My friend Rob Leathern over at AnalystBlog.com is needling Plaxo for a press release that promotes their speaking role at an upcoming conference.
I agree with Rob that it's a crummy topic for a press release. It's certainly not anything any member of the press would be interested in, and seems to belie a gross misunderstanding of trade marketing vehicles - particularly for a Web 2.0 company like Plaxo. In fact, it's almost as if the CEO came out of his office and proudly declared, "I'm speaking at a conference!" to which his assistant snidely remarked, "I'll alert the media." And then did just that.
But...
As foolish as it makes Plaxo's PR department look, the conference producer - Supernova - is likely thrilled with their efforts. If each speaker at a conference promotes their role through their own channels - whether Press Releases or blogs or client / prospect newsletters - it can create a veritable groundswell of mindshare for the show itself, boosting Search Engine results, building relevance for the show's brand and assets, increasing the authority for everything related to the show. This translates into more attendees, happier sponsors, greater coverage of the event itself, and on and on.
So if you're speaking at a conference and you want to be invited to speak at additional conferences, by all means talk about it, blog about it, shout it from the rooftops in every way short of issuing a clumsy press release about it (Rob's right - the reputation liability isn't worth the payoff, which is tiny) - knowing that your primary audience is not your audience, but the show producers themselves.
I'll even go a step further and say that while promoting your involvement at a conference today makes you a more valuable speaker/partner, it's going to quickly become the cost of doing business in the conference biz, and failing to do so in the very near future could get a speaker blackballed.
UPDATE 6/28/06:
Tim Bourquin over at New Media and Tradeshow Startup just called my attention to his post from yesterday, where he rants a bit about what NOT to do if you're a prospective speaker. It's definitely worth a read. Subscribe to Tim's blog (like I just did) so you don't get this day-old second-hand perspective from me.
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