This week, I had the opportunity to attend PR News’s Nonprofit PR Awards as a winner in the Marketing category for .ORG’s DNSSEC Rollout for promotion, education and awareness around DNS Security Extensions.  We beat out some very good campaigns/organizations for this award, including BackBay Communications, Bloomington Hospital, First 5 LA/Hershey Causes, Foundation for Chiropractic, and Goodwill Industries!   We were excited to be nominated and chosen for this award as it is a challenge to effectively and comprehensively communicate this important upgrade to the Internet infrastructure to both the Internet community and the general public at large.

The awards event was held at the National Press Club with a sold out crowd honoring the best of the best of Nonprofit communicators.  With a keynote speech from the largest charity in the world, United Way’s VP of Public Relations, Del Galloway, the afternoon was exciting.  Lance Wolak, Director of Marketing and Product Management, accepted the award, and included a thank you to Lauren Price, Sr. Product Marketing Manager, for assembling and leading the DNSSEC Industry Coalition and me for the implementing .ORG’s social media platform.

While we still have a long way to go to increase awareness and adoption, PIR has managed to gain a foothold in its efforts and it’s nice to be recognized for our achievement.