Whenever possible, I pester B2B writers who persist in adhering to a source-first/news-later editing policy. The chance to revisit the topic arose during a recent conversation with Bianchi Public Relations president Jim Bianchi. Here’s how we addressed this exchange: Howard Rauch: There is a basic editing issue that shows up quite a bit in my…
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Do your PR contacts blog regularly offering editorial management how-to advice? Sounds like a good idea to me. I’m talking about the Meet the Media blog program created by Bianchi Public Relations. According to company president Jim Bianchi, the firm “tries to do two profiles per month on a journalist who covers our clientele—automotive or…
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High-value competitive editorial analysis reports should go beyond conventional page counts. In fact, they should aim for a dual goal. Of course there is the obvious objective of matching quantitative strengths and weaknesses. But equally important—and frequently overlooked—is input gained regarding qualitative superiority. Perhaps you’ve overestimated your edge in that respect. What follows here are…
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Earlier in this series, I described an eight-factor e-news editing test that should be applied during competitive analysis projects. Warning: that collection of caveats is merely the tip of the snafu iceberg. And in many cases, you are your own worst enemy. Take timeliness, for example. Needless to say (I hope), the news you post…
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Writers and editors of B2B news need to pay more careful attention to the use of direct quotes from end users (that is, their target readers). While many trade publications excel at gathering comments from readers, just as many do poorly. Still others gather ample reader quotes, but mostly from advertisers and vendors, not end…
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In part 1 of this article, I covered the first 13 of 25 qualitative factors in my competitive scoring system. Here are the remaining 12. Contents page. Do headings go beyond conventional labels such as “Features” and “Departments”? Are photos accompanied by newsy captions, not just the page number? Do department listings consist of the…
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Will corporate demands to “do more with less” overwhelm editors who already have their hands full with print and online responsibilities? Several tweets posted over the past two months indicated that answers are not immediately forthcoming. Other tweets in this time frame summarized several high-value guidelines covered in the first four installments of the new…
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The system described here emerged shortly after I launched Editorial Solutions Inc. in 1989. A B2B publisher with multiple titles asked me to prepare a two-day, in-house editorial workshop. One of the longer sessions (90 minutes) was to focus on competitive analysis. Part of the challenge was to create an objective scoring system that would…
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The ability to deliver a steady flow of high-value editorial content has always been a miraculous skill. For evidence of such miracles, you need look no further than to those many publications where full-time staffs of just one or two editors have against all odds consistently produced great publications. But as if such miracles weren’t…
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At least 10 years ago, it became apparent that B2B print media news sections were growing more tepid every day. Some clients admitted to me that they intended to eliminate their news coverage entirely. In many cases, the news department’s focus was being directed to online coverage. Surviving print news sections, such as they were,…
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