Hilary Topper

Hilary JM Topper is an American podcaster, media consultant, blogger, publicist, author, entrepreneur and triathlete. She currently is an adjunct professor of social media at Hofstra University.
Early life
Topper was raised in Long Beach, New York and graduated from Long Beach High School. She received a bachelor of science degree in public relations from Hunter College and a master of public administration in Non Profit Management from Baruch College. Prior to starting her own business, Topper worked at several public relations agencies, including Ogilvy, Hill Holliday and Ruder Finn, where she worked on projects for GLAD Wrap and Bags, Jell-O, and Dove Beauty Bar.
Career
In 1992, Topper founded HJMT Public Relations, a public relations and social media marketing firm. Since then, the firm has represented Enterprise Rent-A-Car, Con Edison, Lockheed Martin, and the American Lung Association, among others, on various projects. The firm is currently headquartered in Long Beach, New York, with satellite offices in Denver, Burlington and New York City.
Topper is known as one of the first Public Relations executives to adopt the use of social media and wearable technology for a business application. In 2007, Hilary launched a new social media division within her agency, with a focus on helping the small business owner gain visibility and awareness using the social media site Facebook. Her company's blog, NYLifestyleBlog.com, was named “Blog of the Year” by the Fair Media Council and was also a two-time Stevie Awards “Woman’s Blog of the Year” finalist.
In 2009, she wrote one of the first books on social media, “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Social Media but Were Afraid to Ask --Building Your Business Using Consumer Generated Media,” a manual on the usages of social media. The guide was published by iUniverse. In 2012, she founded the Social Media Association, a Long Island-based social media business group, which was one of the first such associations in the country.
In 2008, she started the New York Lifestyle Blog, which now has with 88,000 unique monthly visitors. In 2011, she began writing the blog currently known as “A Triathlete’s Diary,” a daily triathlon-focused blog with 50,000 unique monthly visitors. The same year, she recorded her first podcast on “Hilary Topper on Air.” Since then, this weekly business podcast to help the small business owner grow both personally and professionally has a listenership of nearly 250,000. Topper interviews chief executive officers and motivational speakers.
In 2011 Topper was selected by Google as a Google Explorer, after winning a social media contest run by the firm with the tweet “I want my #Google Glass more than I want my MTV,” echoing the music channel's '80s tagline. She received a Google Glass, which she used to create the first reality show using the product. Topper's web series, “Glasslandia,” which showcased her life as one of 8,000 Google Glass beta testers, was the first filmed in first-person through the device. The series features Topper interviewing job applicants, delivers a presentation on personal branding to unemployed Long Island marketers, and running on the Long Beach boardwalk.
In 2016, Topper organized the New York Tri Expo, a conference for triathletes, nutrition specialists, sports psychologists and injury prevention specialists to discuss their work and the sport of triathlon. The event consisted of 60 companies and 40 experts exhibiting products, holding workshops and presenting triathlon research. Competitions held at the event included a CompuTrainer competition, where participants raced against each other on stationary bikes. Matt Dixon, former pro-triathlete, elite coach, and author of “The Well-Built Triathlete,” gave the keynote address on training more efficiently for a triathlon.
Triathlon career
In 2011, Topper began running, which she documented on her blogs. In her various seminars, she has claimed that she “was never an athlete” and “barely passed high school gym”, but felt as she was getting older, that she needed to do something difficult. At age 49, in 2012, Topper ran her first half marathon at the NYC Half Marathon. After her fourth half marathon, in 2014, she competed in her first sprint triathlon, finishing the Captiva Triathlon on Captiva Island, Florida in 1 hour, 37 minutes and 30 seconds. In 2015, she qualified for and competed at the United States Triathlon National Championships, where she completed the Olympic distance with a time of 4 hours, 10 minutes and 39 seconds, finishing in 2,599th place out of the 2,609 finishers. She continues to race in both sprint and Olympic distance triathlons, throughout the country.
Since completing her first marathon at the 2016 New York City Marathon, Topper has trained under coach Jeff Galloway, former American Olympian. She currently helps to train beginner runners using Galloway's Run-Walk method on Long Island.

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu