Archive for August, 2010

Tuesday, August 31st, 2010

Merger!

by Jeff Rosenberg

Last night, I put my little Rosenberg Communications to bed. As it existed for 16 years, it no longer exists.

This morning, Rosenberg Communications emerged bigger and better than ever! We merged into one of the nation’s top independent PR firms. Our name stays the same. Our staff stays the same. But the capacity, the expertise, and the talent that we have available to serve our clients has dramatically increased.

Levick Strategic Communications is one of the nation’s top corporate communications firms. For quite some time, they have been interested in building a social marketing and government contracting practice. Rosenberg Communications will be that practice.

For me, this is an important and natural evolution for Rosenberg Communications. We have won awards and have received kudos for our ability to, for example, help clients navigate new media. But I have recognized that, for us to ensure our clients can always be effective in this fast-changing communications market, we need to add the talent and expertise to do everything from creating mobile/smartphone apps to very targeted online advertising to fully engaging in online conversations on behalf of clients. This merger now means that Rosenberg Communications can do all of this, and more.

In the coming months, the story of this merger will unfold. A new Levick Strategic Communications website, for example, is being developed that includes our brand and the added dimension that Rosenberg Communications adds.

For me personally, I get an additional title. I’m now President of Rosenberg Communications and Senior Vice President at Levick Strategic Communications! Even more important is the meaning of this merger – I expected that, when I started to pack up my old office, it would be bittersweet. Not at all. To me, this move feels like the right, practically obvious, next step in my desire to build a top-flight communications firm working on the issues I care deeply about.

Oh, and the legion of loyal Blogenberg visitors need not despair: Blogenberg continues, and will be filled with reporting about how a small-firm boy from a Maryland suburb is surviving, hopefully thriving, in a big Washington, DC PR firm.

Monday, August 16th, 2010

Happy, my wife as puppy, and savory commercials

by Jeff Rosenberg

Lately my moments of being happy have been rare. Nothing wrong — just stress, exhaustion, gutters that need repair, etc. conspiring to make me feel not unhappy, but not happy.

Until this past weekend. Everything seemed to align for a weekend of happy. Business, while very difficult, felt at a proper spot, positioned well for going forward. My 16-year-old daughter gave me $60, without being asked, to help pay for new cleats and clothes for soccer. And, when she got real mad at me about curfew Saturday night, she did it like an adult.

My 16-year-old son was scheduling his first lacrosse recruiting trip for college.

And my 22-year-old continues to show that, while it is very, very hard to get started in life after college, he is not shying away from the challenge — not at all.

It all conspired to make me happy for nearly an entire weekend.

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My wife is becoming like a puppy. And that’s a compliment.

I am finding that, the more stress I am under, the more I just want to be around her because it makes me feel better. You know like a puppy.

(Unfortunately, she is out of the country for 10 days.)

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I TiVo all my good shows. More and more I’m finding that I don’t zip past the commercials because doing so makes the show-watching experience go by too fast. Last week, watching Friday Night Lights, I let the commercials run so that I could savor the experience of watching a great show.

Thursday, August 5th, 2010

Dog days

by Jeff Rosenberg

Yesterday and today I was home sick. Yesterday, I went in to the office for a couple of hours — that was a mistake, because today I felt even worse.

So today, I just sat at home with my dog. It was a dog day of summer. But absolutely necessary because, I think exhaustion had driven me into illness.

So, the best I can say in today’s Blogenberg is that I have neither the energy to be funny nor insightful. So help me feel better, laugh. Right now, just laugh.

Thank you.