Does High Tech PR Still Exist?

Presented by Bob Batchelor, VP Corporate Affairs & Marketing, Bank of America Alan D. Kelly, President & CEO, Applied Communications Group, Curt Kundred, Senior VP, Fleishman-Hillard By David Shoffner

Riding an unprecedented wave of prosperity, the technology and dot-com market seemed unstoppable in the late 1990s, The new millenium looked promising and companies began hiring more employees and spending more money than ever before, gearing up for yet another year of profits and success.

In March of 2000, only 25 dot-com employees lost their jobs (that same month the Nasdaq hits its all-time high of 5,132 - up 88 percent over the last 6 months). But in the summer of 2000 things took a turn for the worse. One year after losing just 25 employees in one month, the dot-com empire released 10,000 workers, with 12,000 more lay-offs in April, The Nasdaq plummeted to 2,052 - a 150 percent decrease that very few tech-based companies could survive, Shares in dot-com start-ups that were changing hands for hundreds of dollars each at the height of the speculative fever were now virtually worthless, Did anybody see it coming? In retrospect, yes, but few chose to pay much attention.

Today the tech market is rebuilding - slowly and very carefully. "We were partying in the late 90s and now we're in the hangover phase, so it's easy to understand why we're a little hesitant to go back out and party again," said Alan Kelly, president and CEO of Applied Comnunications Group. Kelly added that the media high tech hype in the late 90s can partially be blamed on overzealous public relations efforts. Regardless of who is to blame for the collapse, high-tech PR continues to exist, however, it has taken on an entirely different form, Curt Kindred, senior vice president of Fleishman-Hillard said, "Tech (PR) agencies must evolve or die and many are dying, Our services will not go away, but our types of services will change."

Tech-PR fines that survived the crash have completely redesigned the traditional practice of technology PR, With less money and more restrictions than their predecessors, these agencies are taking full advantage of vast changes in the online/offline media landscape, They are now using cutting edge Internet based PR and collaboration technologies to design PR campaigns that are narrowly tailored to specific audiences to achieve specific results with minimal cost.