and criticism of those who may fail to appreciate your clever turns of phrase, one observation of Twain’s still holds true: “A man cannot be comfortable with his own approval.”

As a communications professional accustomed to my approval of what I produce being secondary to that of the client, I often hear comments like, “This is what we want to say, but we’ll leave it to you to polish it up and make it sound good,” or, “I don’t know how we can get all that across in (blank) number of words.”

My job is to create an effective piece of writing intended to serve a specific purpose and achieve a desired result for people who lack the time, or the skill, to do it for themselves. They recognize the value I bring to the table, while at the same time, I appreciate that what I am doing has a direct impact on their image and brand. It is a collaborative effort that must balance creative freedom with the dollars-and-cents demands of lead generation and business development.

But at the heart of this process, regardless of how many other people are involved and providing their input, there remains the individual writer toiling in solitude to string words together in a manner that will engage the reader, convey critical information and spur them to action in as concise a manner as possible. Mastery of this skill requires a natural talent that must be honed through a process of lifelong learning, constant practice and a humble appreciation for the work of a good editor.

Being able to write effectively, on demand, to further someone else’s agenda, is a talent years in the making. It is a professional service that should be given its due and recognized for the value it provides. It should not be regarded as a commodified service. Writers are a dime a dozen, but great writers are in another class entirely. There is a profound difference between derivative cut-and-paste recycling of content and distilling a mass of information from numerous sources into a cohesive and concise form that furthers understanding.

So next time you find yourself in need of a good writer to support your marketing and public relations objectives, remember that you are looking for a partner who will bring unique strengths to the table and work with you to achieve a successful execution. And most importantly, great writers are worth the money, but not everyone who charges a premium rate is a great writer.

Technorati Tags: writing, communications, marketing, public relations, Mark Twain

When Iain Christie, president of Neptec Design Group, took the stage this morning as the keynote speaker at OCRI’s first Technology Executive Breakfast of the fall season, he made one thing clear: he wouldn’t presume to tell his audience how they should run their business, since it was challenge enough to run his own.

Nonetheless, as he shared anecdotes of the lessons learned over Neptec’s almost 20-year evolution from a one-trick pony whose continuance relied on the “stroke of a bureaucratic pen” to a more diversified technology play, it was clear that certain fundamentals crucial to business success apply no matter the industry; they simply manifest in different ways.

Neptec’s big break came in the early 1990s, when it developed an Advanced Space Vision System for NASA to help astronauts assemble the International Space Station. While this crucial contract for the company generated spinoff business, by the start of this decade, Neptec was challenged by the simple fact that it was still living from program to program with one dominant customer — obviously not the best way to build a sustainable company over the long term.

And while additional opportunities have come from NASA, not the least of which is the 3D Laser Camera System now used to inspect the Space Shuttle exterior for damage after launch, Neptec has diversified its expertise in intelligent three-dimensional data collection and processing for multiple applications in the defence and industrial automation markets.

Iain shared the following lessons that have come of the company’s growing pains and emphasized that it is still far better to learn from one’s own experience than from the mistakes of others:

1. Always have a backup plan. Before you jump in and claim to have the solution to a problem, make certain you have a complete understanding of its dimensions and its constraints. ”You’ll get a lot further ahead.”

2. Never let them see you sweat. “Amateurs talk about technology, professionals talk about process.” Technology is great, but if there is not a proven process to govern implementation and operation, and effectively troubleshoot any problems, the best technology in the world will not yield the desired result. You must be prepared for the unexpected.

3. The Perfect is the enemy of The Good Enough. In one instance with NASA, Neptec went from concept to a fully realized system that flew in space in only 16 months. The key from the outset was having a clear and unambiguous objective statement of what they had to achieve. The team had to refrain from the temptation to exhaust time and resources on making something that was already good enough even better. It was an exercise in distinguishing the “truly important” from the “merely urgent.”

4. Stick to your strengths. When the Neptec team embarked on its campaign to diversify its customer base, the key was not to chase after what the market wanted, but to instead remain true to its core strengths and focus on opportunities where it could deliver value to the customer. In other words, find problems they could solve with a solution the target market was willing to buy and could afford, rather than attempting to muscle in where larger and better-funded competitors were already well-established.

5. What gets measured gets done. Case in point: Iain was swimming against the current with his management team trying to argue in favour of expanding the workforce. The central issue was Neptec’s utilization rate: how much of each worker’s time was actually being applied to billable client work. Iain put the spotlight on it, but his managers on their own initiative tackled it and staff efficiency shot up in a matter of weeks. Which led to his next point: as the leader, his job is to ensure the management team is focused on addressing the right problem, set goals, then get out of the way and let them figure out the solution. He should not get bogged down in the day-to-day operational stuff, but . . .

6. Stay focused on what’s next. Change isn’t always desirable, but it is inevitable. While it is easy to fall into the trap of never looking past the end of the current project, or the current fiscal quarter, the person at the top must have their attention focused on what’s just over the horizon to maintain growth and profitability.

Technorati Tags: business development, R&D, product development, leadership, Neptec, NASA, Space Shuttle, ISS, International Space Station, Iain Christie, OCRI, TEB, Technology Executive Breakfast, data collection and processing

In the world of corporate communications, maintaining brand integrity is of prime concern. Consumer loyalty, after all, is invariably tied to the perceptions and expectations that have been created in the marketplace. One need only revisit the classic boondoggle that was New Coke for a clear example of what happens when consumers come to expect one thing from a major brand and get another.

As a one-time museologist, I find it fascinating how these same group dynamics can manifest in a much more dramatic, even combative, form when applied to a hallowed institution such as a national museum or other historical venue. On today’s grim anniversary, the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York City, due to open in 2013, is defending its decision to display written quotations drawn from so-called “martyrdom” videos made by the hijackers who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks, along with witness testimonials.

As reported by Reuters, museum president Joe Daniels told reporters the exhibit would present the facts, focusing on “what happened on that day, why it happened, what does it mean to live in a 9/11 world.”

“Let the perpetrators speak for themselves,” he said, adding, “That’s a powerful and important thing that visitors to this museum need to hear — bearing witness to the actual testimonials of those who committed the atrocities.”

Personally, I applaud the decision by museum officials to stick to their guns despite bitter opposition from victims’ families. But arguing the merits of why it is vitally important for such an important venue to present history in a manner that is as comprehensive, balanced and factual as possible is a little off topic for our purposes here.

What is important is that the museum is presenting a clear and strong message about what it is doing and why. Four years before it even opens, it is establishing in the public consciousness a clear idea of what it is, what purpose it will serve and how it intends to fulfill that mandate by openly acknowledging and addressing the concerns of critics and opponents. It would appear, on the surface at least, that somebody is doing something right in the museum’s PR department.

It is a far more admirable approach than the recent screw up that almost was the reenactment of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, in which an attempt to re-stage this crucial event in the history of the continent on its 250th anniversary died a messy death thanks to vehement opposition from Quebec’s sovereignist lobby.

Even those who thought that reenacting such a contentious event was never a good idea criticized the manner in which it died. As NDP Deputy Leader Thomas Mulcair told CTV in February, “I think that it was a mistake from the beginning and it’s a good thing that it was cancelled. But the problem is it’s being cancelled now for the wrong reasons, because of threats of violence. And it’s never a good reason to cancel something just because you’re afraid.”

A couple of years ago, the Canadian War Museum faced a controversy of its own over an exhibit about the actions of Allied Bomber Command during the Second World War. One particular display panel raised a quite valid point about the limited strategic benefits of a bombing campaign against targets in Germany that resulted in hundreds of thousands of fatalities. Though it was determined that the content of the exhibit was factually correct and simply misinterpreted, the museum nonetheless bowed to pressure from outraged veterans groups and changed the text.

When dealing with material of such a sensitive nature, some measure of controversy, and compromise, is inevitable. But going which ever way the wind blows runs the risk of eroding an organization’s credibility. It’s crucial for any course of action to have been put to an exhaustive test to ensure it fits within the organization’s mandate and has a rock solid defence ready for any PR storm that may arise before it is put into play.

While the ultimate consequences of the National September 11 Memorial & Museum’s decision to exhibit those martyrdom quotations are not yet known, the clear and strong message that museum staff have laboured to convey is certainly the right move.

Technorati Tags: 9/11, Bomber Command, branding, communications, corporate messaging, Joe Daniels, National September 11 Memorial and Museum, Plains of Abraham, public relations, War Museum

It’s been a while since I have expounded on the subject of reference customers. (OK, it’s been a while since I’ve expounded on any subject on this blog, but here I am, back in form.)

In our work at inmedia, where we strive to engage with the editors of specific trade and industry titles to sell them on the merits of a client’s story, enthusiastic reference customers who can articulate the pain points that were addressed by our clients’ products will, more often than not, make the editor sit up and take notice.

Customers who have actually opened their wallets for a vendor’s product or service provide validation and demonstrate uptake in the market. They can speak in dollars-and-cents terms about why they adopted a particular product and the benefits and return on investment they have derived from it.

Please note the emphasis on that last part. A customer testimonial that is along the lines of “we thought this was a great product and we highly recommend it” is so utterly void of any statement of tangible value that is better to not have it at all.

When developing an in-depth article such as a white paper or case study with an agreeable reference customer who is actually in business to make money and who scrutinizes the worth of every expenditure, it is easy to delve deep and get beyond such a vapid endorsement.

In my freelance work, however, I have found myself working on a number of projects for clients who have taken the other approach to getting their name in a desired industry publication–they’ve paid their way by purchasing advertising space for a corporate profile. Which is all well and good, but to ensure those dollars have been well spent and the potential for lead generation is maximized, the copy must sing with the same unambiguous value statements expected of a case study that has passed muster with a competent editor dedicated to providing her or his readers with the information and opinion they need to run their businesses more effectively.

Too often, however, I see paid profiles, or advertorials, that come across as brochure-ware, produced either by writers who do not have the benefit of a journalism background, or worse, by a committee of the organization’s marketing staff and senior management.

It’s not that these profiles are poorly written (well, not always), or fail to convey core messaging, but they have often been developed with a lack of appreciation for three key points:

• This is an ad. That means the odds of actually engaging with a reader have just taken a nosedive, considering that the publication’s editorial content is also vying for their attention.
• We are all busy and pressed for time. We often don’t read, we skim. We take only a couple of seconds to decide if something is of value to us before flipping past it.
• People don’t want to read a bunch of quotes attributed to stakeholders in the organization. Flagrant self-promotion is a dish best served as an appetizer, not as a main course.

What does this mean?

• It means a 900-word profile that fills more than half of a full-page ad with grey text has little chance of being read.
• It means that there is no luxury of wowing readers with colourful prose that details the rich and successful history of the organization before getting down to the nitty gritty of why your products and services are relevant to them.
• It means that an unambiguous value statement from an enthusiastic customer eager to put their name beside what they have to say is not only essential, it should probably lead the piece.

And on that last point, don’t try to micro-manage the process and put the words you want to hear in the mouth of your reference customer for their rubber-stamped approval. Yes, some degree of polishing and massaging will no doubt be necessary, but let the customer express the value points that mattered most to them in their own words. They are, after all, representative of the people you are trying to reach. To have relevance and resonance, this value statement should come across as sincere and true. This is also worth keeping in mind when developing an effective news release.

Technorati Tags: Advertorial, marketing, promotion, public relations, references, value statement

A Cutting Edge Focus on Social Media for Business was the thrust of this week’s Ottawa Network event, but while each of the presenters offered useful insights on the abrupt paradigm shifts in customer and media engagement driven by Web 2.0, what struck me was that no matter how much some things change, they remain the same.

Chris Biber, president and CEO of SearchingWorks, started off the evening by reiterating that social media, be it Twitter, Youtube or a blog, is simply another set of tools in the marketing toolbox, while marketing itself is simply the “consistent application of common sense.”

It all begins of course, by taking the time to research and understand your customers. Who are they? Where are they? What interests them? And what are their needs and expectations? The same basic foundation that’s always been a requisite for an effective marketing program. The difference now, of course, being that social media allows for a much more candid and informal two-way flow of communication between company and customer.

But this is a conversation that cannot be dominated by a “me, me, me” approach. While companies and brands can make themselves part of the conversation and attempt to direct it, they can’t expect to control it. Nor will their audience respond favourably to anything that is blatantly self-serving or promotional.

Rick Radko, president of R-Cubed, drawing on his software-engineering background, took a different perspective and focused on the application of social media as an internal, rather than external, communications tool set. From online tools for document sharing and collaboration, to wikis, Rick talked about how “Enterprise 2.0″ is becoming the norm for organizations with teleworkers and remote offices, to keep staff in touch and part of a common corporate culture.

In particular, Rick touched on using a wiki to keep staff informed on everything from new corporate directives, to who down the hall is offering to car pool. It’s the digitization of that ubiquitous cork board that adorns staff lunch rooms everywhere, plastered with pushpins and dead-tree notices.

Lastly, Natasha D’Souza, founder of Virtual EyeSee, talked about the distinctions between the social media release, versus the traditional news release, an example of which she offered for a recent Mother’s Day event she held. As her example illustrates, the social media release tends to be less formal and directly addresses the intended audience. It also moves up the contact information and incorporates multimedia elements to support it, from pictures, to video and links to other relevant sources of information.

Two things in particular struck me about the structure of a social media release and how she used it.

First, is the volume of supporting content that can be added, in terms of pictures, video, links and so forth. In the good ol’ days of tree slaying, a comprehensive package such as this was called a media kit. Is the social media release, in its fully realized form, in many ways not simply the digitization of this traditional public relations tool? (Editor’s note: Actually, long before the term “social media release” was ever coined, savvy PR practitioners have been offering their contacts multimedia-rich content. And we’ve been hosting or delivering that content via electronic channels for decades. The web has made it easier for practitioners to do it all themselves but there are still some media formats — broadcast-quality b-roll, for example — that you probably don’t want to host yourself.)

The second point came when one attendee asked Natasha how she distributed this social media release. And this is where another classic and intrinsic element of marketing and PR came in. She researched the influential bloggers in the Ottawa area who would be interested in her Mother’s Day event and contacted them to pitch the event and direct them to her release. Proving once again that they’ve yet to come up with a social media tool that is a suitable substitute for hard work and old-fashioned solicitation.

Technorati Tags: public relations, marketing, social media, blogging, Twitter, wiki, Enterprise 2.0, Web 2.0

Recently, Francis fielded a question on LinkedIn about the value of running a survey to generate media coverage.

Surveys can be used effectively to position a company, but not if the company is perceived simply as a sponsor of an external survey. Francis cited the example of one IT consultancy that, on inmedia’s counsel, did away with its external survey of CIOs and instead realized much better media traction from publishing the results of an internal census of its own IT experts. The spotlight was shifted from a group of faceless CIOs to the consultancy’s own knowledge keepers, positioning the consultancy as an authoritative subject matter expert rather than a mere survey sponsor.

As the editor of a business publication, I saw almost daily news releases plugging a survey that, on the surface at least, provided profound insights into one issue or another of relevance to the Ottawa business community. However, the appeal factor quickly evaporated when, upon closer inspection, it was revealed that said survey was sponsored by a major credit card company or software vendor.

This made the objectivity of the data presented, and the conclusions drawn from it, immediately suspect to me. After all, the sponsoring organization would not go to the time and effort to promote survey results that didn’t support its own sales and marketing efforts, now would it? It was this obvious vested interest that made me reluctant to devote even a couple of hundred words of coverage with an online news brief.

When trying to come up with ingenious and cunning ways to engage with the media, there is, once again, simply no substitute for taking the time and effort to understand:

1. Who are the media that are relevant to your organization? Which ones have the clout to move your market and a focus that includes the products and services that you offer?

2. Who on staff specifically covers your offering or the specific markets that you target?

3. What kind of content is the publication looking for and how can you provide it? When you pursue potential customers, you position your product or service as a solution to a problem. Attracting the interest of the media is no different. In Francis’s example above, by putting the spotlight on its own internal thought leaders, this IT consultancy was conveying the value it could provide to a publication in search of expert opinion and insight on pertinent issues and topics.

Answering these questions takes research and the patience and persistence to secure that all-important first conversation with an editor. This is relationship building based upon your ability to offer something that is relevant and valuable. Prove that you’re useful, and your foot is firmly wedged in the door. It is not about flogging today’s news release, though that does present a good excuse to pick up the phone.

Don’t operate under the false assumption that following this process faithfully is a magic bullet that guarantees results, or that great things will happen over night. It still takes time.

For one client, I have been working to place a leadership piece with a key publication since February. The editor held on to the draft we submitted for almost two months before coming back with requested revisions that essentially gut much of the article’s original focus and content. But he’s still interested. With another magazine that lies at the pinnacle of this client’s wish list, I have been touching base with the editor every few weeks for the past three months and finally hope to garner a firm commitment in June when work commences on a signature fall issue.

Invariably, great results are the result of this kind of furious paddling below the waterline, rather than something like a sponsored survey that can fall into the category of gimmickry. The sooner you take to the water and get to work, the sooner those media clippings will begin to add up.

Technorati Tags: public relations, marketing, media relations, pitching

No matter how busy we become and how far flung we are from the people we need to communicate with to carry out our work, there is still no substitute for good old-fashioned face-to-face contact.

In recent weeks, I have been working on a series of business profiles that will run in an upcoming supplement in the Ottawa Business Journal. These are largely 350- to 500-word pieces for which I must interview the principal of each business and perhaps a couple of reference customers. (Nothing validates your business more than a good reference customer).

Considering the size of the articles I must produce, I could easily garner the information I need over the phone. It would be quicker and more efficient from a time-management perspective. But I’ve chosen to visit each of these businesses in person.  They are all local businesses, so why not take advantage of the opportunity to interview the principals in their natural environment?

So much of the work I do at inmedia is with clients outside Ottawa and with trade and industry media spread across the continent and beyond. It’s refreshing to actually put a face to a name and enjoy the interaction of meeting in the flesh. A face-to-face meeting is by its very nature much more intimate and dynamic than two bodiless voices communicating across wires and networks. There is definitely something lost when you can’t look into the eyes of the person who is speaking to you. Body language is a critical part of any human interaction.

Nonetheless, we frequently have little choice but to conference by phone, (as I am about to do with inmedia client Xsilva Systems of Montreal, thanks to a service called Calliflower). And while communicating in this manner may not be as ideal as in person, there are ways to make the most of it. Richard Laermer at the Bad Pitch Blog offers plenty of helpful advice on the subject, and it all begins with planning ahead and staying focused on the matters at hand during the call.

Technorati Tags: communications, conference calls, clients