New government marketing group
It's a competitive world these days, even for networking groups.
A team of marketing pros is forming — or, more accurately, reforming. They call themselves the Government Marketing Forum.
The original Government Marketing Forum started in 2001 but faded in 2004, according to Mark Amtower, founding partner of
Amtower and Co. and one of the leaders of this new group. Now a new crop of marketing experts are retooling the group.
The new group's leaders are
Amtower and Co.,
ConnellyWorks, the
Federal Business Council,
immixGroup,
Market Connections,
Sage Communications and
1105 Government Information Group, which, of course, is the parent company of
Federal Computer Week.
Amtower and
Larry Rosenfeld, founder and chief executive officer of Sage Communications, are co-chairmen of the forum's steering committee.
"What we're trying to form here is a peer networking group that is collaborative in nature," Amtower said. "The only fees are the fees to attend the event."
The government IT market lacks an open networking forum, Amtower said. "There is a closed group, but no open opportunity for people to network and discuss issues," he added.
The forum will host bimonthly peer-networking events that will be paired with an educational component. The events will focus on the interests of people in marketing, sales, business development and other business-to-government positions.
"It's critical for marketing people to start mingling more — and not just with ourselves, but with sales and business development people," Amtower said.
The first meeting will be June 19 at the
Tower Club in Vienna, Va. It will feature a presentation by
Steve Charles, co-founder and executive vice president of immixGroup and a
columnist for
Washington Technology, one of FCW's sister publications. Charles will present an overview of the federal government budget environment.
For more information or to register for the program, contact Amtower at
amtower@erols.com.
Posted by Christopher Dorobek on May 20, 2007 at 9:17 AM