Minneapolis Community and Technical College, one of the largest two-year colleges in Minnesota, has selected McVey Marketing Inc. for another consulting engagement. The firm previously worked with MCTC to successfully complete a marketing audit and to provide strategic marketing recommendations to advance the college's market position and enrollment.

For its new consulting assignment with MCTC, the firm will develop a marketing campaign plan, including recommended strategies and tactics, to support the college's fall enrollment goals. The firm will also partner with MCTC to develop initial creative concepts for the campaign.

MCTC enrolls approximately 12,000 credit students annually. About 42 percent of those students are individuals of color, making MCTC one of the most diverse campuses in Minnesota and the Upper Midwest.

McVey Marketing Inc. is pleased to be continuing its work with Olympic Property Group, a subsidiary of Pope Resources based in Poulsbo, Wash. OPG retained the firm last year to help position and advance the historic mill town of Port Gamble, Wash. The firm will continue to advance OPG and Port Gamble in a variety of ways, including through environmental scanning, researching and contacting potential partners, and providing strategic counsel.

OPG is the largest private property owner in Kitsap County. The company manages nearly 3,000 acres of residential and commercial developments, all within 50 miles of the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area.

McVey Marketing has also been working with other clients during the first quarter of 2009. These organizations include Concordia College, a leading private institution in Moorhead, Minn., enrolling more than 2,700 full-time students from 35 states and 33 countries. The firm's work with Concordia has been focused in the areas of market research, competitive analysis and strategic marketing planning. The firm has also been working with other clients based in Washington state and Minnesota.

IS YOUR WEB SITE MOBILE READY?
With more and more people using mobile devices to access the Internet, it's increasingly important for organizations to consider how their web sites appear on small screens. And with the popularity of mobile devices such as cell phones and Blackberrys expected to continue to grow, organizations large and small have to decide how far to go in building or remaking their web sites to accommodate them.

According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, 42 million people connected to the Internet from a mobile device during November alone. Traditionally designed web sites are often difficult -- if not impossible -- to read on a mobile screen. Consider how important it is to reach these prospective customers -- particularly when they're on the move -- and where a more mobile-friendly site fits within your overall branding and marketing strategies.

If you decide to take the leap, or at least a small jump, consider the following: Are you best served by developing a cell-phone compatible subpage to your existing site, by developing an entirely new site, or by transforming your current site into one that can be easily viewed from both large and small screens? Should you stick with your current domain name or register for an additional domain ending with the dot mobi suffix?

Some companies are now offering free or reduced-cost design and other technical services for organizations using them to register a new ".mobi" domain name. This can include transforming a current site into one that's more mobile friendly, as well as optimizing mobile search engine results -- an important consideration. A good place to start is with a mobile friendly page that includes maps and directions, hours of operation, and other information critical to those traveling to find you.

So evaluate your organization's needs, make sure any mobile extension of your traditional web site is integrated with your overall marketing and branding strategies, and plan and implement accordingly.

ADJUSTING TO CHANGES UNDER CAPITOL DOMES
Andrew Garber of the Seattle Times recently filed an interesting story about the disappearance of fellow reporters from the halls of the Washington State Capitol in Olympia. Deep financial losses, newspaper closings and other siesmic shifts in the media landscape have taken their toll on the numbers and quality of reporters covering state government in Washington state and across the country.

Garber notes that, in 1993, there were 34 journalists covering the Washington State Legislature, many of them from offices in or near the Capitol. By 2007, there were 17. This year, there are approximately 10 full-time journalists covering the Legislature, a decline of about 70 percent from 1993.

During this same period, he notes, the state's population has increased by 25 percent and the amount of tax money spent by the state has more than doubled.

The decline in journalists has affected state legislatures across the country, with press corps in Minnesota, Connecticut, Florida and other states suffering deep cuts.
It makes you wonder, who's watching the store and what important political news are we missing? As one Washington lawmaker bluntly put it, "Legislators will get away with things they didn't get away with before."

The decline of working journalists covering state legislatures also has important implications for organizations advocating for public policy initiatives, and for the government and public relations professionals who work for them. News stories, editorials and other earned media placements aren't likely to advance your cause as far as they used to, particularly if there aren't journalists to catch your story pitches. These and other changes in the media and public policy landscapes make grassroots organizing, social media strategies, and personal communications with policymakers all the more important.