The Power of Public Relations

While her agency is hardly a one-woman show, Alexander sets the standard for the kind of "relationship-building" that most PR people pay lip service to but that few truly master. How legendary is her networking prowess? One rival PR executive jokes about creating a video game to train people in the art of working a room - with the final round consisting of a head-to-head showdown with the world champion: Pam Alexander.

But behind this good-natured gibe is a serious side effect of Alexander's approach to PR: She draws a considerable degree of envy and resentment from rivals who cynically attribute her success to buddy-buddy personal connections rather than to professional brilliance. What her critics fail to see is what goes on behind the scenes. To focus on Alexander's prowess on the conference circuit is to underestimate her multilayered strategy and her hyperorganized way of sharing information about the industry.

Alexander and her employees are unrivaled as both attendees and promoters of high-tech conferences. They represent five such events as well as two publishing companies with highly active conference units. But their approach to these social events is strictly business: They set specific performance goals for every conference, log endless hours in preparation, and go all out when the event takes place. Each Alexanderite who attends a conference drafts and circulates two sets of goals: his or her own objectives for the event, and those that the firm is pursuing for the client. "It may sound kind of detail-oriented," Alexander says, "but when you go into a conference environment, you get so sucked into everything that you're learning, you end up leaving the conference going, 'Gosh, I missed those opportunities.'"

The conferences serve a number of larger purposes. For one thing, they let Alexander demonstrate the kinds of lucrative relationships that she can orchestrate among her corporate clients. "The value of working with us should be not just what press coverage they're going to get but also the business relationships - not necessarily with customers, but with potential partners," she says. "We always try to facilitate that."

For another thing, the conference circuit helps make her agency a real participant in the high-tech conversation, rather than just a megaphone for already-established messages. To that end, Alexander not only represents the Technology Network, Silicon Valley's new political group, but also serves on its board. The strategy of representing and attending conferences, putting on dinner parties, and generally acting as a social secretary for the techno-elite ultimately gives Alexander an information edge: "The issues discussed at some of these top-level conferences appear in the business and trade press a few months later," she says.

The Alexander model is built on "overcommunicating." At Gilder's Telecosm, for example, at least one Alexanderite per session was charged with taking notes and emailing the highlights to clients who couldn't attend and to the Alexander offices. The firm brings the same discipline to its tracking of the media. It maintains a database with active records on more than 25,000 people at more than 6,800 organizations: market analysts, online publishers, financial analysts, venture capitalists, industry pundits, and business journalists. The Alexander intranet makes these data available to the firm's people everywhere, and about 50 staff members access the information daily. Each client gets a targeted "key contacts" list of 50 to 500 media people - with detailed printouts describing their interests and preferences.

Internal communication keeps Alexander Communications up to date on an expanding cast of characters. "A lot of this is very time-sensitive," Alexander says. "You want to get the word out immediately. Typically, what we do is type up a conversation as it's happening. If you wait until the end of the day, either you forget something or something doesn't get done."

This kind of techno-enhanced hustle is an Alexander hallmark. "We bring an intensity and a sense of urgency," says Alexander. "There are so many niche publications coming out. There are so many opinion leaders in so many different segments. To do an effective job, you need to be on top of that. With the rise of the noise level, communications people like us are more active than ever in setting the agenda. We influence what gets discussed in the industry we serve."

The Power of Values

It's 9 a.m. the morning of COMDEX, and while the Alexander forces are rushing to guide their clients through the nonstop extravaganza unfolding in Las Vegas, the week is getting off to its usual calm beginning at Cunningham Communication in Palo Alto. In a conference room, some 30 staffers have gathered for a weekly ritual.