Posted by Joe Franscella, 8-24-2010: I’m a social mediaphile. I have a passion for all things social media and the technologies that enable them. I was particularly intrigued when a client of mine pointed out the Kansas City firm SocialVolt to me. SocialVolt is a social media management platform that claims to provide management and [...]
Posted by: Joe Franscella, 7-30-2010: Las Vegas, NV – After two days of Black hat I now see the relationship between that event and DefCon. Black hat seems to be the place where IT security vendors try to convince the world that they can protect the Internet, whereas DefCon attendees clearly — whether they say [...]
Trainer’s “Best Integrated Consumer Campaign” Produced Billions of Impressions for Online Retailer Zazzle PLEASANTON, CA – June 29, 2010 - Trainer Communications, a full-service public relations, integrated marketing and social media agency servicing the enterprise and consumer technology sectors, today announced that the San Francisco Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA-SF) has [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 6-7-2010: My college days are long behind me, but through the years I have still managed to keep a few extra pounds on by caving to my late night Big Mac cravings, here and there. This seemingly harmless guilty-pleasure is probably something I will never shake (no pun intended). What can [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 3-17-2010: Trainer Communications’ PR and marketing professionals were, again, all over the RSA Conference, myself included. This year was especially exciting as the amount of client’s we were representing there increased 300 percent over 2009 and this year we conducted two surveys for our clients PacketMotion and Brocade and helped our [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 3-5-2010: Again, I had an excellent, educational experience at the RSA Conference. I run into editors, bloggers and analysts I know from time to time at the show and always ask them the same question, anything new, exciting or cutting-edge? Invariably, I get yes and no responses but this year I [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 2-25-2010: RSA Conference 2010 is here, only a few days away at least. Many in the PR trenches are busy psycho-dialing in hopes of scheduling that one last, or in some cases first, meeting with a journalist or analyst so you can prove your worth to your clients. If you have [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella — 1-27-2010: RSA Conference 2010 is here, that’s especially true if you’re in PR and you have an information security client that’s contracted with you to raise awareness for them at the show among media and bloggers. If you’re representing McAfee, Symantec, Cisco, RSA (EMC’s security division) or another mega IT [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – 1-24-2010: The start of January marked my second anniversary at Trainer Communications. On that day, I tweeted: I meant it, too. There’s a lot of great things that go on at Trainer Communications. Aside from working with an excellent bunch of PR, communications and marketing pros, Trainer’s commitment to Metrics [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – 12-28-09 – The appointment of Howard Schmidt to the position of White House Cybersecurity Coordinator is further indication that President Obama’s administration acknowledges that effective cybersecurity can mean the difference between life and death. The administration should look at cybersecurity in this way, after all, cyberspace provides criminals and terrorists [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – 12-23-09 – It’s that time of year again. Time to catch up with family and friends to spend some quality time together, reminisce about times past and times to come. I have had some fantastic things happen to me over this past year, including the birth of a new daughter, [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 12-7-09 – 2010 is around the corner and it’s every account coordinators favorite time of year — Editorial Calendar time! For those of you out there in IT security PR, here is a QA with SC Magazine’s Editor-in-Chief Illena Armstrong that sheds some light on the SC Magazine ed cal process [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 11-24-09 – There’s nothing like an award to rally the troops, build morale and validate the value of your organization’s services. At my day job, Trainer Communications, we value awards our clients win as well as those we earn. They not only instill a sense of organizational pride, they also validate [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella, 11-17-09 – Anyone who’s ever brought a client in front of Mike Rothman for a briefing knows two things: 1.) Prepare the client to tell the truth; 2.) Prepare the client to hear the truth. Although a lot of times clients don’t realize it at first, the toughest briefings — which [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – 11-3-09 – Nobody loves to get angry at Microsoft Windows more than I. At least a few time a day, I am annoyed over bells and whistles that pop up unannounced and uninvited, ticked over apps that just decide to stop responding or swearing while trying to find emails I [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – 10-30-09 – Happy Halloween from a few of the hard-working, fun-loving gang at Trainer Communications. You won’t find a better bunch of PR and marketing practitioners completely devoted to client satisfaction but also sure to have, at least, a little fun every day.
Posted by Joe Franscella – 10-14-2009 – The other day I received an interesting email: B a n k of America Notification [ ref id: 837644 ] Dear B a n k of America member , You have (1) new security message from B a n k of America SiteKey: – Please click on the [...]
Posted By Joe Franscella – 10-10-09 – Back in August, the New York Times published an article written by Ellen Messmer out of IDG’s Network World, titled: Security Start-Up Rohati Extends Access-Control Gear to the Cloud. In it, she says that John Burke of Nemertes Research stated: ….Nemertes in its research has found that fewer [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella – Read an interesting blog post by Larry Dignan at ZDNet Between the Lines blog this morning, IBM targets Google Apps for business, undercuts pricing and touts reliability. One paragraph really caught my attention: The LotusLive iNotes launch, set to be announced on Monday, pushes reliability in a big way. Taking [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella Media designed to be made available quickly and easily over the Internet to anyone with a Web browser and Internet connection is typically referred to as “Social Media.” Commonly used social media types include videos, blogs, photos, PodCasts and remarks made on social media publishing communities, blog reply fields and platforms [...]
Posted By Joe Franscella The last thing any good general wants to do is go to war with untrained soldiers. Could you imagine devising a clever strategy and then deploying soldiers on the battlefield who don’t know the difference between a muzzle and a breach? The results would be disastrous. Imagine you are a CMO, [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella I’m not big on press releases or announcements that start off by stating “… is pleased to announce …” But, I gotta say that in this particular case I really am pleased to announce (on Security Heavy) Trainer TV, my firm’s video contribution to the IT, marketing and public relations spaces. [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella About nine months ago, I had a phone conversation with Bob McMillen of IDG to better understand what he looks for in a news story. During the course of the call, the topic came up of just how many Information Security vendors there are. I don’t have an exact figure, but [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella I was as intrigued by Claire Caine Miller’s New York Times piece, Spinning the Web: P.R. in Silicon Valley, as Michael Arrington and Todd Defren were. Like anyone who read it, I agreed with some of it and I disagreed with some of it. I also agreed and disagreed with various [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella Whenever I am tasked with video responsibilities at my firm, I always make a beeline to YouTube to do dearches and gather inspiration. Today I was searching for some comedy fodder related to technology reporting and I came across this old David Pogue video. Listen to the lyrics closely, it really [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella A while back, I tweeted: The more someone claims to be a social media expert the less of one they become. The message’s implication was clear: so many people are claiming to be “social media experts” that deciding whom to engage to help you position your company and products on social [...]
Posted by Joe Franscella I’m a big fan of Web 2.0 video. I love that Web 2.0 empowers anyone with a video camera and an Internet connection to quickly and easily share their perspectives with the world and it truly is living the dream for me to get paid to produce corporate video for the [...]
Posted by Mary Van Zandt The IT industry never ceases to amaze me! During the dot-com era I was working at Sterling Commerce and my charter was to market the company’s first security products. At that time, many believed that if you were perceived by your buyers as a brick and mortar company you had [...]
Susan Trainer, President of Trainer Communications, receives the 2009 ‘Best Agency to Work For’ SABRE award from Paul Holmes in New York City. Trainer Communications, the premier provider of integrated marketing and high tech public relations services that create global market leaders, today announced its selection as the “Best Boutique PR Agency to Work For” [...]
ThreatPost.com Editor Ryan Naraine talks about his new gig during RSA Conference 2009. ThreatPost.com from Joe Franscella on Vimeo. IT security solutions vendor Kaspersky Lab specializes in reducing risk, ironically though, it has thrown its hat into the most risky industry of the day – news. A few weeks ago at RSA Conference 2009, Kaspersky [...]
Marriage has been good to me, no, it’s been great! I have a great and lovely wife, Kim, and she and I both have stuck to our commitment, which was that we decided to make our marriage work, for better or worse, in sickness and health, for richer or poor, until death do us part. [...]
Trainer Commmunications Security Practice, under the leadership of VP Mary Van Zandt, wins the monthly “Above & Beyond the Call” award for outstanding work at RSA Conference 2009. Proud to say that I am part of the team along with Shannon Magill.
On a recent bi-coastal media and analyst tour, Trainer Communications caught up with Secure Passage executives in between briefings and they validated the importance of having Trainer’s marketing and communications professionals on their side. Trainer Communications, the premier provider of integrated marketing and high-tech public relations services that create global market leaders, today announced that [...]
I have 45 minutes left before he press room at RSA Conference 2009 closes. Just want to take a few minutes to point out a few highlights I’ve experienced over the past four days. Found threatpost.com to be quite intriguing – I think its good news for the news industry that corporations are stepping in [...]
SAN FRANCISCO, CA – RSA CONFERENCE — Secure Passage today announced that its man-on-the-street survey at RSA Conference 2009 revealed that there is no consensus about spending for IT security. When asked if the downturn in the economy would have negative, positive or no implications for security budgets, the more than 100 respondents were nearly [...]
SAN FRANCISCO, CA – RSA CONFERENCE — Secure Passage today announced that its man-on-the-street survey at RSA Conference 2009 revealed that 72 percent of respondents have not deployed any virtual firewall technology. The survey further reveals that adoption is hindered by a lack of consensus as to the definition of a virtual firewall, increased management [...]
It’s almost time. Next week I will be heavily immersed on behalf of clients and my firm, Trainer Communications, in all things RSA Conference 2009. I am especially excited about the social media activities we are executing for my client Secure Passage. Over the course of event, they are meeting with several key journalists, bloggers [...]
I gave in, after not much thought I purchased a Kindle V2. What the heck, I only have to buy about 20 of the half-priced Kindle books to pay it off. My first purchase – Geoffrey Moore’s classic marketing manifesto “Crossing the Chasm.” I have been meaning to reread the piece for some time and [...]
In 2008, according to Royal Group Services, a data breach damages indemnification provider, 35.7 million identities were compromised and 18 million records were stollen from financial services companies. The company, which specializes in PCI DSS insurance services, further reports that in ’08 companies paid an average of $202 per breached file and that the total [...]
