Gator NAMA showed today that it’s not just the football and basketball teams that can win multiple national championships. Today the University of Florida student NAMA chapter won the marketing competition for the second year in a row!
How ’bout them Gators? We’ll have more to post about this inspiring victory later including video.
Way to go team. And congratulations to all the finalists for making it to that elite round.
Hello from the Imperial Room at the Marquis Marriott in Atlanta. We’re live in the student finals room and ready to see the competition. I hope you enjoy it.
Post Update: We had approximately 170 people watch the live stream from the competition today. I think we’ll do it again next year! We’ll plan ahead this time and have a better video feed. Thanks for joining in.
Highlights of this morning’s general session at NAMA 2009 included the presentation of the annual Agribusiness Leader and Marketer of the Year awards.
CHS Energy Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Leon Westbrock was named the 2009 NAMA Agribusiness Leader of the Year. Leon is responsible for refineries, pipelines, refined fuels sales, marketing and distribution, lubricants and propane. He joined the cooperative system in 1976 and managed three local cooperatives before joining the regional system. Westbrock was born and raised on his family’s 640-acre small grain and dairy farm near Browns Valley, Minn.
Jon Anderson, President of OPEN ROADS, received the 2009 NAMA Marketer of the Year award. Jon and two of his colleagues created the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, business growth and development services firm, in 2002. Last year, Anderson and his team at OPEN ROADS celebrated their six-year anniversary of the firm. Starting their business with no clients and no business, Anderson has helped grow OPEN ROADS into a highly successful business growth and development firm. Their business now includes 12 clients and a half dozen consulting associates.
Thanks again to Denny Eilers for the photos. We just haven’t been able to be everywhere today – but we are working on getting that cloning done!
“This report is welcome to the farmers and those I represent,” said Rick Tolman, CEO of the National Corn Growers Association. “This proves that there are no food and fuel issues, but merely the work of a campaign designed to shift blame on farmers and take our eyes off the ball.”
Tolman joined several others in the agriculture and ethanol community today to applaud the recent report, “The Impact of Ethanol Use on Food Prices and Greenhouse-Gas Emissions,” authored by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The report concluded that from April 2007-April 2008 ethanol did have a slight impact on rising food prices but that other culprits, such as high energy prices, had the most impact on rising food costs. Of the 5.1 percent increase in food prices, expanded ethanol production contributed between 0.5 and 0.8 percent of the increase in food prices measured by the consumer price index as determined by the CBO report.
Despite several reports confirming that ethanol and corn prices had a small role in rising food prices, Bob Stallman, President, American Farm Bureau Federation; Tom Buis, CEO, Growth Energy; Roger Johnson, President, National Farmers Union; along with Rick Tolman jointly called for Congress to hold new hearings to determine why food prices are still on the rise. Johnson said that, “We’d love to see the same witnesses who blamed farmers in Congressional hearings last year.”
Tolman stated, “Our farmers are owed a huge apology for the damage they have done to farmers in the eye of the consumer.” He noted that agricultural technology continues to improve each year and that 2007 and 2008 have seen record corn bushels on decreased acres and this trend is expected to continue in 2009 and beyond.
The group reiterated the importance of ethanol in reducing America’s dependence on oil and stressed the importance of increasing the blend wall to 15 percent (E15) in order for the country to meet the goals laid out in the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS).
Thanks to Denny Eilers for providing me with photos of our Best of NAMA award winners for each category.
First up is Best of Show, Advertising
(Left to Right)
Tom Bigelow, Bigelow Advertising
Rick Radermacher, Bigelow Advertising
Chris Lund, AGCO Application Equipment
The next ones are Best of Show, Public Relations
(Left to Right)
Paul Durham, Martin/Williams
Kim Dawson, Syngenta
Kerry Henderson, Gibbs & Soell
And then we have Best of Show, Specialty
(Left to Right)
Richard Williams, Archer>Malmo
James Ward, Archer>Malmo
Mike Butler, Archer>Malmo
On of our Best of NAMA Award emcees this evening was Sally Behringer, Nicholson Kovac, Inc. You can ask her to explain the makeup and costume. There are more photos in the online album.
She and Kyle Bauer, KFRM, announced the winners of our annual awards. Thanks to AgriMarketing Magazine you can learn more online.
Winning Best of Show were:
The pre-conference workshop for NAMA 2009 on Wednesday was tailor-made for today’s challenging economic climate.
Kevin Ochsner of Adayana Agri Business Group was captain of the ship for “Charting Your Course in Uncharted Waters – Strategic Decision Making in Uncertain Times,” which focused on gaining insight into the key principals of scenario-planning. “Now, more than ever, we have to both personally and professionally have a process that helps us sort through some of that uncertainty to make decisions as good as we can,” Kevin says.
Kevin will also be moderating a break out session on Thursday afternoon on “Thriving During Times of Uncertainty and Change.”
Lately, I have been all about social networking. I started my Twitter account in December just to see what it’s all about, and so far, it has been an effective way to communicate with people and market my causes. While I have usually found that college kids are ahead of the curve on most social technology advances, I give the cake to my older colleagues for mastering the art of 140 character marketing. I’m still learning how to utilize my Twitter account to its best potential, and I found two articles by Ron Jones of Search Engine Watch. His Twitter 101 installments have proved incredibly useful in my Twitter learning curve.
Twitter 101, Part 1 explains the basics: what Twitter is, how to setup a profile, filling out a personal bio, profile photo and background, following and listening to others and building relationships.
Twitter 101, Part 2 explains concepts and applications for the advanced tweeter. These I haven’t dived into exploring yet, and any advice you have on the following applications would be great: Tweetdeck for placing people into different columnar categories, twhirl for translating, twellow for finding people to follow, twittonary for understanding lingo, and more. For a complete list of Twitter applications, link here.
In the meantime, I better go amp up my Twitter account! You can follow my updates at AmandaNolz or BEEFMagazine.
I ran across a booklet titled, Facebook Bible, and I thought I would share a few of the finer points from this helpful tool. For college students, utilizing Facebook to keep in touch is as easy as breathing. The tools we use on this social networking service come naturally to us, and there are definitely very cool and very uncool ways to use Facebook. Too often, I see businesses that come on Facebook that clearly don’t understand the concept of this network. If you are one of those people, this blog entry is here for your assistance. I encourage anyone utililzing Facebook for business marketing to read the Facebook Bible in its entirety. For now, I have highlighted the most useful items from the pamphlet to assist you in your social networking education.
For an awesome profile page… Not only is your profile the page that you have the most control over, it’s the place where you can most deeply and authentically express your passion for the brand, company, or product you want to promote. If you don’t want to associate your personal identity with the product or service you’re trying to promote, Facebook is not for you. Inherent in the current state of Facebook is a culture of transparency that devalues and ignores inauthenticity.
Starting and joining groups…Groups are the oldest and simplest way to build community around your brand or company on Facebook. By starting a group, you create a central place for customers, partners, and friends to participate in conversations around your brand. Facebook groups come with boards for posting discussion topics, photos, videos, and links right out of the box. You can also easily send news and updates to your group members, for free!
Enhancing your brand with Facebook pages… Pages are more customizable than
groups. You can add HTML, Flash, or even Facebook applications to your pages to extend their functionality and the depth of experience users can have with your brand.
Like what you’re reading? Link to the Facebook Bible to learn more about Facebook events, notes, photos, marketplace, messaging, advertising and networking.
NAMA Chapter Leaders had a workshop then a lunch this morning.
I didn’t make it to the workshop but I did make it to the lunch. I have my priorities you know. The workshop presenters were Paige Gilligan, Agrestic Solutions, and Diana Monsen, CAPC. You can see them in the photo bottom left. I interviewed them after lunch to find out what they did during the morning program. Basically, they identified a few chapter leadership challenges and broke the participants up in groups to come up with creative ideas to address them.
One of our student NAMA chapters had an unfortunate incident on the way here with a flight and did not make it in time to qualify and compete in the student marketing competition. Penn State NAMA came anyway and we salute their courage. Our judges went ahead and viewed their presentation and critiqued it for them.
I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a student competition but I shot a few minutes of the start of their presentation which you can watch here:
Our NAMA President-Elect, Susie Decker, Farm Progress Companies, spoke to students at their lunch today. She made a very nice gesture and gave out her “tractor numbers” to the group and told them that whoever found them should bring them to her and she would give them her tractor.
In case you don’t know what that means, AgriMarketing Magazine provides scale model tractors each year in each NAMA Connection Point booth. All registrants get a number and if you find a tractor with your number on it, you get it. This year we have McCormick MTX150 Tractors.
After Susie spoke, luncheon emcee, Curt Blades gave out some of the NAMA student scholarships and announced the student marketing competition semi-finalists. They are competing now and include:
Wisconsin-Madison
University of Florida (Go Gators – I graduated in ’80)
New Mexico State
Iowa State
Michigan State
Virginia Tech
North Dakota State University
Purdue
Wisconsin-Platteville
Mississippi State
Ohio State
Nebraska
The NAMA registration desk has been very busy this morning and the staff is hard at work as you’ll see in this video clip. We’re having a great time blogging and tweeting here in the Marquis Level at the Marriott.
Sitting out here in the very open ZimmComm/AgWired tweet station I just noticed that Osborn & Barr has:
. . . announced the promotion of Michael Turley to Chief Executive Officer (CEO). The announcement represents the agency’s continued commitment to delivering forward-thinking solutions to the agricultural and rural-lifestyle markets by utilizing the knowledge and expertise of its high-caliber employees to provide innovative new strategies. The move enables the agency to continue its consistent growth and stay true to its roots, while pursuing new opportunities.
Turley, who has been with O&B for 17 years, will apply his extensive agricultural and marketing communications background to continue driving the agency’s innovation in the industry. He will lead the agency, providing the strategic vision needed to continue its growth and develop new client offerings.
I just saw Mike a little while ago and will try to find him for an interview.
Vintage tractors of all makes and models will take center stage, April 18-19, as the 17th annual California Antique Farm Equipment Show kicks off at the International Agri-Center.
World Dairy Expo is pleased to announce two recent hires. Susan Orth has accepted the position of Sales Specialist and Rachel Kaehler has been named Dairy Cattle Show Coordinator.
Online Auction Listings are now ‘live’ on TractorHouse.com. All machines are auctioned directly by dealers to registered bidders on the Web site. Seller’s fees are minimal, and there are no auction fees charged to buyers.
Gator NAMA is just one of the student NAMA chapters I ran into this afternoon. They were all busy but I did get my alma mater chapter to pose for a quick pick. After all they are the reining champions from 2008!
Advancing Your Career PossibilitiesThe National Agri- Marketing Association is a great way for college students to begin their careers in agribusiness. As a student NAMA member you have unlimited resources at your fingertips to help market yourself in the industry.
* Network with professionals in the industry
* Develop marketing and communications skills
* Expand your skills by serving as a chapter leader
Since 1969, when the first NAMA student chapter formed at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo, NAMA has grown to 34 accredited chapters and over 1,200 student members. We attribute this tremendous popularity to the variety of programs initiated to benefit the students.
I have started the NAMA Photo Album which Cindy and I will be adding to over the coming days so check it often.
AgWired coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by: and .
I found the IFAJ/AMS planning committee meeting. Fortunately for me I walked in just as it ended! Actually I just couldn’t get there earlier but I wanted to. If you haven’t registered yet for this year’s combined meeting please try to do so soon.
I interviewed Andy Atzenweiler and will post it when I get back to my room later. He says that the program is finalized and I got a copy of it. You can see the latest version on the Ag Media Summit website. It sounds like we’re a little ahead of normal with sponsors and the program but then we’ve been planning this one for two years since we’re overlapping with the international folks from IFAJ.
ZimmComm is on location at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis. Cindy and I are just finishing up a little pre-show booth setup. This is where you go to register for an HP Mini Netbook or desktop cube iPod speaker. The NAMA Connection Point will open up tomorrow evening after awards.
When you come in the entrance just look straight ahead to the left of the DTN booth and there we are. While I was in the Connection Point room I interviewed Gary Bates, George Fern Company. They’ve been the NAMA convention trade show service provider for years. He says they really enjoy working with agrimarketers. I can also say that we’ve enjoyed working with them in the 4 years that ZimmComm has been exhibiting at the convention.
I’ve already run into multiple student NAMA chapters waiting their turn to compete. They didn’t look nervous at all, just confident.
I’ve already started taking photos and will have an online album started later today. Right now I’m going to try to find the IFAJ/AMS meeting and see what that committee has done without me.
AgWired coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by: and .
Just when I thought I understood the divisions of John Deere they go and change them. But this is expected to make them more efficient and customer friendly.
Deere & Company (NYSE: DE) today announced a new global operating model that will combine the technology, expertise, experience, channels and investments of the Worldwide Agricultural Equipment Division and the Worldwide Commercial & Consumer Equipment Division into a single unit called the Worldwide Agriculture and Turf Division, effective May 1, 2009. Through the new operating model, this combined organization will be positioned to achieve the alignment and efficiency necessary to develop a more complete portfolio to meet worldwide customer needs – while reducing overall costs.
Effective May 1, 2009, the Agriculture and Turf Division unit will have two presidents: David C. Everitt, responsible for the tractor product and the turf and utility product platforms; and Markwart von Pentz, responsible for crop harvesting, hay and forage, and crop care product platforms. In addition, Everitt will have responsibility for sales and marketing in the regions that include U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, China, Asia, India, and a portion of Africa. Von Pentz will have responsibility for sales and marketing for the rest of the globe including Europe, CIS, the Near and Middle East and Northern Africa, South America, Central America, and Mexico.
James M. Field, current president of the Commercial & Consumer Equipment Division will continue reporting to Mr. Lane in a new role as senior vice president, Deere & Company, with a focus on identifying additional efficiencies and opportunities across the enterprise.
In this week's program Chuck talks with David Armano, Global Innovation and Integration.
David conducted a presentation on delivering expert opinion via social media to an audience at the start of International Poultry Expo week. He's got some great information about who consumers trust and how you can use today's consumer behavior to help communicate your message.
Gator NAMA showed today that it’s not just the football and basketball teams that can win multiple national championships. Today the University of Florida student NAMA chapter won the marketing competition for the second year in a row!
and 
.
Highlights of this morning’s general session at NAMA 2009 included the presentation of the annual Agribusiness Leader and Marketer of the Year awards.
Jon Anderson, President of 
Ethanol Use on Food Prices and Greenhouse-Gas Emissions,”
Thanks to Denny Eilers for providing me with photos of our Best of NAMA award winners for each category.
The next ones are Best of Show, Public Relations
And then we have Best of Show, Specialty
During our Connection Point session tonight the finalists for the NAMA Student Marketing Competition were announced and here they are.
On of our Best of NAMA Award emcees this evening was Sally Behringer, 
The pre-conference workshop for NAMA 2009 on Wednesday was tailor-made for today’s challenging economic climate. 
Lately, I have been all about social networking. I started my Twitter account in December just to see what it’s all about, and so far, it has been an effective way to communicate with people and market my causes. While I have usually found that college kids are ahead of the curve on most social technology advances, I give the cake to my older colleagues for mastering the art of 140 character marketing. I’m still learning how to utilize my Twitter account to its best potential, and I found two articles by Ron Jones of Search Engine Watch. His Twitter 101 installments have proved incredibly useful in my Twitter learning curve.
I ran across a booklet titled, 
NAMA Chapter Leaders had a workshop then a lunch this morning. 
One of our student NAMA chapters had an unfortunate incident on the way here with a flight and did not make it in time to qualify and compete in the student marketing competition. 
Our NAMA President-Elect, Susie Decker, Farm Progress Companies, spoke to students at their lunch today. She made a very nice gesture and gave out her “tractor numbers” to the group and told them that whoever found them should bring them to her and she would give them her tractor. 
Sitting out here in the very open ZimmComm/AgWired tweet station I just noticed that 
Gator NAMA is just one of the 
I found the IFAJ/AMS planning committee meeting. Fortunately for me I walked in just as it ended! Actually I just couldn’t get there earlier but I wanted to. If you haven’t registered yet for this year’s combined meeting please try to do so soon.
ZimmComm is on location at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis. Cindy and I are just finishing up a little pre-show booth setup. This is where you go to register for an HP Mini Netbook or desktop cube iPod speaker. The NAMA Connection Point will open up tomorrow evening after awards.
Just when I thought I understood the divisions of 
In this week's program Chuck talks with David Armano, Global Innovation and Integration.
