Living the Dream

Once in awhile, my public relations tactics II class has the privilege of listening to a PR professional that has graduated from UW-Whitewater. On Tuesday, we were graced with the presence of Melissa Bohl, Customer Experience Marketing Leader at GE Healthcare. Melissa graduated from UW-Whitewater in 2006 and knew from the get-go that she wanted to work in the health care industry. Melissa took us through her role and responsibilities that she has with GE Healthcare including producing the AssurePoint monthly newsletter. The newsletter goes out to all service sales employees at GE Healthcare and includes a re-cap of all new items on AssurePoint, a spotlight and key news/new offerings that AssurePoint may have. Melissa shared with us a new program that she is helping to develop called Marketing Blueprint. This program is for the sales team at GE Healthcare and is to aid them in developing a proposal to fit the needs and goals of the customer. 

Melissa shared with us the core principals that GE Healthcare has on communications and social media internally and externally.  

Internally: 
 
Social Media That GE Healthcare Utilizes:

• GE Connect (all work related)
                  - Similar to blogs
• Yammer (all work related)
                 - resembles Facebook
                 - all employers are required to log-in everyday and post a new status 
• Support Central
                - internal/departmental website (Intranet: internal way to communicate with employees; secure website with documents that employees need) 

Internal Communications Vehicles:  

• @services magazine
• blog postings - GE Connect
• Homepage article
• Americas Services newsletter
• Healthcare Systems newsletter 

Externally:

Social Media: 

• Next Level website - blogging, videos, and online tools  
• Youtube 
• LinkedIn - Individual sales reps are on LinkedIn including GE recruits! (:  

 Today, tactics II had the privilege of meeting and listening to Cory Zimmermann of Z2 Marketing. However, unlike Melissa, Cory wasn't all too sure what he wanted to do when he graduated high school in 1991. Cory set off to be a professional marathon runner before he thought about attending college. He turned down being an accountant with a full ride to UW-Whitewater and instead went to a design school. When Cory graduated he made a few attempts at starting his own free lance agency, but ultimately was hired out and worked on a design team for a bigger agency. In 2003, Cory and his business partner Deb created Z2 Marketing and has recently celebrated their eight year anniversary. 
Z2 Marketing is the only branding company in the Midwest that is FULL service. Z2 Marketing works for relationships and to become partners with their clients. Cory gave us a piece of advice when stepping foot out into the real world - sell yourself; you are your first client. Cory showed us a lot of his work and how he tells a stories; stories are told in moments and Cory captures those moments through his work. One way that Cory is such a success as what he does is that he sees things in a different way or light. He also encourages his co-workers to do the same thing.

Both Melissa and Cory love what they are doing, but they both went through some tough love before they got to where they are now. Sometimes the road ahead may seem crazy and totally out there, but not a lot of people get places being "safe". 


Thank you to both Cory Zimmermann and Melissa Bohl for coming to speak to us about the fabulous world of PR! (: