Tara Smith has kindly joined the MarcomBlog.com. Tara is Senior Marketing Manager with Marqui. This is cool for many reasons, but here are a few: Marqui is a hot topic, they do CMS and Tara is … well, Tara – an experienced Marcom professional.

Plus, I finally have found a female PR/Marcom practitioner for our students to interact with in the blog. I know, it sounds so simple, but it is important. My classes are about 95% female students. Don’t get me wrong. I love all the guys that have volunteered to help the students. They are terrific! Still, I’m very glad Tara volunteered to join us! Doin’ the Snoopy dance here. And, I’m still looking for more female role models for the students.

Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz were so kind to talk about our activities in MarcomBlog.com on their ForImmediateRelease podcast. Many thanks to Neville and Shel. Neville has actually joined MarcomBlog. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to invite Shel, too. We’ll see how that goes. I have no shame. I’ll ask anyone anything. The one lesson I learned many years ago is, “Hey, what can they say. No? Like I haven’t heard that before.” Try ‘cold calling’ or ‘selling bibles door to door’ … it changes you.

And, there is a new Marketing/PR blog out there. Welcome to AJR Spin Zone. The blog is written by Alec Rosen of Miami, FL. See Firm bills self as first S. Fla. PR agency blog from South Florida :: The Business Journal.

I mention the blog for a lot of reasons, but mainly because (1) it is new, (2) it is a PR/Marketing blog and (3) the best reason – Alec mentions ‘students’ in his tagline.

“A Blog for real PR and marketing pros (and students) to discuss client and agency-related challenges … as well as random thoughts on the biz of spin. Should be fun. alec”

Hey, anyone looking out for students is a sure fire winner in my book! Welcome Alec and best wishes for your new blog.