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 Matter™ (the agreement made between Trainer and clients on the amount of press coverage that will be achieved for each initiative) and entrepreneurial spirit fosters the perfect environment for me — one where results are key and creativity and initiative are rewarded.

Prior to coming to Trainer, I had been the managing editor of a Central Valley (CA) newspaper and founder and general manager of a communications and advertising consultancy that produced a weekly cable network television show covering sports and recreation activities. During the 26 episodes, I leaned to do everything it took to produce a weekly show, which included but by no means was limited to — securing sponsors, filming, editing, voice over, production, coordination with the cable company for scheduling and technical matters, and receiving praises with humility and scorn with professionalism. Need to produce a weekly cable television show? Let’s talk.

One of the things I wanted to carry into my PR and communications work for clients and Trainer was my ability to produce video — something I am glad to say I’ve had a chance to do. Through the course of my Trainer career, I’ve produce videos for former clients, current clients and Trainer, some of which you can check out here:

Solidifying my satisfaction over the past two years at Trainer were two key events, 1.) Helping our firm to win a national Videographer’s Award of Distinction for production of a Web 2.0 news video, and, 2.) Being named as one of the leads of Trainer’s Video Practice in our 2009 yearend release. Check it out:

I am looking forward to another year with Trainer (and many more after that), to building the video practice and to continuing to help lead client accounts successfully. Next up: RSA Conference 2010, here we come!

Tisa Penny (left), Shannon Magill and Susan Thomas with the PR News and MarCom Gold awards, earned for outstanding communications, PR and marketing efforts in support of the Mt. Diablo Region YMCA fund raising efforts.

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 fine work done and best efforts put forth.

Recently, the Association of Marketing and Communications Professionals, PR News and the Videographer Awards recognized Trainer for its outstanding work in communications, public relations, marketing and video.

For its pro bono work done on behalf of the Mt. Diablo Region YMCA’s new facilities fund raising efforts, the Association awarded Trainer its International MarCom Gold award and PR News awarded it an honorable mention. For its outstanding work in video production, the Videographer Awards presented Trainer with the prestigious “Clapboard” for corporate video and Web 2.0 news video production for its work done for former client G-Log and current client Bear Valley Resort. The MarCom and PR News awards were earned by the outstanding trio of Trainer founder and CEO Susan Thomas, Account Coordinator Shannon Magill and Account Coordinator Tisa Penny. The Clapboards were earned by the Trainer video duo of VP Ross Perich and myself.

G Log Corporate Video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Bear Valley Resort Web 2.0 News Video

Click here to view the embedded video.

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 may leave them rattled — often end up being the most productive as they not only provide (pardon me) “insight,” but also a good indication regarding the true level of resonance that their messages are having. Prior to going to eIQ, when Rothman was still taking briefings, I had an opportunity to bring a couple clients in front of him, while the clients didn’t necessarily exit walking on sunshine, they were forced to reconsider at least a couple bullet points and then recraft them to be more aligned with reality as opposed to hype (which paid off in subsequent briefings). My hope is that Rothman will again take vendor briefings and continue to provide the same sharp-witted insight as he has in the past — the truth, as harsh as it may sometimes be, does everyone a favor.

I am glad to see Alan Shimel continues to go strong on his blog, now AShimmy, when he announced he had left Still Secure I was left to wonder if he’d continue to post his thoughts and opinions on the tech industry, to my delight he continues to go strong. Many of my It security marketing and PR plans start off with a trip to Alan’s blog to find out what he’s saying about “it,” to understand how he’s breaking “it” down or to find out if I am really planning around something “new” (note to security PR pros: when Dan Kaplan at SC says publicly that Alan’s blog is one of the sites he looks at for potential ideas, checking it out on a regular basis isn’t a bad idea).

Alin posted an interesting link to an I.B.M. Cloud commercial aired during Monday night’s NFL game. I don’t disagree with him that taking the Cloud into the pop culture main stream may signal the demise of it’s media sexiness, however, my observations were on the quality of the commercial itself and what a valuable learning tool it was for those of us pitching technology full time. Watch the commercial:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I.B.M. does a nice job of quickly defining what the Cloud is from a technology perspective and then goes heavily into what the business and consumer benefits it offers are. This format is a good lesson for anyone pitching a technology story — go light on tech and heavy on practical benefit. A lot of times it’s hard to get client’s to understand that a lot of the writers you speak with, unless they’re techy bloggers, don’t have time to become engineers, what they write about are the practical benefits a technology provides over its really cool code.

Reading Brad Stone’s piece in the New York Times on new eTailer Glyde.com got me thinking, what’s the return policy? If I buy a used — often very cheap –  game at Game Stop I can return it within seven days for a full refund and it won’t cost me $2.50 (see Glyde.com return policy). New DVD’s are so cheap to buy at stores like Walmart and to rent at RedBox in the supermarket it doesn’t seem to make any sense to buy something used on an online venue. It will be interesting to see where this company heads and what the future holds for this Web site, surely the profitability plan can’t be based around consumers selling used games and DVD’s to one another, there has to me more coming in the future.