A wonderful article by Donna Hedge Burns, about “contributed articles”. A wonderful articulation that highlights the effectiveness of contributed articles by employees and others within an organization. It’s a great potential of getting the noise out from a company prospective and also your own, individual noise.
Here it goes……
And I'm Gonna Count the Ways
I have a new love. It started slowly, as great relationships often do. I admit I didn't see his potential right away. I thought he had little influence on my goals and plans. But over time, he's shown me that he is dedicated to me.
My new love? The contributed article.
Why do I love the contributed article? Let me count the ways ...
They are Great
I work at a technology company and our most powerful PR weapon is the case study. But good case studies are like finding an Xbox 360 at Christmas – hard to come by. Yet, we still have to get my company and its message out to our potential customers on a regular basis.
Enter, my love, the contributed article.
We've found the contributed article to be a great way to get our ideas out in between case studies.
IDEAS
Flickr Photo Courtesy of Cayusa
We might not get an article into our tier one target publications (as they often don't accept outside contributions), but we can often place articles in our tier two publications or web sites that specialize in the industries we sell to. Trade web sites especially love fresh content as they often have to update their sites on a continuous or daily basis. Oftentimes, even the tier one publications will take contributions for their web site, even if they don't for their print magazine.
They Can Be Syndicated
Our content has frequently been syndicated and published by other trade magazines or web sites – especially if the original publication that published the article is part of a larger conglomerate of media outlets.
They Help in Search Engines
This content also helps in search engines. We know from conversations with our sales staff that potential customers research us on Yahoo! News, Google News and other news sites. As long as our company name is in the article somewhere (which it at least has to be in the author biography, right?), then the article appears as fresh content and news for us. It also validates our claims that our consulting professionals are experienced and knowledgeable.
They Create Internal Support for PR
Flickr Photo Courtesy of I'm Won
(EDITOR'S UNPROVOKED COMMENTARY: WE LIKE TO CALL'EM LOVE CIRCLES HERE AT WORK)
Who's going to complain about you when you're getting them published? Everyone is motivated by self-interest. Getting your company experts published is going to help their career. They can charge more for consulting or service engagements because potential clients view them as an industry virtuoso. Plus, they increase their notoriety in your own company, which could lead them to plum assignments. Use the ego factor to your favor.
They are Great for Self-Publishing
Flickr Photo Courtesy of Euskerasky
With electronic newsletters, e-books, blogs and microblogs, you can easily bypass the media and get your written message directly to your audiences. The company, Cincom Systems, developed an electronic newsletter, Expert Access, a couple years ago (you're reading it right now). Instead of focusing on all-Cincom, all-the-time, it culls the best articles on the web that discuss the business side of IT. It now has almost 200,000 subscribers worldwide.
That's a large audience we can reach by including an article written by one of our company's experts. If an article has been published by one of our target publications, we always include a link to its web site in our newsletter. But if we have an article that we're having difficulty placing – because of the timing, the publication is already full, or it's considered a tad too promotional – we can publish it ourselves.
Now you know why I love the contributed article.
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