400. Four hundred. FOUR HUNDRED! This is how many times my blog post, “ ‘CFA credential implies a standard of care not always upheld,’ says Forbes opinion piece”, was shared, according to the ShareThis widget on my blog. “CFA” is short for chartered financial analyst, which is a credential that I hold.

I couldn’t have done it without LinkedIn Groups, the interest and affinity groups that you can join on the popular networking site. I shared my CFA credential post on three CFA-related LinkedIn Groups, where it generated conversations and clicks.

Here are the lessons I learned:

1. Sharing your blog posts on LinkedIn Groups can boost visits to your blog. Four hundred “shares” is above-average traffic for my blog.

2. A blog post targeted to hot spots of a few LinkedIn Groups can generate more traffic than a less-targeted post shared with many LinkedIn Groups. My popular post addressed ethics and fiduciary duty – topics that CFA charterholders care a lot about. I suspect that I couldn’t have generated another 400 “shares” by distributing my post to the rest of my 47 LinkedIn Groups.

3. You may wonder how to pick LinkedIn groups for sharing. Don't share every blog post you write in every one of your groups. If you blog frequently, you'll alienate group members who'll tag you as a relentless self-promoter. Instead, focus on sharing into groups with members likely to be interested in your topic.

4. Another tip: Solicit feedback from members of the group on your post. Asking “Do you agree?” and then responding to comments shows that you're not posting purely to generate page views. Plus, you may learn something from your exchange.

If LinkedIn Groups have generated good results for you, I’d enjoy hearing your success story.

Susan B. Weiner, CFA, leads a highly praised teleclass, “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read: A 5-Week Teleclass for Financial Advisors.” She writes and edits articles, white papers, investment commentary, web pages, and other communications for leading investment and wealth management firms as well as financial trade publications.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Social Media, Susan Weiner

By Tonie Auer
DFW Chapter President

Occasionally, other bloggers can say things so much better than I can. This time, it’s Joe Pulizzi. The author, speaker and strategist for content marketing and founder of content matching site Junta42 marked his 37th birthday with 37 reasons to blog. And, they’re good ones.

Here's a sampling:

5. You can't be taken seriously in social media unless you have a robust, consistent blog. That's the truth. Deal with it.

7. A blog is search engine candy. Google loves blogs and Google is hungry. Feed the beast.

8. A blog is an industry game changer. When the buying decision comes down to three or four companies, the company website with consistent, relevant content is 60% more likely to win (Custom Content Council stats).

11. How can you be successful with Twitter, Facebook and other social media without generating consistently relevant content through a blog? Remember, content strategy comes before social media. That content strategy can be executed through the blog.

13. A blog can serve as the content hub for your enewsletter, print newsletter and company magazine.

14. Your customers want and need to be inspired. Is there a better way to inspire customers than through consistent content gifts through a blog.

So, go forth and be inspired by Joe. He gave me this great idea for a blog post.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Joe Pulizzi, Social Media, Tonie Auer

By Tonie Auer

• How can your publication succeed online?
• What points should a social media policy address?
• What challenges will face us as we convert our magazine from print to digital only?

Answers to these questions — and quite a few others — are in these 20 high-value posts from the ASBPE National Blog.

We combed through posts from the blog's three-plus years of existence to compile some of the best. In choosing these posts, we had specific criteria in mind. We wanted to highlight posts that provide actionable, “how-to” material in an easy-to-use format (blogs with bullet lists and checklists were favored). We also wanted the posts, as a group, to cover a variety of topics.

With those considerations in mind, here are 20 of the best ASBPE National Blog posts, roughly in reverse chronological order.

• Two posts by past ASBPE president Steven Roll address social media guidelines. One is “It's Never Too Early to Adopt a Social Media Policy”; the other is
  
  
• “Got a Social Media Policy?”
  
  
• “President’s Letter: It’s All About Brand at the Symposium,” by current ASBPE president Warren Hersch, reports on ASBPE’s November 2009 Digital Symposium.
  
  
• “5 Things To Consider When Converting To Digital Only” is a Q&A with Sara Zailskas of Housing Giants on her publication's experience of the process. The piece was contributed by Chicago chapter board member Erin Erickson.
  
  
• “McCracken: Experimentation Vital to Web-Launch Success” is another report from the Digital Symposium, this time on a session presented by Technologizer founder (and former PC World editor in chief) Harry McCracken.
  
  
• “6 Ideas To Boost Revenue, Readership, or Recognition” contains advice from ASBPE Washington, D.C., chapter president Katy Tomasulo.
  
  
• “SEO Best Practices” was contributed by former Website Magazine staffer Maureen Alley.
  
  
• “Twitter Tips for B2B Editors,” another post from ASBPE officer Katy Tomasulo, features advice specifically for those of us who work at business, trade, professional, and association publications.
  
  
• “Top 10 Strategies To Drive Traffic To Your Blog” was contributed by Michelle Rafter, a long-time freelancer on technology and other topics. Rafter writes the very popular blog Word Count, aimed at freelance writers and editors.
  
  
• “Seven Reasons Why You Should Start Your Own Blog” was contributed by Steve Roll, who did just that with the Latin America travel blog Travelojos.
  
  
• “No Matter How Painful, Editorial Productivity Should Be Analyzed” came from Howard Rauch, an editorial consultant and chair of ASBPE’s ethics committee.
  
  
• “No Solid Answer To ‘What’s Next For B2B?’” reported on a roundtable hosted by ASBPE’s Cleveland chapter.
  
  
• “Want To Learn HTML? Get Your Feet Wet” offers basic coding tips from ASBPE web editor Martha Spizziri.
  
  
• “We Are Already Marketers” is Christina Pellett’s argument for why editors shouldn’t balk at requests to help market their publications. Pellett is now editor of Agent Sales Journal.
  
  
• In “Building Your Wings on the Way Down,” Technologizer's Harry McCracken gives advice on starting a new publishing venture.
  

• Joe Pulizzi, founder of the custom publishing marketplace Junta42 Match, contributed three posts with advice for freelance writers. “Getting into the Custom Game” tells freelancers how to break into custom publishing (aka content marketing);
  
  
• “The Freelance Writing Retirement Plan: Create an Asset” gives advice for maximizing income; and
  
  
• “You Are What the Web Says You Are: Writers and Social Media” explains how many writers’ online presences are lacking.
  
  
• The advice in “Making Time for Print and Online” comes from Dan Blank, director of content strategy and development for Reed Business Information. (Dan also blogs at danblank.com.)
  
  
• “Sure, ’09 Will Be Tough. You Can Tell the Grownups, Though: They Think Rationally” comes from consultant Thomas H. Temin, It still holds up in 2010.
  

The ASBPE National Blog’s value never stops. We have ongoing discussions scheduled on plenty of hot topics. And take advantage of the opportunity to express your own view via a follow-up post. Email me at tonieauer@gmail.com.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Career/Employment, Custom Media, Digital, Economy, Freelancing, HTML, Management, Media Business, Productivity, Social Media, Technology, Tonie Auer

By Tonie Auer
DFW Chapter President

Covering real estate in a down economy makes story creation a bit limited at times. But, I’m taking the advice that a commercial real estate broker gave some “young guns” at a recent event: make yourself indispensable. He told them that the key to success is making sure that your team needs you on every deal. Be a go-to person. The same is true in B2B journalism as well.

How do you do that? Be creative, for one. Find the stories that need to be told instead of rehashing the same tired topics over and over.

A great example in the commercial real estate world in Dallas is the use of Jones Lang LaSalle’s SuperBowl blog. They took their top dog — who just happens to be Hall of Famer and former Cowboys QB Roger Staubach — and paired him with his broker son to write it. So, now they've taken something that really has nothing to do with JLL and made themselves relevant.

With the SuperBowl coming to Dallas in February 2011, they have something to generate the interest, and the person to make it interesting. Tie in the real estate world and voila.

But, Tonie, we don't have a Roger Staubach or a SuperBowl to get people interested, what do we do? Find something that makes you relevant to your target audience. Are they all wondering about unemployment? Industry regulations? healthcare reform impacts?

What's on your readers' minds? Ask them. Make your blog relevant to them and their needs. Maybe create a forum for them to ask each other questions. Christianity Today has a blog for its Your Church magazine. From information that is pertinent to its readers — church leaders — and from its comments section, the editors have developed cover stories that relate to what their readers are asking about. Let your readers guide your topics from time to time. What a novel concept? I don't think so. It's time we got back to basics in our coverage. With scaled-back budgets and staff, we may have no choice.

But, we have to make and/or keep ourselves relevant to our readers. Remember, make yourself indispensable. If you come up with the good ideas, your publisher, editor, board of directors (whoever) will remember that.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Tonie Auer, Writing

By Steven Roll
ASBPE Past President

The Wall Street Journal has one, the New York Times has one, Bloomberg has one. What about your publication? Does your publication have a social media policy?

Like many B2B publications, chances are your publication has been dipping its toes in the social-media ocean, but hasn’t jumped in yet. Maybe you’ve set up a Twitter account or a fanpage on Facebook, but nothing more.

Even if your publication is still in the exploratory stage, it’s probably a good idea to adopt a social media policy.

After making a few informal inquiries last week to some tech-savvy editors, I was somewhat surprised at how many publications still haven’t adopted a policy for how writers and editors should conduct themselves when communicating in a professional capacity on social media. Many of the people I spoke with said they were in the process of developing one. (Of course, the reason I was asking is because I'm drafting a policy for my company.)

Maybe editors are reluctant to adopt a formal policy because they feel social media initiatives are something that should be built from the “ground up.” After all, it’s mostly the younger people who have fully embraced it. Perhaps adopting a formal policy might somehow inhibit the free flow of conversation on Twitter etc. Both the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg were criticized for adopting overly rigid policies.

It seems like the danger of off-message or inappropriate communications outweigh the awkwardness of adopting a policy concerning a medium many of us don’t fully understand yet. But it seems like it would be a lot easier to change an misguided policy, than to try to somehow compensate for an offensive Tweet or misguided blog post.

The social media policy I’m working on has two levels. The first level is a set of broad principles that outline some basic rules of conduct. Here are a few:

• be honest and transparent;
• coordinate your messages with your publication;
• add value;
• blog about what you know;
• if you make a mistake, admit it, and correct it; and
• be diplomatic and professional — especially with the people who are behaving rudely or with whom you disagree.

The second level reads more like a style guide. It will include more specific information such as:

• a sample blog post;
• what a typical Tweet should look like; and
• best practices for sharing a blog post on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

To be sure, the policy my company ends up adopting is likely to look entirely different than my conception of it. But even if that turns out to be the case, I think it's a worthwhile exercise to start establishing some guidelines. Otherwise, how else will you be able to identify inappropriate conduct. Like old age, having a policy to point to sure beats the alternative.

Through a colleague, I found the following gem at the Online Database of Social Media Policies: Chris Boudreaux, author of the upcoming book Social Media Governance, has assembled 82 such policies on the book’s website. From companies to charities to military organizations, it’s a treasure trove for those struggling with social media guidelines.
Source: Social Media Governance (via Mashable)

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Career/Employment, Digital, Electronic Style Guide, LinkedIn ASBPE, Management, Productivity, Social Media, Steven Roll, Technology, Twitter, Work Life

As we blogged about on Sept. 3, here is the second part of the notes taken by the Chicago chapter of the ASBPE held its first Do-It-Yourself Roundtable discussion.

Some of the information gathered included using Twitter and Productivity Tools.

TweetDeck – Downloadable application for your computer that offers “one-stop-shop” for posting, retweeting, replying, direct messaging, following topics, searching for topics.

Twhirl – Downloadable desktop application for posting, replying to and shortening URLs for Tweets.

Twitterfeed – allows you to pull in RSS feeds and send them into your Twitter stream.

Bit.ly – allows you to shorten URLS and track click throughs on Tweets.

Twitter Search – lets you search for topics, words, etc. to find out what is trending or who is talking about it.

Tweeters to follow:

@prsarahevans
@problogger
@prnewswire

More Twitter Tips

• Use PowerTwitter on Firefox (as opposed to IE).
  
  
• If you’re going to be Tweeting as a group, use your pub name and real name:
  FoodProcessing_Erin (not a real address)
  ErinErickson (not a real address)
  
  
• If you use your real name to tweet for your brand, but be careful not to mix too much pleasure with business:
  FoodProcessing_Erin: Pepsi CEO steps down; cites unruly eyebrow
  FoodProcessing_Erin: OMG that bartender is hot!
  
  
• Use #hashtags to point out keywords in your tweets. Be sure to see if such a hashtag exists already.
  
  
• @Twitter the “@” is part of your address.
  
  
• RT = ReTweet
  Example of a retweet:
  @Ehal76 RT@foodprocessing Looking for examples of your favorite ice cream flavor. DM me your ideas!
  
  
• DM = Direct Message
  

Facebook

Fan Pages. Similar to personal Facebook pages. Can post images, videos, Twitter feeds and RSS feeds which people can “friend” and see updates from. It will not show who created it.

Use Facebook’s Twitter application to feed tweets into Facebook.

Use RSS Feed to feed tweets into Facebook – OR – Twitterfeed + Twitter application will feed your RSS into Facebook.

Group Pages

• Are related around a cause or commonality.
• Can not be “friended” but joined.
• People need to visit the page to find out updates. Will not feed into their Updates.
• Person who created the group is visible to others.

Widgets

You can create widgets for your site(s) to display Twitter posts, RSS feeds, news updates.

• Spring Widgets
• WidgetBox

Blogs

Usually two types of B2B blogs:

• Personal/Personality blogs can be informative, controversial or instructional (or all three).
  
  
• Group blogs can combine different personalities or different reporters of information or instruction.

Personal/Personality blogs – it’s your name/you opinion. Attribute (and link) the same way you would an article. Let comments in unless they are downright attacks (“Purina tastes like crap”). Make sure you’re correct in your reporting and don’t publish false news.

You are not liable for other people’s opinions on your comments.

Labels: ASBPE Chapters, Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Technology, Twitter

By Maureen Alley

During my five years in business-to-business trade, I've learned a great deal about niche marketing and writing. I've also learned a great deal about magazine production. Additionally, I've learned I have a huge passion for these. But one thing that surprised me about this industry is the struggle editors and publishers have with social media and new media in general.

I've always been excited about new media. Maybe this comes from my age, or maybe from the fact that I've been surrounded by computers my whole life (my dad is a computer guy) — but nevertheless, I have always looked at the computer as advantage, not disadvantage. And this is where I drift from the traditional B2B world. My ideas are different, and those who've been in B2B for a while don't tend to agree with me or see what I see.

There's no arguing that B2B is struggling to find its footing between loss of ads and growing reliance on the Web for users. I don't think it's as difficult as some think. The first step is being open-minded and realizing that past models are outdated. We must change the way we operate to succeed. I truly believe B2B has the most advantage of all media to succeed with the different platforms available. However, to do that, things need to change. Below are a few tips for B2B editors to guarantee you're getting the most out of social media and online.

• Get on LinkedIn and make sure your profile is up-to-date and active. Only have connections on LinkedIn that you can vouch for — quality vs. quantity.
  

• Start reading RSS feeds. RSS provides a more efficient way of reading more content faster.
  
  
• Get on Twitter and use your name as your handle. Too many editors think you need a personal Twitter as well as a separate professional one. This is a huge mistake. Make yourself a brand — and your brand will enhance your magazine's brand.
  
  
• Create your own website or blog. Again, use your name if possible as your domain name for branding purposes. Then use your website or blog to showcase your knowledge making yourself an expert in whatever you're an expert in.
  
  
• Stay up to date on the latest technology and try it out. Most of them are free, so why not? Example: I just signed up for FriendFeed because it was being talked about so much online and I didn't know what it was. Surprise — I like it better than Twitter!
  
  
• Participate in conversations online. Use Twitter, FriendFeed, Facebook, LinkedIn — and any other social platform to make connections.
  
  
• Don't limit your connections to those in your industry. Read blogs and tweets from technology insiders so you stay up to date on the newest tools.
  
  
• Despite my annoyance that Google has such a large market share (73 percent), it offers good tools. Use them!
  
  
• Google Docs allows multiple people to collaborate, edit, share information on spreadsheets and other documents. This is huge for efficiency and communication.
  
  
• Google Groups allows you to collaborate with others in a forum-like fashion.
  
  
Create your Google profile to guarantee your owning your brand. Even if you only set it up with the basic information, you still own it.


• Write blog posts on your magazine's website at least three times a day.
  
  
• Readers like new content. If you're constantly putting new information up, they will come back.
  
  
• Search engines like new content, so make sure you give it to them.
  
  
• Market these new posts on all your social platforms such as Twitter.
  
  
• Make sure these posts are of the highest quality (relevant information, written professionally, no spelling or grammatical errors).

These are just a handful of ideas that you should be doing at a minimum. Once you get this far, you'll have your own ideas on how to keep moving forward. It's just getting to this point that's been a struggle for so many. Good luck!

Maureen Alley is managing editor for Website Magazine, a trade publication dedicated to Web professionals. She was formerly managing editor for Residential Design & Build magazine, a property of Cygnus Business Media. Alley graduated with a BA from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, and is currently attending Roosevelt University in Chicago for her Masters of Science in Journalism. She has been a member of ASBPE since 2006 and was a judge for the 2009 Azbee Awards program. She writes a blog at www.maureenalley.com about young journalists and new media. Contact her at malley13[at]gmail[dot]com.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Maureen Alley, Social Media, Technology, Twitter

By Steven Roll
ASBPE President

If you see a blogger on a bicycle, why should you swerve to avoid hitting him? It might be your bicycle!

What do you call 100 bloggers buried up to their necks in sand? Not enough sand!

If these jokes seem familiar to you, it’s because I’ve adapted from lawyer jokes.

What do bloggers have to do with lawyers?

For one thing, there are about as many people in the U.S. who make their living blogging as there are who practice law, the Wall Street Journal reported a few months ago.

At the same time, the number of journalists has significantly declined. There are about 80 percent fewer D.C.-based employees of major newspapers than there were just a few years ago, according to the Wall Street Journal story.

One thing that separates bloggers from lawyers and journalists is a code of ethics. Lost in all the laughter produced by lawyer jokes, is the fact that the legal profession has a code of conduct that is regularly enforced. Most attorneys can point to a former classmate who is also a former lawyer as a result of an ethics code violation.

Journalists typically belong to associations such as ASBPE or the Society for Professional Journalists, which have developed well-established codes of conduct.

But bloggers haven’t gotten around to adopting an ethics code yet. If they wait much longer, it looks like the government will do it for them.

One practice that has placed bloggers in the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s sites is failing disclose payments or other forms of compensation in return for blog posts about a product or service. The FTC is expected to approve new guidelines this summer that would clarify that the agency can go after bloggers for failing to disclose conflicts of interest, the Associated Press reported recently.

Among other things, the guidelines would require bloggers to disclose any compensation received in exchange for endorsing a product or service.

Some bloggers have criticized the guidelines as being overly broad and unfair. But that's often the result when an industry fails to police itself. If bloggers wait much longer, their quickly growing profession will deserve the reputation it's earning as a laughingstock when it comes to ethics.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Steven Roll

By Tonie Auer
DFW Chapter President.

I'm on a few different email distribution lists and sometimes I get useful information and other times, I'm simply hitting delete. More often than not, I don't have time to read them.

The same is true with blogs. I have hundreds bookmarked on my computer, but probably swing by each of those only a few times a year. So, how do you make sure your blog is one to which people return?

I got a tip off one of my email newsletters from Writer's Web Watch.

This eTIP is called LINKS ADD VALUE TO YOUR BLOG:

People return to your blog because your posts are informative and interesting. When you provide links to other sites that you find valuable, you're giving them even more reason to return. You're also using the Web the way it was meant to be used. Many corporate bloggers make the mistake of writing only about themselves and their organizations. In doing so, they miss out on the opportunity to link to sites where other professionals are making points that support their own.

That tip was contributed by Denise Shiffman, principal with Venture Essentials and the author of www.ageofengage.com.

So, I'll follow that advice and post a few informative links here. One that I thought was interesting with all the Twitter talk focuses on How Should Newspapers Use Twitter? I like it because even though B2B journalism is very different, we have similarities more and more with newspapers as we deliver breaking news on our websites.

So, there you go. I'm following the advice. What other things do you do - both professionally and personally - to keep the traffic coming back to your blog? Post it in the comments, then come back to see what others say.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Tonie Auer, Twitter

By Michelle V. Rafter

Editor’s note: This blog post originally appeared on Michelle Rafter's WordCount blog and is copyright 2009 Michelle Vranizan Rafter. It is reprinted here by permission. The original post can be found here.

Traffic to this blog [WordCount] has grown steadily since I launched it in January 2008 but it’s really started picking up lately. It doubled last month and is on track to double again this month. I attribute it to several things:

1. Timeliness - Writing about timely subjects, such as the story of Roxana Saberi, the freelance broadcast journalist who’s just be convicted of espionage in Iran. I blogged about her situation last month and each time there’s been a development in her case I’ve seen daily traffic spike to four and five times the usual amount.

2. History - My blog’s now 16 months old and people who write about the same subjects - freelancing and digital media - have discovered it, link to it, leave comments on it, etc. I do likewise on their blogs. All of that has added to traffic, though not as much as #1.

3. Consistency - When I first started blogging I was a very inconsistent poster. Then I did a month-long blogathon and posted every day, which gave me a nice bump. After that I blogged M-F for the better part of 8 or 9 months, until earlier this year when I had so much writing work going on I dropped back to MWF. That’s been enough to keep people coming back and traffic increasing.

4. Standing features - Awhile back I started running a recap every Friday of highlights of the week’s news and developments in freelancing and digital media. Now my readers look forward to it - I know because they tell me. I also run Q&As with freelancers on a regular basis. I know other writing bloggers have had equally good results with the standing features they run.

5. Guest posts - Writing guests posts for other bloggers introduces you to potential new readers of your own blog. Likewise, when you ask someone to write a guest post on your blog, hopefully their regular readers will follow them over for the day, discover your stuff and become regulars.

6. SEO - Using tags and keywords helps move your posts up in searches on Google, Yahoo, etc., and that brings more people to your Website. Putting pictures in your posts - and labeling them - is another way to show up on top of search results. Some of my most well-trafficked blog posts got those click throughs because of the pictures I used to illustrate them. Is that cheating? Not really. People may click through for the image, but if you’re lucky they’ll stick around to read the blog post too.

7. Web rings - I’m a very part-time member of a Web ring of freelance writers who help promote each others’ work on social bookmarking services like Digg and StumpleUpon. The few times I’ve asked people to promote blog posts it’s pushed traffic up significantly. If you’re interested in this type of thing, though, you have to be prepared to give as much as you receive, which means spending some small portion of your day Digging and Stumbling other people’s blog posts.

8. Twitter - One of the things I use Twitter for is to promote my blog posts, and it’s not a surprise that traffic to my blog started to really take off right around the same time I joined. When I write a new blog post I tweet about it and include a link. When people follow me, I DM them to say hi and introduce myself, and include a link to my blog. When I see a question about something I’ve blogged about, I’ll answer, and include a link to my blog. That sounds like a lot of promotion it really isn’t, because I also tweet about a bunch of other things. I did an analysis once and figured out that I included links to my blog in only 1 of 10 tweets, and I’d estimate it’s an even smaller ratio now.

9. Links - If you link out to source material that’s related to what you’re writing about and your readers click on those links, pretty soon the owner of that blog is going to come investigate where the traffic is coming from. When that happens, you could take the opportunity to leave a comment on their blog or send them an email - in other words, get acquainted. After that happens, you might offer to exchange links, you put their blog in your blog roll and they do likewise. That drives traffic up for both of you.

10. Good content and good writing - Have something interesting to say, and say it in a compelling way. You can use all the tricks in the SEO book, link like mad and use every social bookmarking trick there is, but if your ideas and writing don’t sing, people will stop in once and never come back.

There are other things too - keeping posts short, lists, sexy headlines, etc., but these are the top 10.

What’s driven traffic to your blog?

Michelle V. Rafter is a freelance writer based in Portland, Ore. She has spent more than 20 years covering business and technology for magazines, newspapers, wire services and Websites.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Michelle Rafter

By Steven Roll
ASBPE President

Since I started reading blogs a few years ago, I’ve often thought about how much fun it would be to start my own. But I couldn’t think of a good topic to blog about. I also fretted over whether blogging would somehow detract from my job performance.

Picking a good topic was especially difficult for me because, as a nonpracticing attorney, I’m fascinated by many of the legal topics that my company covers. But blogging about one of these issues could land me in hot water because I would be competing against my employer.

Plus, I had all the other usual excuses like lack of time, identity theft, and the possibility of falling victim to hackers, spammers, and other nasty people on the Internet.

Steer Clear of Trouble. Despite all these concerns I started a blog anyway. To steer clear of trouble, I chose a topic that has nothing to do with my job. I also vowed to maintain a strict firewall between my job and my blog (a vow I honor by keeping my work at work and my blog at home).

Since launching my blog in late December I’ve discovered that my worries about job performance were unfounded. Blogging has made me a more valuable employee. In just a few short months it has strengthened my writing skills and turned me into my company’s resident social media expert.

My experience has been so great that I think you should start a blog too. Blogging will help you to:

1. be more creative. Thinking of three or four different topics to blog about during the week will strengthen the same mental muscles you’re using to come up with good topics to write about for work.

2. learn to be a faster writer. Between work, home, and ASBPE-related activities I have limited time for blogging. To compensate for this I’ve become better at thinking of what I need to say ahead of time and then writing it quickly.

3. become more technically savvy. To start my blog I registered my own domain name, picked and customized a WordPress theme, and learned basic search engine optimization techniques. A few times, I’ve been surprised at the technical jams I’ve managed to get myself out of.

4. figure out how to use social media. I’ve become obsessed with Web traffic. A casual interest in Twitter has turned into a fixation. I’ve also figured out social booking marking tools such as StumbleUpon, which were a mystery to me in my preblogging days.

5. find out that the blogosphere is full of great people. Out of about 10,000 visitors to my blog, I’ve had only one somewhat negative comment. The bigger problem is the people reading my posts are too nice and I’m getting no constructive criticism (unlike work and other areas of my life, where constructive criticism is a major part of the landscape).

6. think like a blogger. Having your own blog will give you insight on how to work with bloggers who cover the area you write about for your regular job. Bloggers can be a great source for quotes or help you to attract attention to your publication.

7. make yourself more marketable. Blogging is all about creating a community of readers and then interacting with them. Do this and you’ll be a valued employee wherever the job market takes you.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Steven Roll, Writing

By Steven Roll
ASBPE President

In a recent speech delivered via Twitter BusinessWeek.com’s John A. Byrne (@JOHNABYRNE) emphasized that the next phase of journalism will require editors and writers to get readers involved with every step of the process, from generating story ideas to filling in the missing details of a published story.

For example, Byrne said that when one of BW’s editors did a story early last year about Twitter, he tweeted the topic sentences and asked “tweeps” (his followers on Twitter) to fill in the rest. “This created terrific engagement among readers, seeded an audience for the story, and was truly innovative, Byrne said.

Part of being an editor or writer today, he noted, is learning how to create and build communities and then how to serve them.

One of BW’s editors did this last year with a story called “Social Media Will Change Your Business.” He created the story by asking readers of his blog to comment about what had changed about a story he had written three years ago on the same topic. The result was that all of that interaction was used to inform the reporting of the story and the end result really resonated, Byrne said.

Another reason why reader engagement is so important, Byrne said, is that it helps editors make better editorial judgments. “Most journalists get their respect and their reinforcement from colleagues — not the people who consume their writing. We need to understand the people we’re writing for and open up the process of journalism to improve our ability to serve them.”

Despite all of the turmoil and pain in the industry, this is an incredibly exhilarating time in journalism, Byrne said. “Never before have journalists had access to so many tools to perform their jobs more creatively than now. Never before have journalists had the advantage of having their own printing presses to do their own thing. We’ve spent too much time whining about the changes out there and not enough time taking advantage of the new opportunities.”

“You can become an entrepreneur. You can engage your readers as true partners. You can change the very nature of journalism,” Byrne concluded.

Journalism and Web 2.0 are beginning to make more sense to those participating in #editorchat on Twitter from 8:30 to 10 p.m. on Wednesdays. #editorchat is one of the many group discussions on various topics are held on Twitter during the week.

Why the funny looking title? You follow the dialogue on Twitter by doing a search for the term “#editorchat.” Because Twitter provides live search results, responses to the conversation pop up as they are made. Tracking the discussion in this manner also helps to avoid having to wade through tweets that are not part of #editorchat.

See you on #editorchat next Wednesday!

Follow me on Twitter at @b2beditor.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Digital, Steven Roll, Twitter

By Michelle V. Rafter

This blog post originally appeared on Michelle Rafter's WordCount blog and is copyright 2008 Michelle Vranizan Rafter. It is reprinted here by permission. The original post can be found here.

In the past week I heard from several writers who are thinking about starting a blog. Bravo! Now comes the hard part.

There are all kinds of reasons for blogging: building a brand, practicing different types of writing, promoting a book, putting your resume and clips online, or just getting stuff out there that you couldn’t or wouldn’t put in a paid assignment.

Though the reasons may vary, the mechanics of getting a blog started don’t. Here are six simple steps to starting your freelance writing blog:

1. Pick a niche that you’re in love with. If you’re not passionate about something, your enthusiasm for writing about it will fade. So pick something that speaks to you. Entertainment writer Jane Boursaw blogs about movies at Film Gecko. Sandra Hume, a freelance writer in Kansas, blogs about Laura Ingalls Wilder. Another freelancer, Roxanne Hawn, blogs about her dog Lily. I blog here about how digital media is changing the freelance writing business, a topic that combines my experience covering the tech business with my personal interest in keeping up with the times as a freelancer.

2. Deal with the mechanics. Once you’ve got an idea, you need to give it a home. You can set up a blog on any number of free blog sites including WordPress, Blogger or TypePad. Or you can download free software from Moveable Type or WordPress.org and pay a service like GoDaddy to host your blog. Most of these services have extensive FAQ sections and user forums where you can get answers to your blogging-related questions.

3. Present interesting and well-written material. There’s no right way to write blog posts. But there are some good rules of thumb. Short is good. Write like you’re talking to a friend. Vary post styles: lists, Q&As, and anything with bullet points seem to be particularly popular with readers. Blog posts that spell out your reaction to new events practically write themselves. Others that offer your original reporting or commentary take more time and effort. I included a bunch of other ideas in this post on writing great freelance blog posts and in this one on whether to plot out posts ahead of time or write on the fly.

4. Commit to posting regularly. How often you post is up to you, but doing it consistently is a sure way to increase traffic. That’s one of the main lessons I learned from my May blogathon, where I posted every day for a month. Now I blog Monday through Friday. Other freelancers I know post a couple days a week. Boursaw, the entertainment writer, writes multiple posts a day, sometimes as many as 10. Maybe it’s why traffic to her blog is through the roof.

5. Build traffic. There are all types of tips and tricks to get people to find out about your blog, including using search engine optimization or SEO to tag your blog posts so Google, Yahoo and other search engines will pick them up, and putting links into your posts. Other traffic builders: maintaining a blogroll, leaving comments on other blogs, and joining blogging networks. Here’s a list of other tips for improving traffic to your freelance blog. You can find more information on these and other techniques on sites such as Copyblogger and ProBlogger and Blogging Basics 101.

6. Have fun! Don’t freak out if your blog’s not popular right out of the gate. Unless you’re lucky or are using a blog to promote a book that’s already bestseller, it takes time for people to find you.

If you’re still not comfortable getting started, you can always take a class online or sign up for a new media seminar.

Got your own suggestions for how to start a writing blog?

Michelle V. Rafter is a freelance writer based in Portland, Ore. She has spent more than 20 years covering business and technology for magazines, newspapers, wire services and Websites.

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy, Career/Employment, Freelancing, Michelle Rafter

by Erin Erickson, Chicago Chapter Vice President

Last week, the company I work for convened for a day-long editorial meeting. One of the hot topics of discussion was our blogging strategy.

I work for a small B2B company with an even smaller number of people who blog on behalf of their magazine's website. Most of the bloggers post news; some of them post timely opinion pieces; a couple of them have written posts that have landed them in hot water with advertisers.

In these economic times, upsetting advertisers over a blog post isn't necessarily something you want to do particularly if there's an advertiser that can make or break your year.

So this room of editors started to ponder: Can you really "blog" if you work for a B2B?

I put blog in quotation marks because a blog, when used as intended, is an often-updated, interactive vehicle for promoting news and/or opinions.

If you can't post often enough to call it news or can't present an honest opinion without risking monetary consequences, can you really call that blogging?

And if you can't call it blogging, then what should it be called?

The format that blogs provide certainly is a great way to show the world that your media company "gets" interactive media. But, if you're not actually "blogging," then what is it you're doing? What should you call that portal on your site where you post news and not-quite-100%-honest opinion?

I'd love to know of a B2B site that actually blogs with 100% honesty about a topic, advertisers be damned.

I'm also curious to find out other people's opinions about what this altered style of blog posting should be called: B2B Community Journalism perhaps?

Labels: Blogging/Blogging Strategy