We know the huge hit that events are taking now. And we encourage everyone to register for next Thursday’s SIPA/AM&P/Connectiv webinar titled Coronavirus and Your Events: How to Make Decisions that Protect Your Business and the Safety of Your Staff, that will include our own Brian Cuthbert from Diversified Communications..

On a recent webinar titled Podcasting for Publishers: How Podcasts Can Deliver Qualified Leads and Bottom-Line Revenue for Minimal Investment, Lynn Freer, president of Spidell Publishing, told about running into a tax accountant listener at one of her events. He kidded her about his wife wondering who that woman with the great voice is who he's conversing with every Sunday morning.

A common thread in film festivals these days is to continue the momentum all year round. The Annapolis Film Festival, which takes place in March, is showing a documentary featured called Toxic Beauty next Tuesday. The DC Environmental Film Festival, perhaps Washington's best film festival—also in March—screens films every month, congratulates their filmmakers on achievements through the year, blogs each month and sponsors other mini-events.

On the phone last week, Stephanie Williford, CEO of EB Medicine, spoke to me excitedly about SIPA's new Executive Councils, groups that will consist of 12 niche publishers who meet by video conference 11 times a year, plus once a year for an in-person meeting in Washington, D.C., in conjunction with SIPA's annual conference in June.

I once had a job writing scripts for a daily 90-second radio show for Joe Gibbs, the nice-as-can-be, Hall of Fame coach of the Washington Redskins. He did not enjoy recording it and felt more comfortable reading from a script. I had gotten to know how he spoke so I could add in the "heys" and "for you fans" and more of his favorite sayings. But still I did cringe when my morning alarm would ring and I would hear him stiffly reading my lines.

What do people trust most these days? It's not government, media, for-profit organizations or even nonprofit organizations. It's online reviews. According to a study last year, a whopping 91% of people trust an online review, even if they don't know the person behind it.

Podcast numbers keep growing—about 35% of Americans ages 18-54 now listen in. "People are adding more podcasts to their media diet [each month]," said Edison Research in their April survey and subsequent webinar. And what's great about podcasts is that they don't have to be huge productions.   Witness CampWire, the podcast of the American Camp Association (ACA). It has aired 10 episodes so far, and the last one on staff training drew the biggest audience. Camp directors tune in, and it was May, so no surprise there.   Sam Hirt, communications data specialist at the ACA, launched the podcast and offered some tips in an article in Associations Now. We add some SIPA notes to it.   Know your audience and what they care about. "What do [listeners] want to hear about?" Hirt asked. "Can we talk for 40 minutes to an hour about it? And who is going to be the right voice for it?" Said Stephanie Williford, CEO, EB M ...

Answering a question posed recently on the SIPA Forum about video vs. podcasts, Stephanie Williford, CEO, EB Medicine, wrote, "We haven't done a formal test, but I think the old 'know your audience' adage applies well here. For ours (emergency physicians, who are notoriously ADHD), they can't stand to sit still and watch an educational video for more than a few minutes, but they love podcasts because they can listen and learn while doing something else too."