MacroBlog

In this modern era of the Interwebs, every business is a publishing business. As a result, instead of being clustered exclusively at magazines and newspapers, writers are finding their way into into a variety of companies, whose owners are finding a need for writing ability that didn’t exist ten years ago.

If you run a business, you may already know people who write well and are versatile. Sure, they have talent with words– they didn’t get to be pros without getting their point across clearly in a style appropriate to the audience, all while avoiding grammatical and punctuation errors.

But what about their other skills, such as the ability to research a topic quickly and thoroughly? Suppose you find a writer who also knows his or her way around the Web and social media? Now you have someone who can affect a company’s bottom line in all sorts of ways, with powerful, polished writing that resonates with customers, staff, suppliers, business partners, and the world. Here are five points to ponder:

1. Professional writing applies not just to websites, marketing and advertising, but to business letters, conference summaries, internal documents, knowledge bases, even articles for submission to publications. Published articles in industry trade journals are a wonderful way to complement your marketing strategy, raise awareness of your brand and increase your company’s prestige in the minds of customers. All the above will have a positive effect on revenue.

2. Website content management – Are there errors, bad links, and outdated information on your company website because nobody updates it regularly? Is your site being optimized to attract search traffic, and organized to serve visitors efficiently? Is there any reason for people to read what’s on your site? Time after time, usability studies show that if you build a clean, compelling website, you’ll have a competitive advantage.

3. Search engine optimization and marketing (SEO and SEM) – Do you have anyone in charge of these areas? A writer’s skills figure heavily in these word-based disciplines. Hiring a writer to manage them could make a big difference in leads, conversions, and sales.

4. Social media marketing – Agencies can help get you started, but who inside your company is paying daily attention? Knowing what’s being said online about your business is important to protect your business reputation. You can’t fake this or hand it off to outsiders. Learn by interacting with customers, both happy and unhappy. If nobody at all is mentioning your business online, it’s the perfect time to step in and take control of your online image!

5. Effective email campaigns – Here too, an internal staff person who can write professional copy, hire graphic designers, set up and manage mailing lists, administer and track results can be more effective– and cost-effective– than an outside agency.

The list of potential uses for a writer goes on and on. How about powerfully written request for testimonial letters? Use of testimonials on websites and other marketing media can greatly increase the odds of acquiring a new customer. What about customer surveys? Even small companies can benefit from regularly polling their customers and analyzing responses.

Now that I’ve advocated the idea, where can you find such a person? You’re reading one of his blog posts right now. How’s that for a call to action?

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It was time to spiff up my blatant self-promo card, so I used my piercing intellect to come up with this breakthrough concept, which I printed up and glued over the old card. A targeted few were mailed this card, which pointed them at this blog and prodded them to vote in my poll.

So here you are, and the poll is over there to the right. Fly free across the page and select as many as three answers. Try not to injure yourself in the process.

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Oh, and just to clarify: I am looking for two things: freelance work (writing, editing, developing websites on WordPress) and a job as communicator, marketer, digital and social media guy, webmaster. If you know someone who could use help in these areas, I’d appreciate your letting me know.

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In CUPRAP One, I promised some specifics from the speakers at their recent workshop . Millions are struggling with how to implement social media in business, and I found that– for the most part–  these expert communicators for academic institutions have a good handle on the transition. Here are some key points from remarks by Ray Betzner, assistant vice president for university relations, Temple University and vice president of CUPRAP:

• We’ve taken budget and staff cuts while having to do more.
• We used to be in charge of our own brands, our message. Now everyone has a worldwide platform to talk about our brand.
• A blog over which we have no control, www.cherryandwhat.blogspot.com, has about as much influence as the official online newsroom we run. More students get their news here, and we have no control over this, folks!
• How often do you look at your Wikipedia entry? We do every single day. (People change it.)
• Is Wikipedia important? Studies show that students go to Wikipedia first, not books.
• Increasingly, your bosses are looking over your shoulder, focusing on return on investment; therefore you need to align your results with the bottom line of the institution.
• Go back to basics. Evaluate why you’re doing what you’re doing. What does it cost? Is it working? How do you know?
• Reallocate dollars and resources to allow for new ventures.
• Get accustomed to the new normal. I don’t see us getting flush, as in 18 months ago before the bottom dropped out of the economy.
• Talk to your colleagues; attend workshops such as this; get ideas.
• Watch your competition.

Mr. Betzner’s remarks are a wake-up call that, unfortunately, not everyone will heed. At lunch I spoke with several college communicators whose bosses turn a deaf ear to their pleas for more social media openness, like starting academic blogs. It’s tough to do, but I think it’s imperative that anyone in a public relations department maintain pressure on the higher-ups to move into the twenty-first century.  In social media circles, it’s getting to be an old saw that people are already talking about you and you have to join the conversation.  But I doubt that it’s been said often enough or in the right ways to the right people.