With experience that began with his first “real job” as a daily newspaper reporter and moved through PR agencies, independent consulting and in-house positions, Jim Zahniser has a well-earned insight into the workings of media and communications strategy. In his most recent professional ventures, he has led communications strategies for companies such as Castor & Pollux Pet Works  and Precor Incorporated.

While he cringes at being labeled a troglodyte for advocating old-media values and practices, Jim continues to be a voice for strategy and restraint in the era of open content – as media becomes less structured, he sees a core role for traditional PR and editorial disciplines.   And yes, prior to becoming a communications professional, actually Jim did sell school buses.

Jim Zahniser earned a B.A. in English Literature from Portland State University.

What are you working on right now?

Like many of my old-school communications and marketing contemporaries, I’m scurrying to catch up with changes in the ecosystem.

For example, driven by my pet dog Pal’s sorties into neighborhood garbage cans, I’m working on a mobile solution involving a dog-collar swallow-response sensor and micro geo-location. We’re able to track swallowing activity at targeted locations, and then auto-send personalized apologies to affected neighbors, bundled with an e-gift of flowers or chocolate.

In truth, right now I’m between projects, with proposals out, including PR and marketing support for a more practical mobile app than the aforementioned.

3 Trends that excite you?

1. Consumer-generated content rights ownership. We’re concepting an IP rights play leveraging “compromising” consumer-generated content on sites like Facebook. Basically, it’s an online marketplace enabling consumers to identify content and images that they’d like to regain usage rights to. We’re calling it Second Thought©.

While on the subject of dubious content . . . I’m loathe to de-friend a few associates, but, honestly . . . “On my way to coffee” is being followed immediately by “Great coffee.” And sent to hundreds of LinkedIn contacts. Editing is becoming a lost art, and self-editing a lost concept.

2. The splintering of consciousness. Also in the works is ZenDeck©, a platform that celebrates the state of oneness of tweeting, chatting, streaming and talking on your headset while driving. It’s a new twist on old tradition, offering unprecedented ability to be fully centered while multitasking.

3. Entertainment as the most important element in social media or web content. I’ll drop the sarcasm for a moment. This Lear Center presentation: makes a great case on the primacy of entertainment. As an aside, this is something that you, Mario, clearly, have tapped into.

How do you bring ideas to life?

Seriously, over the last few years, I’ve learned the value in beginning with bite-sized, manageable, projects. It’s a great way to prove concept, build stakeholder buy-in, and identify issues or challenges.

I came to this while building co-promotional relationships with external partners. There’s no better way to assess a prospective partner than take a trial run, and see what happens when you encounter the inevitable challenges of starting something new.

What is one mistake that you made, and what did you learn from it?

My biggest mistakes have resulted from not listening actively enough, and pushing forward on a course that made absolute sense to me. I spent a lot of time in agencies, where rapid ideation, strategy and action are valued – and, for the most part, a tendency toward action plays well as long as you’re aligned with the client contact.

When I went to work within a corporation, gaining consensus and buy-in across functions became crucial. And, in fact, my agency client contacts probably were managing those issues, as I was off tilting at windmills.

If you want to get the right people on the bus, you need buy-in, which requires active listening. Granted, you’ll often encounter program dilution, but you dramatically increase the odds of getting the bus out of the parking lot. Actually, for a year early in my career, I sold buses to school districts throughout the state of Washington — so you can consider my perspective on getting people on the bus as directly from the source.

What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?

I’ve already disclosed Second Thought, the marketplace for repurchasing rights to online content that threatens to muddy your reputation . . .

What can you recommend to traditional media practitioners who are playing catch-up to technology?

Keep your chin up and find ways to get more engaged. Media has come a long way, but it continues to change. It’s not going to just stop and let you catch up. So you might as well find a way to step into the stream.

At the same time, don’t give up on your strengths.  Strategic content remains important in Web print and video venues.  The same can be said about strategic promotion in areas like mobile.

Also, I expect the ability to produce or manage creative, strategic content will re-gain currency as traditional media declines — my bet is that web-media consumers will miss both the authority and entertainment we currently take for granted with old media.

Which is not to say that old media will make a comeback. Rather, consumers will gravitate to online sources that feature strategy, review and vetting by critical gatekeepers. We’re currently at a point at which anyone can say anything, anytime. And, unfortunately, they do. Look for a comeback of well-developed content.

Contact

503-539-5158

jim@jz-communications.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/jimzahniser

John Koenig is an experienced digital marketing consultant, specializing in search engine marketing, social media, web analytics and usability. He has worked in-house at both search marketing and interactive agencies, on the client side, and as a freelance consultant for a number of clients including multiple Fortune 1000 clients.

John is a graduate of the Lundquist School of Business at the University of Oregon.

He is heavily involved with multiple ocean advocacy non-profits; currently holding the Vice Chair position for the Portland Chapter of Surfrider Foundation. Among many of their initiatives, John Koenig is active in Portland Surfrider’s campaign to ban single-use plastics in Portland, OR.

John also helped co-found and launch the non-profit, Warm Current. Founded in 2008, Warm Current supplies impoverished locations and communities around the world with ocean sports gear. They work to promote ocean environmental awareness and economic development through the gift of surfing. Warm Current currently operates out of Portland, OR with partnerships and reach in Mexico, Chile, Peru and Morocco.

John’s an avid surfer and spends much of his time on the north Oregon Coast. When there’s no surf, John can be found in his Portland surf shop shaping surfboards for friends, family and the occasional client.

What are you working on right now?

Among the many irons I have in the fire right now, I’m working to build and manage the growing SwellPath team. Our team here is everything and it’s an ongoing job to be recruiting the right people professionally and culturally as we continue to grow.

Warm Current is also gaining a lot of momentum and we’re continually looking to add new partners locally and abroad.

3 Trends that excite you?

1. A Gen Y-driven workplace

Business is changing more drastically than ever before. Our generation (Gen Y) is just getting started. We’re about 5 or so years into the workforce and making a big stir. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that 2009 has seen the greatest increase in startups. We’re ambitions, social and itching to make an impact. This is less a trend and more a fundamental change.

2. Authenticity in marketing

Authenticity is being forced. Marketing used to be about one-way talking; of course now people can’t be forced to listen. Social mediums and apps are forcing brands to give up power and actually engage with their audience. It’s just the start and I see it infiltrating all areas of an organization and challenging antiquated approaches to marketing and advertising.

3. Cloud computing

Cloud computing has been a key trend over the last couple of years. From an end user perspective, on-demand access is key. I can get access to my data/profile from anywhere at anytime on any device. My browser is my desktop. For IT, there are other benefits of the cloud such as significantly reduced IT and energy costs through usage metering and scalability.

How do you bring ideas to life?

It’s all about execution with a little bit of planning. Sounds cliché but it’s true. Most ideas/organizations/businesses fail because of a lack of a clear plan, which leads to lack of execution.

Ideas are a dime a dozen; execution is everything. A lot of people would argue that not everyone has brilliant ideas, which is absolutely true. However, I come from the mindset that anything is possible; the only variance to success is the ability to recognize the amount of effort and reward of pursuing one idea over another.

What is one mistake that you made, and what did you learn from it?

I’ve made the mistake of continuing on projects regardless. There’s a lot of value in knowing when something isn’t going to succeed and walking away from it at that point. You have to fail to succeed and it only makes you wiser. I’m constantly working on different ideas and projects, not all of them get past a certain point though and I’ve learned when to walk away.

What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?

In a more general sense, I’ll give some advice that I always practice – treat everyone with respect. It seems simple but when you start to grow and time is no longer a commodity, you’ll have to prioritize. Give the Fortune 500 CEO the same amount of time and energy as the bootstrapped startup entrepreneur. That’s a very difficult thing to do but everyone starts somewhere.

That’s obviously not the only reason to treat people with respect, but from a business standpoint the world is small and connected so the person you blew off yesterday could be that CEO tomorrow.

How do you balance your social and business projects?

I don’t necessarily see the two conflicting with each other but rather bleeding together. Of course it’s all about prioritizing my time between SwellPath, Surfrider and Warm Current.

Non-profit work is reflected in our approach at SwellPath, we have programs in place to give back to the community through monetary donations and services. We provide pro-bono work and support to organizations such as the United Way and Schoolhouse Supplies.

What do you like most about your job?

I love the work and the ability to have a voice and impact on other’s ideas. We have great clients and an amazing team at SwellPath. I love coming to work everyday, collaborating with the team and challenging the old approach.

Connect

SwellPath Interactive: SwellPath.com – @swellpath

Warm Current – WarmCurrent.org – @awarmcurrent

John Koenig Personal – JohnPKoenig.com – @johnpkoenig

Thubten grew up in Malibu, California in the 1970s surrounded by 
celebrities. His classmates included Charlie Sheen, Chris Penn, Rob
Lowe, Dean Cain, Robert Downy, Jr., Holly Robinson Peete and Griffin 
O’Neal.  He once wanted to become a movie star, just as his classmates 
were, but eventually decided to leave LA “at the top of his career,”
following his appearance in a scene with Ken Olin on the TV show
 Thirty Something in May of 1990. Thubten knew that Silicon Valley held
 the keys to his future.

After arriving in the promised land, Thubten worked in marketing at 
Apple Computer and later at Mac World Magazine. After catching the 
internet wave in 1995 Thubten supported Macintosh users for Netcom (an 
early ISP), then moved on to serve as a postmaster for AOL. In 1998
 Thubten founded a network engineering firm in San Jose, Samaya Inc., 
and after securing a contract with the Thai government, opened an
 office in Bangkok.

Following a disagreement with the board, Thubten
 left Samaya, and California, swearing off technology, (at least for a
while). In 2000, Thubten founded Denver-based White Hat Technologies,
a network security firm, which garnered a great deal of industry 
attention. White Hat made it onto the cover of Computer World two 
years in a row (2001 & 2002).
 Thubten realized that what he loved about being an entrepreneur, (he’s
 been starting businesses since he was in elementary school), was the 
marketing, communicating the value of the product or service so that
 the sale virtually makes itself. Armed with this realization he 
ventured into the world of consulting. To build his consulting 
business he began to explore online methods that would leverage his
 efforts.
One of the early adopters on LinkedIn, Thubten began to attract 
attention as a super-networker. His direct connections on LinkedIn
 have reached nearly 20,000, and he has remained in the top 100 
best-connected people for several years. Thubten also caught the
 Twitter wave early, learning everything there was to know about how 
the new micro-blogging service could best be used to reach out to
 others. Thubten has continued to demonstrate his mastery of Twitter as
 he approaches 60,000 followers.

Thubten moved to Oregon last summer and has been enjoying getting
 settled into Southeast Portland. Since moving to Oregon Thubten has 
continued his work with entrepreneurs, mentoring them in 
entrepreneurship and social media, and assisting them with 
bootstrapping their companies and with attracting investment capital. 
Thubten is active with the Angel Capital Summit as well as Startup
 Weekend. In addition to managing his own social media consultancy,
 Thubten serves as CMO for two social media startup companies, Business
3.0 and CluePad. 
As if there were any spare moments in his week, Thubten Comerford enjoys the 
local Portland cafe culture, as well as the raw/vegan food scene. He 
writes for his own blogs, and is presently putting together a blog focused on Portland startups. Find his profile on LinkedIn.

What are you working on right now?

I’m building my social media consultancy, Social Potency, which has 
been my full-time “job” since moving to Portland. I’ve also been 
contributing my social media and marketing expertise to two technology  startup
 companies, Business 3.0 and CluePad. Keeping up with my blogging can 
be a challenge, too, but I love it. I have two Meetup groups in 
Portland, one for entrepreneurs called Startup Founders, and a Twitter
 group called PDX TUG (Portland Twitter Users Group). I also volunteer
 as a facilitator and mentor for @StartupWeekend events around the
country.

3 Trends that excite you?

1) People are starting to understand the power of social media, of 
authentic communication,

2) The trend toward entrepreneurial business
continues to grow,

3) Portland gets weirder by the day.

How do you bring ideas to life?

I am someone who can’t let a good idea just sit around. If I hear a
good idea, my mind takes it to the nth degree in every possible 
direction. I do the same with my own ideas. I share the ideas with 
others over coffee, skype, email, etc. until they land with people who 
can and will run with them.

What is one mistake that you made, and what did you learn from it?

I once took a consulting client who was not a close fit for my skill
 set because I felt for the client’s situation and wanted to be 
helpful. Although I explained at the outset that the project was not
 my forte, the client expected perfection, and ended up becoming a 
nightmare, and now former client. The lesson that I learned is that 
regardless of how much you want to help, if the project is not a fit, 
don’t take the job.

What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?

I give this business model away all the time: take something that you 
love to do; create a DVD that shows others how to do it; market the
 DVD on a blog site. I once met someone at a networking event who was a 
house painter. It was winter, and he was not painting any houses 
at the time. He asked me what I would suggest for him to do to make 
some money in his off season. I suggested this exact model, as it 
would provide income throughout the year, and it wouldn’t cost him 
much to shoot the video and produce and mail the DVDs. He no longer 
has to paint houses for a living.

What’s most important to remember when marketing through social media?

1) Be yourself,

2) Update often,

3) Provide value, up front, for 
free,

4) Build an audience,

5) Communicate WITH (not at) your
 audience,

6) Entice them to engage you on and through your blog/web
site.

What’s the most important aspect of your life?

What’s most important 
to me is that I make a positive difference in the world, that the 
profits from any of my business endeavors go to heal the sick, feed
 the hungry, house the homeless, and make the world a better place for
 all of us to live. Continuing to give that idea away brings about a
world that works for everyone, with no one left out, sooner and sooner 
every time it’s shared.

Connect

Thubten Comerford on Linked In

Thubten.info – Blog

Thubten Comerford on Twitter