Voice Over IP (VoIP) services have grown exponentially in recent years and are slated to increase even more throughout the next decade. What is driving this growth? Mainly the inherent benefits to the technology itself:

• Dramatically decreases the cost of communications
• Flexibility to adapt with new technologies like WiFi and 3G
• Feature rich service sets that enhance the user’s experience

Still not convinced that VoIP is for you?  QT Talk’s PrePaid Calling Solution (without the card), PUREMinutes, is offering trials of its international VoIP network services – for free.  This service allows callers to use the service and see for themselves how the quality of VoIP is just as good as traditional telephony services.

By using the PUREMinutes service from companies like QT Talk, the retail division of QT Globe, users can also save money – up to 70% off traditional international carrier rates.

In today’s economy – free international calling PLUS savings of up to 70% – it’s certainly worth a try.  For a limited time only, and as part of the company’s promotion as they attend the International Telecoms Week (ITW) meetings May 24-26, 2010 in Washington DC,  QT Talk is offering $10 Free Calls – simply text QT to 64842  from you mobile phone – then call family, friends and clients – globally, today.

Check them out there or also www.qttalk.com and www.pureminutes.com.  For information email info@qttalk.com.

*QT Talk was Voted Best VoIP provider by Voip Review and  a 5 star rating by MyVoipProvider.com

Jaymie Scotto & Associates (JS&A), a full-service public relations and marketing firm with proven experience in delivering strategic branding, design and communications for the telecommunications industry, today announces the launch of Telecom One-on-One, a JS&A Power Networking Event that provides telecommunications executives with time-efficient networking opportunities to further expand their business. The first event will be held on April 29th in New York City.

Similar to “speed dating” for telecom business, JS&A has developed the Power Networking concept to provide JS&A clients and industry professionals with a well-managed setting through which to conduct targeted prospect and customer meetings. Attendees can begin scheduling meetings immediately after registering through an online meeting planning system, the DealCenter. All meetings will occur on-site, in 20-minute intervals, throughout the 3-hour event.

“Telecom One-on-One is an innovative approach to networking, bringing industry thought leaders together to conduct business,” states Lauren Sauer, Manager of Events & Webinars for JS&A. “Scheduling meetings prior to the event increases business objectives and goals, ultimately making networking more efficient and focused.”

“Additionally, JS&A clients will have the opportunity to participate in a media match-up before the event, to meet with industry press and analysts to share their latest news and company developments,” continues Jaymie Scotto Cutaia, CEO of Jaymie Scotto & Associates and DealCenter. “Telecom One-on-One is another way in which we help our clients and the telecom community develop new business relationships and expand their market reach. We anticipate a successful event packed with effective networking.”

For more information about Jaymie Scotto & Associates, please click here.

To register for Telecom One-on-One, click here.

TELEHOUSE America held its Q’1 2010 Breakfast on Broadway (BoB) event on February 25^th.  Though there was a snow storm in New York City that day, attendance was terrific.   Three companies presented at the event, including TELEHOUSE America, AboveNet and Digital Edge – each company had strong messages and interesting data to ponder.

TELEHOUSE’s Fred Cannone, the company’s Director of Sales and Marketing, discussed how data center demand is outpacing supply.  There continues to be a limited number of multi-tenant data centers that can accommodate companies looking for cost-effective access to an eco-system of service providers that can offer high bandwidth solutions. 

In 2009, the company announced its interconnection solution through its Ethernet Private Line service, Global InterLink, a service that has the capability of connecting TELEHOUSE’s 37 global data centers while also providing access to other major data center hubs.  This solution provides companies a tremendous amount of benefits, including cloud computing.  TELEHOUSE calls this solution Data Center as a Cloud^TM.(DCaaC).  Their DCaaC solution provides companies with Total Managed Network Services through its data center and colocation footprint through their Internet exchanges in New York (NYIIX) and Los Angeles (LAIIX) as well as global Ethernet private line connectivity and a full suite of Manage-E solutions including on-site support, data back-up solutions, business continuity planning and more.

Key customer examples of the types of companies leveraging the DCaaC solution include Global Financial firms, Post Production houses and Law firms.  Each company requires a unique footprint, but all grounded on similar solutions; Dedicated Data Center Suites, Global Interlink – private line connectivity, Managed Services, IP Transit all in multiple locations across multiple continents.  This is TELEHOUSE’s specialty – a complete Total Solution Provider.

AboveNet’s Doug Turz presented next on high-bandwidth Ethernet trends and solutions.  AboveNet considers anything above 100 Mbps to be high-bandwidth (I say that’s certainly fair).  The company provides solutions to enterprise buildings and data centers serving companies that require bandwidth flexibility, convergence and low latency. 

The company is seeing a push toward more video, which of course uses more bandwidth.  Another trend that AboveNet sees, being a data center neutral provider, is there are more companies than just financial firms concerned with latency.  The healthcare industry is building out their network infrastructures with low latency bandwidth solutions.   Unlike the Financial industry that associates each millisecond with the loss of tens of thousands of dollars, it’s harder to put an actual figure associated with network latency when considering the healthcare industry, but it could certainly lead to a life or death situation.

The final presenting company was Digital Edge.  Digital Edge provided us with a special presentation, given by its client the March of Dimes.  Digital Edge provides consulting and virtualization implementation solutions.  For the March of Dimes, a company that relies on donations and fundraising programs that primarily uses the Internet it was important to be assured 100% uptime, since downtime equals lost donations – lost income and of course the company’s inability to aid the children they support. 

At any given moment the March of Dimes’ network could have up to 13,000 concurrent sessions – per second.   Digital Edge designed its network to ensure uptime – at the same time the company’s design did not fall prey to complete virtualization.  Scalability was a key driver for the design as the number of simultaneous virtual instances could be high – and had high processing requirements. 

As Digital Edge put it ‘you need a strategy.’  Companies need to know what to virtualize versus not and to understand the security associated with any network architecture.  When working with high performance solutions that require precise tuning, virtualization is not the answer.   In addition – if you require high security for your applications and services, virtualization will not suffice.

Digital Edge’s years of experience has indentified holes in a variety of software solutions developed by MicroSoft, Zen, VMware and more.  To have a company like Digital Edge consulting, designing and implementing your network solutions will certainly guarantee efficiency for the data you are transmitting.

For more information about these companies or to view their presentations, please click on these links.

TELEHOUSE America:  Data Center Market & TELEHOUSE Advantage

AboveNet: Low Latency Data Center Connectivity Bandwidth Flexibility

Digital Edge: The Intelligence Behind The Technology

Excerpt posted by Vanessa Eixman:

If you want to find the best-of-the-best in Twitter check out Listorious which publishes Twitter Lists featuring the top people and their posts on any given topic. So whether you are looking for the Top 50 Funny Twitterers or Twitter’s Top Travel gurus you can find it quickly on Listorious. Today we are zeroing in on the Tops in Technology with a special mention for Ilissa Miller, Managing Partner at Jaymie Scotto & Associates. Ilissa recently made Listorious’ Women in Telecom Twitter list. To check out Ilissa’s tweets follow her on Twitter!

Ilissa is tops in social media, as well. She and Jaymie Scotto Cutaia, CEO of Jaymie Scotto & Associates were recently interviewed for a Web 2.0 Expo webinar titled Social Media for Event Exhibitors where their ideas on effective uses of Facebook, Twitter, and blogging were incorporated into the presentation. Social media efforts, public relations initiatives, and events are greatly enhanced by the ideas shared.

Find out the latest on telecom public relations, technology, and social media on the JS&A website and its award winning JSA Telecom News Now Blog.

Here’s the JS&A ‘Top 10 in 2010′ List of Hot Marketing Tips.  Take a look and let us know your thoughts, predictions and trends for marketing this year as well.

10.  Content is King: We are no longer in Kansas Toto.  You can’t just write around the topic anymore.  Say it precisely, say it again and get out.  Make sure it’s relevant or folks won’t read.  There’s a very low tolerance these days for anything but real.  BTW: this will drive your site retention, SEO, media pickup etc.  So really, keep it real.

9.  Marketing Means Experience: Think Apple, Amazon and Starbucks.  All these brands understand that users/viewers want an experience, not just a product.  Understand your buyers, including their emotional drivers, and make sure your product or service offers it.  In a trying economy, the experience you provide can be that key differentiator for why you succeed.

8. Customer Service: This point goes hand-in-hand with “experience.”  If you don’t do it well, don’t do it at all.  If that means only having 3 products vs. 5, then only have 3.  And customer service should be a top consideration of every member of your company, including your receptionists, technicians and A/P representatives.

7. Tell A Story: No one wants to hear a company ringing its own bell anymore.  Give us customer testimonials and case studies, preferably in video.  Give us the reasons why.  The days of just stating “we are the best” are over, thank goodness.

6. The Community Wins: With blog comments, facebook posts, and YouTube dumps, to name just a few, there are more ways than ever to hear from the buyer/community-at-large.   2010 will be the year companies have to listen and should respond… or risk having no control over messaging hitting the marketplace.

5. Not So Personal Anymore: As we are all jumping online for our latest tweets or LinkedIn posts, be careful of your “personal” posts– as personal is not so personal anymore, especially when your CEO and mother-in-law are your latest “followers” and “friends”.

4. The More Minds the Better: Sharing is a key word this decade.  Online Apps, such as Google Apps, YouSendIt, Skype and Webex, are helping companies, large and small, embrace collaboration.  Even QuickBooks is providing secure access for financial employees and external accounting services.  

3. Cell Phone Heaven: Yes, everyone has an iPhone or Android and smartphone apps are all the rage.  But with services like Foursquare hot on the market, it won’t be long before every restaurant you hit or store you step into has a rating and review site and coupons and discounts are being pushed to you.  GPS has never looked creepier.  From a marketing standpoint, yay.

2. Personal Touch: Having said all this, the personal touch still goes a long way.  A hand-written thank you note, a meeting in-person,  a handshake still speaks volumes, perhaps even moreso, in this high-tech crazy world.

1. Listen and Listen More: The last tip is an “oldie but goodie”.  My father used to tell me that the smartest person in the room is usually the quietest.  He might have been trying to keep me quiet for more than 2 seconds, but it always stuck with me.  Most interviews, prospect meetings and even blogs are better when you first listen to others, then speak/write.  It leads to a more productive, targeted conversation.  Ideally it answers a few questions that were on the table.

So without further adieu, please leave your top tip or trend.  Looking forward to reading your posts.

Jaymie Scotto Cutaia

Introducing:  TECHISTAN Publication – ‘Land of Technology’  (www.techistan.net)

Jaymie Scotto Cutaia, CEO of Jaymie Scotto & Associates (www.jaymiescotto.com)and publishers of Telecom News Now (TNN) had the pleasure to speak with the founders of TECHISTAN:  Suzanne Bowen, CEO and Editor in Chief; Nusrat Zehra, Marketing Manager and Omar Shaikh, Senior Editor of Techistan.

Suzanne is a pioneer in the Telecom space where she hails over a variety of companies including Super Technologies and DIDx companies that provide VoIP Hosted Platforms and VoIP 2.0 Enabling Technologies. 

This podcast interview is a discussion about TECHISTAN and its mission, which Omar Shaikh, its Senior Editor describes it as an online media magazine featuring broadcasts, radio interviews, podcasts and articles for the Telecom industry.  An issue that propelled TECHISTAN to the market is the founders observed that the majority of online news media magazines seem too commercial and don’t pay enough attention to the ‘little guys.’

TECHISTAN promises to provide Telecom related Press Releases, Interviews and news in one location.   In this podcast interview, Suzanne Bowen explains that TECHISTAN is collaborating with other entities, including other online media organizations and aims to reach the early adopters, developers, open source and IP communication industry managers and executives.

TECHISTAN’s motto is ‘No Boundaries’ the goal of the organization is to help keep everyone informed and entertained.  To hear the complete interview, please click here:

For more inforamation about TECHISTAN, please visit: http://www.techistan.net/

I go to PTC in Hawaii nearly every year to meeting with clients, prospects, journalists, analysts and to hear the comings and goings of the International Telecom industry.  This year will be much of the same, as I will be escorting five JS&A clients to the event.  I will be busier than a bee, making sweet honey while introducing clients to the media and analysts that will be on hand.  PTC is an opportunity to take a good pulse of the market and layout marketing plans for the rest of the year.  There are few shows in the International telecom arena of this caliber – ITW in Washington DC is another that requires planning, strategizing and positioning.

PTC this year is starting to take stride -with just a few weeks away – it better!

The key events at the conference have begun to be scheduled:

Bharti Airtel is sponsoring the opening reception, which will be held on Sunday night from 6:30pm – 8:00pm on the Village Green.    The reception promises to offer cocktails and an array of wine as attendees are entertained.

On Monday night, ROGERS will once again sponsor an event at the Lagoon Green – also starting at 6:30pm.  This is a traditional event that ROGERS brings in an entertainer to ‘wow’ the crowd.  This year it will be Caissie Levy entertaing with ‘Broadway on the Lagoon.’

There are many private functions happening as well, including one hosted by AT&T.  Jerry DiMartino, along with a few special companies, will be hosting exclusive golf outings and breakfasts at the event – if you’re lucky enough to get an invite, I’m sure it will be worth your time.

This year, I will be hosting the first ‘WOMEN IN VoIP’ breakfast.  We will be meeting on Monday morning at 9am.  If you’d like an invite just email me (ilissa@jaymiescotto-dot-com)  the more the merrier – and a great opportunity to meet with some of the industry’s best. 

As the dates draw near, no doubt more functions will arise – if you know of some of your own, please post them here so that we could all meet up and be seen!

Oh.. and I’ll be on the PTC ‘bus’ from Newark on Saturday …  I promise to bring the nuts.

In this podcast New Paradigm Research Group (NPRG) analyst Stephen Hernan talks with Grant Kirkwood, CTO of Mzima Networks, and Terry Koosed, President of Bel Air Internet. Be sure to join us as we discuss how these two carriers have collaborated to deploy an all-wireless voice, data, and video bundle to both the residential and business customer segments – and how this might represent the next big threat to the incumbent carriers and cable MSOs.

TELEHOUSE America announces its partnership with Akibia, a leading provider of consulting, integration and support for data center, network and security solutions, who will also present at the company’s next Breakfast on Broadway event to be held November 19^th at 25 Broadway, TELEHOUSE America’s New York City data center facility.   TAMP will also join Akibia to offer attendees insight into High-Availability Disaster Recovery Support and Business Continuity as part of TELEHOUSE America’s positioning as a Total Solution Provider with its Manage-E suite of products and services. 

The full press release is below for your review:

TELEHOUSE America Partners with Akibia to offer its Customers High-Availability                          Disaster Recovery Support

New Service is Just One of TELEHOUSE America’s Manage-E Solutions to be Featured at its‘Breakfast on Broadway’ Event in New York

Staten Island, NY, USA – October 28, 2009– TELEHOUSE America (www.telehouse.com), the United States’ leading provider of dedicated data centers, international Internet exchanges, and  managed IT services along with Akibia, a leading provider of consulting, integration and support for data center, network and security solutions, announce their partnership to offer TELEHOUSE America customers 24/7 high-availability systems’ support for their mission-critical data center needs.

With Akibia, customers of TELEHOUSE America gain access to a 24/7 leading provider of hardware maintenance and operating system support.  Akibia’s services are offered with custom SLAs that cover the leading hardware and software brands including SUN, HP, IBM, Dell, EMC  and others, IT best-in-class logistics and expert field engineering and education services.  Akibia’s multi-vendor systems maintenance services provide a single point of contact for all network, security and data center support needs.  In addition, the company also offers data center relocation services, guaranteeing minimal downtime while optimizing companies’ data center footprints.

TELEHOUSE America continues to leverage best-of-breed partners, such as Akibia, to provide Total Solutions to the global communications marketplace.  “Akibia’s complete data center support services, as well as our consulting, implementation and support on critical network and security solutions is an ideal fit for TELEHOUSE and its customers,” comments Robert Klotz, Vice President of Technology at Akibia.  “Our partnership allows TELEHOUSE to enhance its already robust service offering, providing customers with maximum network uptime, data integrity and greater customer satisfaction.”

“Our vision is to provide the industry, housed within our datacenters and beyond, complete end-to-end managed solutions, which we call Manage-E,” continues Vincent Corley, Sr. Marketing Manager for TELEHOUSE America “The November 19th ‘Breakfast on Broadway’ event at 25 Broadway will clearly communicate multiple components of our managed services portfolio, which continually emphasizes turn-key solutions to aid companies in building solid business planning and practices..”

The ‘Breakfast on Broadway’ event will be held from 8:30am – 11:00am on November 19th at 25 Broadway in New York City.  TELEHOUSE will discuss its Manage-E solutions, providing comprehensive IT Infrastructure and Systems Management.  Akibia will discuss its full life-cycle services, ranging from implementation to on-going system support.  TAMP Systems, one of the few companies worldwide with Certified Business Continuity Vendor (CBCV) certification from the Disaster Recovery Institute International (DRI), the world-wide leader for education and certifications in Business Continuity Management (BCM) will discuss several areas of business continuity and disaster recovery planning. 

The ‘Breakfast on Broadway’ event is free to attend, however there is limited space.  To register, please visit: http://www.rsvpbook.com/event.php?431232 or email Vincent Corley at corley@telehouse.com.

About Akibia, Inc.

Akibia provides innovative IT solutions that enable leading companies worldwide to optimize, secure, manage and support their mission-critical infrastructure. As an independent advisor, Akibia partners with its customers to deliver solutions that improve the availability and performance of their data center and security infrastructure. Combining expert consulting, integration and support services with world-class customer service, Akibia helps IT organizations maximize the value of their existing infrastructure, while mitigating risk and reducing complexity. Founded as Polaris Service in 1988 and headquartered in Massachusetts, Akibia is an independent services company with offices throughout the United States and Europe. Contact Akibia at 1-866-4-AKIBIA or www.Akibia.com

About TELEHOUSE America

TELEHOUSE America is the US’s leading provider of dedicated data centers, colocation facilities, international Internet exchanges, managed IT services and disaster recovery solutions.

A stable and trusted pioneer of carrier-neutral data center services, they provide secure, power-protected environments, where clients house and operate their telecommunications and network resources. Companies from a wide range of industries locate their mission critical equipment at Telehouse’s colocation “meet-me-centers” in New York and California; taking advantage of the potential business opportunities that exist from other Telehouse customers. Among the many benefits of colocating with Telehouse is the ability to connect to state-of-the-art peering exchanges in New York (NYIIX) and Los Angeles (LAIIX). Through Manage-E (http://www.Manage-E.com), TELEHOUSE provides a comprehensive suite of solutions – from help desk and hardware support to managed IT infrastructure, security and compliance services – all delivered by expert consulting and operations teams on a global scale and from one point-of-contact.  Additionally, the global availability of TELEHOUSE-branded data centers in 17 cities throughout Asia, North America and Europe, delivers continuous, cost-effective operation of network-dependent, IT infrastructure to businesses around the world. Please visit http://www.Telehouse.com, or contact us at sales@Telehouse.com.

By Jaymie Scotto Cutaia

Here are the top 7 pitfalls to avoid when working with your Public Relations firm to increase your media visibility.

Why 7?   It’s my favorite number and far less of a time-commitment then top 10.  And there is the best selling book, “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”, which further illustrates that 7 is just great.

So without further adieu– here’s the JS&A Top 7 “Must Avoids” for PR:

7.  Don’t Lie: Sure, it sounds easy enough, and we may have all the best intentions in the world to remain 100% honest 100% of the time, but when a journalist asks a tricky question which might not be within your expertise, just say “I’m not sure, and I will further research this and get back to you,” rather than touting something you might not be 100% certain on.

6.   Don’t Delay: Ok, you know all those silly adages your mom used to say, “don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today” or “The early bird gets the worm” etc.  All true.  Sorry.  Journalists (like all of us) are under tight deadlines – and especially in this day and age when they have content due for their in-print mag, online column and blog site, their deadlines are often fast-approaching.  If you can respond quickly with a quote or a 10-minute chat, even considering how hectic your day is already, it further cements that your company is media-friendly.

5. Don’t Be Vague: If the news isn’t ready for prime-time yet, don’t mention it.  If it is, try to have as many details, such as maps, photos and customer quotes etc.,  available to back it up.  Stats on industry trends, percentages of how much you have increased your sales or sales force and an industry analyst quote are also excellent.

4. Don’t Claim its Newsworthy– When Really…: How often do you see a press release and think, “really?”  It’s not worth the time, energy and expense to announce this particular “news” about a company.  Often companies set “PR Quotas” on their PR team– whereas they must send at least five press releases a month, for example. But here’s our advice: don’t announce it unless it’s worth it.  This will only frustrate your journalists who will opt out of your future news, if they feel they are only getting spammed with stuff that’s not worth their time.

3. Don’t Assume PR Means Wires Only: Sending your press release out on the wires is just one small fraction of the overall media outreach (or at least, it should be).  For example, here at JS&A, we target the ten top media organizations that are perfect for the given news and pre-market the embargoed release, then we distribute via wires, via our personal contacts and via social media (among other of our “secret sauce” activities)– to insure a very large but appropriate net is cast.

2. Don’t Avoid the Power of Social Media: It’s free, it’s got an incredible audience, and if used accurate, it can deliver powerful, targeted results.  Make sure your news is hitting the appropriate groups on LinkedIn, FaceBook, Digg, YouTube, Twitter and more.  If you harness these tools, it can be powerful.

1.  Don’t Forget to Ring the Bell, When Appropriate: When it’s big news, really big news (think acquisitions, for example), build a complete PR campaign around the news.  Don’t expect that one press release will cover it.  Consider html emails, client/prospect communications, internal communications, website revisions, and then staff your team appropriately, to be available when the media comes knocking.  Also consider a media roundtable or road show.  Let us know if you need help with any or all of these things!

So words to end on:  PR is a craft.  And if done right, it can increase your company’s brand power and ultimate net worth.  If done incorrectly, you can damage both you and your company’s credibility with the media and overall marketplace.  Have questions– let us know: pr@jaymiescotto.com.