It’s all right to go ahead and look forward to the 2012 Ag Media Summit. I’m sure the ABQ loudly proclaims that we’ll be in Albuquerque, NM next August 4-8 at the Albuquerque Hyatt Downtown.
No real news yet. Just a “look” to tease you. Online registration opens May 1. Get that on your calendar too.
If you’re looking for the best place to promote your company or organization’s products and services, then you’ll want to be at the 14th Annual Ag Media Summit in Albuquerque, New Mexico, August 4-8, 2012. This annual get-together, the largest meeting in the United States of the ag industry’s top writers, editors, photographers, publishers and ag communicator specialists, begins with pre-meeting events on Saturday, August 4, followed by the AMS program August 5-8. We invite you to participate as a sponsor or an exhibitor at our InfoExpo or both, and be a part of this important agricultural media event.
The AG MEDIA SUMMIT is a joint meeting of the American Agricultural Editors’ Association, the Livestock Publications Council and the American Business Media Agri-Council. This industry-wide gathering of agricultural communicators offers one of the best opportunities for professional improvement and industry networking. More than 600 attend this event each year, and the InfoExpo annually exceeds 85 booths.
Jeff Hamlin is the Director of Agronomic Research for Weatherbill. At the Ag Media Summit I met Jeff and learned “what is Weatherbill?”
Jeff says “We provide weather insurance that pays farmers for the types of bad weather events that cost them yield.” He says their product is designed to work along with the federal crop insurance as a supplement to “cover the top end bushels that the federal crop insurance program can’t cover.” Weatherbill is currently available for a variety of crops. Jeff says one thing growers like is how simple the product works. You can fill out a form on their website to find an agent near you.
At the Ag Media Summit I stopped by the FMC booth in InfoExpo to find out what’s new. On hand was Matt Foster.
Matt says they’re very excited to be launching Anthem herbicide in 2012. That’s a grass and broadleaf pre-emerge for both corn and soybeans that has both pre and post activity.
I was out on field tour duty with FMC recently. You can learn more about Anthem and how it has been performing in trials from the York, NE event.
Jeff Morgan, Stoller USA is standing next to his good friend and ours, Kip Cullers. Actually it’s a Kip cutout. Jeff was on the floor of InfoExpo to talk about Bio-Forge ST a new seed treatment product that he says is “farmer driven” and has taken off this year.
He says the first question he gets from ag journalists is “How’s it going for you?” The big thing is the crazy weather that has perhaps started to tone down.
At the Ag Media Summit I visited with Monty’s Plant and Soil Products and Gary Coughlin. Thanks to whoever took the photo and posted it on the Monty’s Facebook page! So I asked him, “What’s new?”
Gary says they’ve just released four new products, Corn Blend, Soybean Blend, Cotton Blend and Tobacco Blend. He says they all contain their humic materials, plant food, liquid sugar and appropriate amount of micro nutrients. They can all be applied in furrow, in the row on the seed to enhance the germination of the seed and soil around it.
At the Ag Media Summit I visited with Russ Berndt, Becker Underwood. I asked him what’s new.
Russ says one of the relatively new products he’d like to point to is their Vault HP product line. He says they had a phenomenal increase in sales last year. You’ll hear him explain why in our interview. He says that the ag media were interested to know what the trends are that he sees in the marketplace. Those include the increase in use of seed applied treatments and interest in biological solutions to disease and pest problems, both of which are being worked on by Becker Underwood.
At the Ag Media Summit I visited with Barry Nelson, John Deere, to find out what’s new. There is definitely going to be something new from John Deere very soon he says.
“On August 24th and 25th we are going to have the largest most significant product introduction in our history.” Barry says the new equipment will be unveiled at the Farm Progress Show. I’ll be there for the launch in August and can’t wait to see what’s new.
During the Ag Media Summit I met Michael Sanford, head of production at KVIE Public Television which produces America’s Heartland, the tv show about agriculture that airs on PBS stations and RFDTv.
Michael says the show is going into its seventh season. He says that Farm Credit, the InfoExpo booth in the photo, has come on board as a primary sponsor. He says they’ll be traveling to all fifty states producing stories and they will have some new features that include Ask a Farmer, Off the Shelf and others.
Measuring the return on investment of social media is a big challenge. We deal with the question of “how to” all the time. More importantly though is answering the question of what your goal is with social media. This topic was on the agenda at the Agricultural Media Summit.
I spoke with Shelly Kramer, V3 Integrated Marketing, an integrated marketing and social media agency. She spoke to a full house and answered questions for a while afterward.
Shelly says that to measure your social media ROI you need to have a plan. I know that’s tough but if you don’t know what your goal is, then how do you know if you met it? To help her clients better understand digital marketing and especially the social channels she encourages them to act online just like they do in real life. However, that’s not easy for companies to do.
Listen in on my conversation with Shelly in this week’s program and hear more about her perspective and thoughts on using social media in your marketing efforts: Integrating Social Media & Measuring ROI
Thanks to our ZimmCast sponsor, GROWMARK, locally owned, globally strong, for their support.
During InfoExpo at the Ag Media Summit I visited with Case IH to learn what’s new. I spoke with Kristina Hopkins.
Kristina says that they are promoting their Web Press Room to ag media. It’s where you can find news releases as well as video, images and a media kit. So ag journalists make sure you bookmark this website.
The Ag Media Summit is all about professional improvement for both students and professionals. I wish I could have interviewed all of our session leaders but that’s not possible for one agriblogger. However, I did get some interviews conducted.
One of our presenters was Brandon Souza, AdFarm. He spoke to students about finding the best fit for your first job. He recommended they find out early what they want to do, hone those skill sets and talk with people in the industry. He spoke to professionals about social media etiquette. He pointed out that everything is public in social media. That’s not necessarily a bad thing but he recommends defining what you want to get out of social media.
Have you ever been a beta tester? Beta testers are vital so a company gets real user feedback. That’s the mode AgHaven has been in.
I met AgHaven beta tester Phil White during the Ag Media Summit. Phil is a reporter at KFDI in Wichita, KS. So far he says AgHaven has come a long way and is becoming a valuable tool for producers or reporters like him. The search engine built in to AgHaven is providing more specific ag information than the big search engines. He recommends getting an AgHaven account. AgHaven is still looking for feedback and ideas.
Meet three of my amigos from the Ag Media Summit. This is the BASF team that greeted us, prepared to talk “what’s new.” They are (l-r) Nick Fassler, Dr. Scott Walker and Dr. Dan Westberg. I spoke to each of them and thank BASF for sponsoring my coverage of this year’s event.
Let’s start with Nick Fassler, Technical Market Manager, Fungicides. He was here to talk about research plots to get the “most out of every acre.” He says they’ve doubled the size of their research program this year. Results should be coming in within the next couple months.
Next up is Dr. Scott Walker, Biology Project Manager, Fungicides. Scott covered Xemium fungicide performance data. Xemium is a new fungicide active ingredient that has been submitted to the EPA for registration. It was announced earlier this year at Commodity Classic. Scott says that field data will be presented to the scientific community at the upcoming American Phytopathological Society Annual Meeting.
And next is Dr. Dan Westberg, Technical Market Manager, Herbicides. He covered new Zidua herbicide. This new class of herbicide for corn and soybeans has performed well in summer research trials and registration is expected by the end of the year in time for the new season in 2012.
The Ag Media Summit held a shoe drive to benefit Soles4Souls. I believe almost 300 pairs of shoes were donated! During the conference we held a public distribution of shoes at the Ozanam Inn, a local homeless shelter.
On hand were Andy Atzenweiler and Kathy LaScala, pictured here with two of the folks we met at the shelter. The shoes were sorted by size and groups of people made their way through, finding their size and leaving with something good for their feet. The shoes distributed here were actually not the ones we brought to the AMS. Those are going elsewhere. However, we wanted a way to show publicly our support for the effort and were able to get a quantity of tennis shoes via Soles4Souls for this event. I’ve got a short video clip you can watch of the distribution. Thanks to everyone who supported this very worthwhile effort.
There are a lot of awards presented during the Ag Media Summit. I’ve got some information here to share with you from the American Agricultural Editors Association. I posted their Lifetime Achievement Awards already but here are some more. If you’d like to download the full document of winners then use this link (pdf).
Pictured is Mike Deering, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, receiving the Andy Markwart Horizon Award from Barry Nelson, John Deere. John Deere has very generously made this award possible with a financial grant to AAEA and matched by the AAEA PIF. You may know that this is given in memory of Andy who was the editor of The Furrow and passed away in 2006.
Also presented was the 2011 Distinguished Service Award, made possible through a grant to the AAEA Professional Improvement Foundation by Archer Daniels Midland Company. The Distinguished Service Award recipient is Dr. Paul Sun, special project scientist for Dairyland Seed, posted at Dairyland’s 600-acre Southern Wisconsin Research Station in Rock County near Clinton, Wisconsin. A native of Mainland China, Dr. Sun and his family moved to Taiwan when he was 11 years old. He received his master’s and doctoral degrees in Plant Breeding and Genetics from the University of Wisconsin. Dr. Sun, with more than 40 years experience in plant breeding, nearly 30 of which have been with Dairyland Seed, is considered the father of hybrid alfalfa.
Other awards include:
AAEA 2011 Photographer of the Year – William DeKay, The Western Producer
AAEA 2011 Writer of the Year – Steve Werblow, Steve Werblow Communications
Congratulations to all winners. I will post winners from ACT and LPC as soon as I get them.
I conducted quite a few interviews at the Ag Media Summit but none of them compare to this one for not only the topic but also who I interviewed. Ted Jackson, New Orleans Times-Picayune staff photographer was our luncheon speaker yesterday. His topic was “Who Will Photograph the Apocalypse?” That pretty well describes the devastation and trauma he faced each day during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. He wanted us to have a sense of just how bad it was and thinks it’s important to keep the memory of this event alive. You can find some of his images on his website. Other resources include the newspaper website and The Digital Journalist.
Ted shares an anecdote from his coverage of this terrible tragedy. It will move you not only from what he saw but the ethical challenge he faced in performing his job or dropping his camera and trying to become a rescuer.
Everyone who attended the Ag Media Summit is a winner. But only one person won the BASF Xbox 360 drawing. That’s Jeanne Bernick, Editor, Top Producer, magazine. She’s flanked by Dr. Scott Walker and Nick Fassler, both with BASF.
Jeanne will be giving the Xbox 360 away at Top Producer’s new Executive Women in Agriculture event this December in Chicago.
The 2011 Ag Media Summit is concluding with a breakfast session. We’re sharing sixty good ideas in sixty minutes and there are some really good ones. Heck, they’re all good.
I’ve got lots more stories to post, including interviews. However, I’ll be traveling today and spending some time with family. So keep your eye on AgWired to see more of what happened in New Orleans. My photos are fully updated. I hope you enjoy them.
Receiving one of the awards from the AAEA was John Harvey (pictured on right).
These awards are just some of the many awards that are presented during the Ag Media Summit. I will try to find an electronic copy of them and provide a link as soon as I can.
Fred Myers received one of the awards too (pictured on right). Earlier in the day he received recognition during the luncheon for fifty years of service to AAEA.
I visited with Fred before the awards banquet about his service award. He says he doesn’t know where the 50 years have gone. He’s always considered AAEA “his organization.” He also received a nice letter from our Secretary of Agriculture. Fred also has a book that he’s written. If you’d like to know more about it or order one just send him an email.
Do you have your AgHaven account created yet? If not, what are you waiting for? AgHaven is still seeking feedback as it works to improve and finalize different elements of this new agricultural “community.”
AgHaven is a sponsor of my coverage of this year’s Ag Media Summit and they were giving a lot of tours to journalists here during InfoExpo. I spoke with Srik Soogoor, President, and asked him how AgHaven is developing. He says things are “going great.” Traffic is growing and feedback has been helpful. Based on that feedback they’ve made a number of improvements and more are planned. One of the things they’re working on is – mobile. They’ve got six apps in development for example!
In this week's program Chuck talks with Mike Adams, AgriTalk.
Chuck and Mike often wind up at the same events all over the country so it seemed like a good idea to do a little AgriTalking about the changes they've seen in the ag media landscape.
It’s all right to go ahead and look forward to the 2012 Ag Media Summit. I’m sure the ABQ loudly proclaims that we’ll be in Albuquerque, NM next August 4-8 at the Albuquerque Hyatt Downtown.
Measuring the return on investment of social media is a big challenge. We deal with the question of “how to” all the time. More importantly though is answering the question of what your goal is with social media. This topic was on the agenda at the Agricultural Media Summit.
The 
In this week's program Chuck talks with Mike Adams, AgriTalk.
