After months of planning, this week Cookerly Public Relations is hosting the Worldcom Public Relations Group Americas Region meeting in Atlanta. As an Americas Region board member, I am especially excited to have many of our Worldcom partners learn more about Cookerly, experience the city we love and build friendships throughout the week.
For those not familiar with Worldcom, it is the world’s leading network of independently-owned public relations firms, which consists of 110 international agency partners that operate in nearly 100 cities on six continents. Founded in 1988, it was formed so the strongest, most capable agencies could serve national, international and multi-national clients while retaining the flexibility and client-service focus inherent to independent firms.
This year’s theme – “Ignite ATL – Agencies that Lead” – is most fitting. The City of Atlanta serves as a leading global business hub, just as many Worldcom agencies are considered industry leaders in their respective markets and niches. To that end, selecting Atlanta as our meeting site was an obvious choice for many reasons.
First, the city is a global center for numerous industries including aerospace technology, financial technology, supply chain and logistics, and transportation. Second, we claim the third largest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the country. Atlanta is home to such bellwether companies as Coca-Cola, Delta, Home Depot, UPS, Newell Rubbermaid and many others. The city also has the world’s busiest airport for passenger service and 80 percent of the U.S. population is within a two-hour flight.
Moreover, Atlanta is regarded as a melting pot of educated, driven people with a collaborative and creative spirit constantly exploring new ways to accomplish goals. The same is true of Worldcom and its members.
This week’s conference brings together the brightest, most accomplished public relations practitioners in the industry to share best practices, opportunities to collaborate and emerging trends and resources. It also attracts notable speakers from a wide range of companies and organizations to discuss innovative public relations and marketing campaigns, successful business strategies and other topics.
Cookerly proudly welcomes our Worldcom partners and we look forward to showing them our renowned southern hospitality and good times. Stay tuned throughout the week to the Cookerly Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram pages for updates – because this week we plan to “Ignite ATL” in a big way.
Cory Stewart is the chief operating officer at Cookerly PR.
As design director at Cookerly, Tim serves as the creative lead in the development of branding campaigns, print collateral and digital media for clients across a broad range of industries, including consumer, professional services, healthcare and technology.
As a senior vice president at Cookerly, Mike Rieman is a strategic communications leader specializing in media relations and reputation management. With a proven track record of securing high-profile placements in top-tier outlets such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, CNN and USA Today, he excels at crafting compelling narratives that resonate across print, broadcast and digital platforms.
Mike Touhill is vice president at Cookerly Public Relations, where he helps lead traditional, social and digital media programs for B2B and B2C clients in packaging, telecommunications and technology, among other industries. As a communication leader, he develops and executes public relations strategy, provides proactive and reactive counsel to C-level executives and secures earned media coverage for client initiatives and product.
Andrew Agan is a vice president at Cookerly Public Relations, overseeing the agency’s internship program and leading media relations, content strategy and social media initiatives. He provides counsel and executes campaigns for clients across various sectors, including finance, healthcare, hospitality, technology, automotive and many others. Andrew excels at crafting compelling stories and building media relationships, resulting in clients being featured in notable outlets such as CNBC, Associated Press, Business Insider, Fox Business, HBO, Inc. Magazine, Sirius XM, The Wall Street Journal and USA Today, among others.
As vice president of Cookerly, Sheryl Sellaway uses her extensive corporate communications background to lead consumer PR efforts, deliver strategy for marketing programs and share expertise about community initiatives.