ARC President Deron Johnson, Rhea & Kaiser and Golden ARC Awards Contest Manager, Amy Keith McDonald, McDonald Marketing Communications, presented the awards. ZimmComm New Media won two awards in the Tactics Division. Working with BCS Communications for John Deere we won for the blog, DriveGreenTractors.com. Working with the Renewable Fuels Association we won for the podcast, The Ethanol Report. These are the first Golden ARC Awards we’ve ever won and Cindy and I are very excited about it.

The app is now available for iPhone users to download, free of charge, in the Apple iTunes store. You can find the AgWired App in the iTunes Store with this link: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/agwired/id382820712?mt=8

Apps just make on-line access from an iPhone quicker and easier. We wanted to be the first to develop an iPhone application to show that it can be done and that there is a demand for this new technology tool in the agricultural world. And of course, the AgWired iPhone App is open for sponsorship. Who wants to be the first?

We’re looking for feedback on our first app. Let us know what you like, don’t like and wish it would do and we’ll try to incorporate your suggestions in a future update. Thanks.

Top Ten Reasons to have ZimmComm cover your next event:

10. We “Tweet” u right – in so many ways. We have multiple established Twitter accounts with thousands of followers on several different topics and can help tweet your event to tweeps all over.

9. Flickr Photos up in a Flash – get your photos uploaded and out for media to use and everyone to see faster.

8. Google Loves Us – Search engines pick up posts from ZimmComm blogs fast and furious, both news and web searches.

7. We Flip for YouTube – short, web quality video clips give your event a YouTube presence.

6. Audio on Demand –interviews with key presenters and speeches can be available on-line to listen or download.

5. First Class Photography – we take high-res photos of everything so you don’t have to.

4. Targeted Exposure – We can post on your blog and one or more of our own – with audiences that include agribusiness, renewable energy, dairy, and precision farming. We can even design and build a blog for your specific event.

3. Event Blogging Trail Blazers – ZimmComm was one of the first pioneers of event blogging, starting with the National Biodiesel Conference in February 2006.

2. Multi-tasking is our Middle Name – We often do audio, video, photos, tweets, blogging and more at the same time – while chewing gum and balancing a book on our heads. Ok, we made the last part up.

1. Historical Preservation – Your event is archived for history on the web and we provide a digital copy of all photos, video and audio sent to you for the sake of posterity after the event.

AgWired:

Are you and advertising or public relations agency with ag clients? Do you want your story and brand in front of agrimarketers who might want your services? Then please send all agency announcements to news@agwired.com. We’re finding that many agencies have multiple “lists” and we want to be on all of them. We want your agency news releases as well as those you distribute for your clients. AgWired is probably the most unique online industry news source and you can help define it. Just go to “What Is AgWired?” (http://agwired.com/2010/05/11/what-is-agwired/) and add your comment! The same thing applies to you farm groups and marketing and communication departments for agribusinesses. We can’t tell your story if you don’t tell us!

Domestic Fuel:

Are you doing any work in the renewable fuels industry? Ethanol, biodiesel, algae, wind, solar, natural gas, propane? Do you have clients who are? Then please send all announcements to news@domesticfuel.com. With nearly 30,000 unique visitors a month and growing, Domestic Fuel is the best way to get your message out to all the participants in the industry as well as a significant component of interested consumers.

Precision Pays:

Here’s where we cover the latest technology that’s making farming more efficient and cost effective. Send your news to news@precisionpays.com. Precision Pays is one of the only online sources of news dedicated to this topic.

World Dairy Diary:

This very active news service covers all things dairy. Send your news and announcements to news@worlddairydiary.com.

A signature feature of our on location online event coverage is a photo album and I took quite a few during this event: President Obama POET Biorefining Photo Album

Even we didn’t know that today you’d be following news and information produced by the company via Twitter on your mobile smart phones.

Well, one thing you can count on is that ZimmComm will Tweet you Right! If you’re attending this year’s National Agri-Marketing Conference please stop and visit and while you’re there get some Twitter tips from the professional ag tweeters and enter our drawing for a cool prize.

Between the two of us and our hardworking freelancers, we did 4310 posts on all websites, including Agwired, Domestic Fuel, Precision Pays and World Dairy Diary. We also did 176 podcasts and too many audio interviews to count.

We uploaded 11,282 photos to 48 Flickr photo albums and 88 YouTube videos.

The most popular YouTube videos on our channel in 2009 were Daryl Hannah at NBB with 6854 views, the new John Deere planter with 5876, the New Holland Celebrity Tractor Race 4557 and the tractor pull at National Farm Machinery Show 2872. Top stories on Agwired included:
John Deere Unveils Largest Planter
HSUS Challenges American Agriculture
HSUS in Nebraska (tops in comments)
Record Phone Calls on iPhone
Get a Rustler from New Holland

We visited over 60 different cities, from Panama City to Portland, San Antonio to Minnetonka, and San Diego to Boston. Read our travelogue here.

Best of all – our readership was up significantly on all websites:
Agwired – up 45% to 158,400 unique visitors
Domestic Fuel – up 15% to 269,000 unique visitors
Precision Pays – up 166% to 29,000 unique visitors
World Dairy Diary – up 68% to 110,000 unique visitors

Thanks to our of our wonderful friends in the industry for making 2009 a great year for ZimmComm. We look forward to continuing our relationships in the new decade.

Happy New Year!

To start with, we can’t say enough good about our relationship with Dave Larson and Larson Enterprises. In just a few months, with Dave’s assistance, we have obtained a number of new clients who are utilizing our services and websites. He’s keeping us busier than ever and our schedule is filling up for the next few months.

I’ll start more regular posting here and bring you more up to date on ZimmComm activities in coming days.

Today we’re happy to announce a partnership with Dave Larson of Larson Enterprises as official sales representative for ZimmComm’s on-line publications and services, including Agwired.com, DomesticFuel.com, WorldDairyDiary.com and PrecisionPays.com.

Many of you know Dave and for those who don’t I recorded a conversation with him yesterday about our new deal. In it you can learn more about his background and what our plans are. Listen here: chuck-dave-larson.mp3

After five years of growth, our company is now at the point where it makes sense to retain the services of an established media representative to market our products/services. Dave will help us more effectively serve our many clients in the agribusiness industry.

Larson Enterprises is a full service advertising, marketing and consulting firm located in West Des Moines, Iowa. Dave has over 25 years of advertising, marketing, public relations and public policy experience with both public and private sector clients including national and international trade associations in food safety, agriculture, recreation and legal fields.

“I am pleased to have the opportunity to assist ZimmComm in representing the targeted advertising, marketing and media opportunities provided through their network of sites,” says Larson. “This truly is a unique opportunity of future growth for advertisers in reaching their key target markets. As a part of this new opportunity we will be offering new packages and schedule opportunities for those reserving advertising placements prior to July 15.”

So if you’re looking for a great new media deal Dave is your man. You can contact him via email or 515-440-2810.

After attending J-School at the University of Missouri, David Brazeal worked as a radio reporter and wire service editor. Then the Internet lured him away from the newsroom. Now, he uses his experience to help clients communicate better with their customers and employees through a wide range of social media tools.

And you know who I am.

So why are we doing it? Because we’ve continued to grow and are now hosting 26 different websites! Of course that doesn’t count others we manage on client servers.

So, basically we’re doubling our capacity and upgrading to some fantastic new server software which means our sites will perform even more reliably and faster. You shouldn’t notice anything during this move since we’ll have all sites up and running on both servers.

And just in case you want to know more, here’s what Wikipedia says about it:

Thanksgiving, or Thanksgiving Day, is a harvest festival. Traditionally, it’s a time to give thanks for the harvest and express gratitude in general. Thanksgiving is a North American holiday with the dates and whereabouts of the first Thanksgiving celebration a topic of modest contention. It has generally become a national secular holiday with religious origins. Though the earliest attested Thanksgiving celebration was on September 8, 1565 in what is now Saint Augustine, Florida[1][2], the traditional “first Thanksgiving” is venerated as having occurred at the site of Plymouth Plantation, in 1621.

Today, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday of October in Canada and on the fourth Thursday of November in the United States. Thanksgiving dinner is held on this day, usually as a gathering of family members.

ZimmComm was on the scene, publishing content on both AgWired and the AgNite Blog.

This is one of the over 300 pictures Cindy and I shot during the event. You can see 200 of them in our online photo album. We also conducted 12 interviews and produced 1 YouTube video. So far we’ve produced 15 stories from the event and counting.

That’s what you get when you bring in the agriblogging and farm podcasting experts from ZimmComm.

You can count on seeing some live video via AgWired Live TV and lots of photos and interviews. My coverage will be sponsored by the Minnesota Agri-Growth Council and AgStar Financial Services.

Can’t make the call? That’s okay. It will be available for download after the call. Go ahead and register anyway, and you will receive an email with the download link!

Imagine having this done for your event or company.

Besides posting on these clients blog sites we’ll also be posting on our own, Domestic Fuel, AgWired and World Dairy Diary. These ZimmComm-owned sites provide you with a “sponsorship” opportunity to have online exposure even if you don’t have your own site to provide this kind of event coverage.

Let’s face it, there’s no more interactive, up to the minute, interesting, search engine optimized way to showcase your activities than with online coverage on the websites we create. Let me know if you’d like to discuss doing this for your company or group.

To view my profile and write on my wall you’ll need to have a Facebook account though. I’ve got pages created so far for AgWired and ZimmComm New Media.

The same is true with LinkedIn. If you’ve already got an account then visit me and let’s link up. I got started on this one from invitations from a few friends in the business!

Of course you can also just send me an email, text me to my phone (573-230-3024), call my phone, post a comment here or on one of my sites like AgWired, or contact me through my Flickr or YouTube account

ZimmComm New Media has grown significantly this year and we want to thank all the wonderful people we get to work with. None of it would be possible without your faith and trust in us and your support.

We’re looking forward to a great 2008!

This just means that the audio we create from over the phone interviews will increase in quality. We’ve been delivering audio to broadcasters, websites and other content users for years. These new tools just help simplify the process while allowing us to produce an even better product.

We’re very thankful for all that the good Lord has blessed us with this year and that certainly includes the many people and companies we get to work with.

We wish a very safe and happy holiday.

Well, so far I’ve uploaded 73 video clips, mostly in just over the last year. Those clips have been viewed over 66,000 times collectively at this point. They vary from the highest one being the very first one I posted which has now been viewed almost 23,000 by itself to some as few as a dozen times or so.

One thing is constant though. The number of views keeps going higher for all of them. They stay archived in YouTube and I’ve made sure they’re all key word tagged with good descriptions which makes them very easy to find for people searching.

I was just showing someone my latest stats and he thought I ought to share them with you.

So why join and especially since they haven’t done anything yet? Because it’s a chance to get in at the beginning and have a voice and hopefully access to information that will help us and our clients. One of the things I can already sense is the need in this ADM to address niche topic/audience producers. When I joined they asked me to check a range of how many downloads my podcast gets in a month. The first choice was 1 – 50,000 and then they went higher! I don’t know about you but I don’t see this medium as a mass medium necessarily. In fact, if all they’re going to focus on is podcasting or other downloadable media content that’s just out to see how many downloads they can get then I think they’ll not only be making a mistake but missing out on what most of us are doing.

I produce podcasts for niche audiences. If my program is targeted to 40 people and I’ve got 40 downloads then I might be reaching my total audience. I don’t care about having thousands of downloads. It’s not just the total number of downloads but who those downloads represent.

So, it’s going to be interesting to see how this evolves. The traditional media buyers and agencies are so metric driven that they tend to overlook the quality of the audience. When you’re used to measuring CPM but now have a buy option that is only going to reach the target audience with no waste the numbers get a lot smaller but the message is making a much bigger impact and the cost is probably a lot lower. Of course then you have to ask, “How do I make a living on small buying fees/commissions?” Good question.

If there is one word to describe ZimmComm this year it would be BUSY! And we LOVE it! Our clients are just fabulous to work with and even though we are working hard we are really enjoying our safari in this new media frontier.

So, what have we been doing lately? For one, we have a few more contract part-timers helping us out. John Davis, a 20-year veteran broadcast news reporter, has been posting on Domestic Fuel since January. He has been a great help. Also, a new media world professional by the name of Laura McNamara is now trained to help us with on-site events with photography, interviews and posting. She helped out with the Indy 500 and quickly became an event blogging pro!

Where have we been lately? Since NAMA, we’ve been to Dallas, Memphis, Atlanta, Kansas City, Chicago, Los Angeles, Des Moines, Lexington, Indianapolis, Ontario, Nashville, Washington DC and a soybean field near Laddonia, MO. Some of the highlights include – interviewing Jay Leno, using a BIG boy lens to shoot some awesome photos at the Indy 500, covering the Country Music Association Music Festival, and watching soybeans grow.

Watching soybeans grow? Yeah – you’ll read more about that on AgWired in the weeks to come.

Where are we going? Upcoming trips include: the Iowa Corn Indy 250, the Fuel Ethanol Workshop in St. Louis, the National Appaloosa Horse Show in Oklahoma City, the Cattlemen’s Beef Board summer meeting in Denver, the Ag Media Summit in Louisville, American Coalition for Ethanol in Minneapolis, Farm Progress Show, and IFAJ in Japan.

Ag Media Summit will feature two ZimmComm workshops – Blogging for Business and Podcasting for Publishers.

Sponsor opportunities – currently available for Ag Media Summit, ACE, Farm Progress and IFAJ. Be our sponsor for online coverage of these events on our websites and receive the kind of coverage described below. You have access to all the content we create to use for your own post-event purposes which can include your newsletter, website, commemorative DVD’s, custom loaded iPods, etc.

Updated rate cards – now available for DomesticFuel, AgWired and World Dairy Diary. Please contact Chuck and he’ll send you one and a custom proposal if you’d like.

Some recent event coverage summaries:

Indy 500 – 52 posts (2 websites), over 1,000 pictures, 1 online photo album (222 photos), 25 audio interviews
CMA Music Festival – 34 posts, 635 pictures, 1 online photo album (236 photos), 1 online slide show w/music (79 photos), 11 YouTube videos, 19 audio interviews
Propane Days – 12 posts, 38 pictures, 1 YouTube video, 9 audio interviews

ZimmNews is being emailed to over 1,600 of Chuck’s agricultural marketing industry contacts. These are very influential people in the biz. Hey, you’re getting it aren’t you? If you’d like to sponsor ZimmNews let Chuck know and he’ll work out a sweet deal!

That’s all for this issue of ZimmNews.

National Press Club – Washington, DC – Ethanol Promotion and Information Council
World Ag Forum – St. Louis, MO – World Ag Forum
CBOT Ethanol Press Conference – Chicago, IL – Ethanol Promotion and Information Council
Elanco Sensory Briefing/Wet Lab – Des Moines – Elanco Animal Health
Syngenta Soybean Field Project Setup – Missouri – Syngenta
Alltech International Symposium/IFAJ Board Meeting – Louisville, KY – Alltech/IFAJ
Indianapolis 500 – Indianapolis, IN – Ethanol Promotion and Information Council

Blogging or podcasting are involved in most of these projects. But even more descriptive of the type of work I’ll be doing is photography, audio interviews and some video. These things become content in my posts but also have additional applications for each client including for internal and external public relations.

This week Aaron and I will be making some of those presentations in Memphis, St. Louis, Des Moines and Kansas City. Can you say road time?

If you’d like to see what was going on then check out my AgWired site using this category to call up all my posts from the Conference.

I’ll be blogging the conference on AgWired and also on the NAMA Blog. Keep up with our agricultural marketing efforts as we work with Truffle Media Networks to help spread the new media bug to many more communication professionals.

Most of the activities kick off on Wednesday but since some of us get in there early so the Truffle guys and I are inviting our friends to stop by and say hello on Tuesday afternoon. We’ll be hanging out in Monduel’s, the Hyatt Regency atrium bar and we’ll buy you a drink. We being yours truly, Ned Arthur and Aaron Gilbertie. (Aaron’s buying, right Aaron?). It’s easy to find. Just come in the lobby entrance and look up since it’s up a level by escalator.

When you stop by we’ll give you a card to bring by our booth at the Trade Show so you can enter to win an iPhone. Get in on your chance to win the coolest phone of the decade. You’ll also be able to listen to sample podcasts on our listening stations in the booth just in case you’re not already subscribing to one of our podcasts.

ZimmComm New Media is celebrating 3 years in business and over 2 years of helping companies find their way in this new online communications world we live in. Starting today I’ll be posting more regularly about our projects and gathering information for you to help you join the online conversation.

Please feel free to comment or email me if you have any questions or world like to schedule a consultation or training session.