North Coast Media, LLC

Danielle Pesta

Danielle Pesta
Senior Digital Media Manager

Danielle Pesta has a bachelor’s degree in journalism and media communications from Otterbein University. At North Coast Media, she manages the digital media team as well as the digital strategy for LP Gas. She has been in B2B publishing since 2014 and has won multiple awards from the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association and the American Society of Business Publication Editors.

Crack the code: B2B media ethics

Background photo: Mark Turner via Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

By Joelle Harms, Senior Digital Media Content Producer

In the world of business-to-business (B2B) media, ethics are a bit complicated.

As an American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE) 2016 Young Leader Scholarship recipient, I made the trip to St. Petersburg, Florida, for the association’s national conference.

“B2B ethics vs. revenue smackdown,” a presentation by Kelly McBride, vice president of academic programs at The Poynter Institute, stressed that having a code of ethics is vital to your B2B publication. Yes, many challenges will present themselves when trying to create a code, but don’t let that shy your company away from creating one.

“Ethics is a process,” McBride repeated throughout the presentation. “Spend a lot of time getting the process down, and solving each individual issue will come easier.”

B2B vs. MSM

B2B differs from mainstream media (MSM). B2B publications may have fewer resources and full-time staff, more contractors and freelancers, and unstable or declining revenue. However, McBride says that MSM is having the same issues when it comes to revenue, e.g. Runner’s World — back in 1981.

The 50-year-old magazine made a tough ethical decision after publishing an article rating running shoes: It vowed get rid of its grading system altogether after Nike pulled its $1 million contract when its shoes didn’t do so hot on the scale.

The decision Runner’s World made showcases how ethics and revenue can battle head-to-head, but the two don’t always have to be competitors.

One step at a time

“Ethics is a process,” remember? Here’s the workflow McBride recommends when creating an ethics guide:

1. Principles. The first thing a B2B company should do when creating a code of ethics is to address its core values. Why does your company exist? Once you have those values laid out, they can then be translated to principles.

There was much discussion in the room about one word that related to principles: transparency. Can you be too transparent? Not transparent enough? Maybe, but B2B has a unique relationship with its readers. By respecting that relationship, your audience will appreciate the honesty you bring to the editorial review process and take the time to acknowledge it.

2. Journalistic purpose. After you’ve outlined principles, identify your company’s journalistic purpose. Remember, a piece of content could not serve a journalistic purpose, yet it falls under your company’s principles.

Leadership is key

When creating a code of ethics, take a look at your company leadership. McBride shared four types of B2B media company ethics styles:

Clear internal guidelines and strong leadership.
Vague guidelines and strong leadership.
Vague guidelines and weak leadership.
Clear internal guidelines and weak leadership.

It’s obvious which would be the best situation (The first one!), but can you guess which style is the worst? B2B publications need leadership to execute guidelines, so having clear internal guidelines and weak leadership takes the cake. It’s even worse than having vague guidelines and weak leadership.

“The biggest danger is a disconnect between what you say you stand for and what you actually do,” McBride concluded.

3. Questions. As with any set of rules, it’s important to question them after you’ve laid down the groundwork. Ask yourself what your company has promised, how it can be transparent and what conflicts of interest editors may have. Also ask how you’ll manage those challenges.

4. Alternatives. It’s impossible to predict every circumstance, so have a range of alternatives ready, but take a look at which possible alternatives maximizes your company’s purpose.

5. Solutions. After you’ve addressed numbers one through four, figure out the solutions. Since transparency should be one of your values, decide exactly how you’ll be transparent to your audience. Will you incorporate more Editor’s Notes? Will you link to a Terms of Engagement page on each editorial piece on your company’s website?

Kickoff the code

It’s time to get started. McBride recommends using a “Green Light Ethics” approach, which means your code of ethics will list what to do in certain situations (green lights) instead of what not to do (red lights and stop signs).

She also said a good code of ethics addresses conflicts of interest, anticipates challenges, states company values clearly, contains standard practices, allows deviation through other established pathways and allows a certain threshold for that deviation.

The process still may seem overwhelming, but the ASBPE offers a list of ethics codes for several business, trade, association and professional publications — so there’s truly no excuse to get started.

Start processing your company’s ethics code to avoid possible future hardships.

How to network like a pro

By Joelle Harms | Senior Digital Media Content Producer

Networking is a common approach to expanding a career, or finding one, but walking into a room of people you don’t know in a professional setting can be daunting.

Yeah, they can be awkward, but I highly suggest taking advantage of networking events. You never know when you could be in a situation where you need a new job, need help with your job or need to help someone else with a job, so it’s important to stay in touch and meet others in the industry.

Networking, or “professional socializing,” as I like to call it, is something I used to struggle with. Did I share too much? Did I get too personal? Did I talk too much business?

All of your time at networking events will be spent… networking. There usually aren’t activities at these types of events, so be prepared to talk (a lot) about yourself and your career.

One key takeaway to remember: Be confident in whichever approach fits you. Chances are, you’re overanalyzing a situation that someone else may have seen as so minute.

I’ve compiled some tips from my past experiences and research to help you network like a pro:

Dress to impress. Wear business or business casual clothing — a collared shirt or a blouse and no jeans.
Be genuine. You could end up working with someone you met or got to know at a networking event. It’s important to let your personality show.
Bring a business card. This may seem obvious, but you would be surprised. Make sure it’s an updated card with the correct information. If you’re currently unemployed and looking for a job, make your own business card! It’s pretty cheap; just find a website that has preset templates for your to drop your contact information on and print.
Don’t get trapped. Don’t spend all of your time talking to only a few people. Take advantage of the event and talk to as many people as possible. Tell yourself before you walk in that you have to talk to X-amount of people. You never know what opportunity awaits you.
Help out other networkers. You’re not the only one looking for an opportunity, so be alert and aware that you have the possibility to help out someone else with their career.
Smile! If you’re like me and have a “mean mug” look even when you’re doing just fine, it’s not a bad idea to be conscious of this during networking events. Unfortunately, people make judgments on looks. From my experience, it’s better to put on a smile than give the wrong impression.

Still dreading networking? Reward yourself with some pizza on your way home. More likely than not the food was terrible anyway.

Components of a great résumé

By Joelle Harms, Senior Digital Media Content Producer

It’s most important to set yourself apart form other applicants. You both will most likely have similar backgrounds, so use the tips below to make yourself stand out.

Writing style and appearance play a large role in an employer picking your résumé out of a pool of applicants. For jobs you currently hold, use active words like “analyze” and “train” as opposed to “analyzed” and “trained” for jobs you have previously held.
Tailor the description of your job for each job you apply for. Chances are, the employer is looking for someone with specific experience and quality. Look at the details in the job description, and think of ways your past employment applies to those details. List out the important ones.
Format your résumé as you would any other professional written document. Keep the paper size as 8 inches wide by 11.5 inches tall. Keep the margins at 1 inch on all sides, and the font size should be no smaller than 11 point.
A basic serif or sans font is recommended for legibility and professional appearance. The most common standard fonts for résumés are Times New Roman, Garamond, Helvetica and Arial.
Color is acceptable if the job will require some creative work. It’s best to avoid color to play it safe.
One page is usually enough for a résumé, although if you’ve been in the same industry for 15 or more years and have held many jobs, it’s OK to go over one page in length. But, keep in mind that if you are summarizing your job duties that apply well enough, you should have no problem keeping it to one page.
Cover letters should be included along with your résumé. It’s a good idea to present who you are and why you want the job in your own writing.
If you’ve left off a couple jobs due to space or inapplicability, make sure to keep a list of all of your previous jobs for the interview.
Make sure there are no mistakes. I mean none. Take each sentence or phrase, copy it into a text editor and run a spell check on it. It pays to double (or triple!) check. Send it out to a few friends or colleagues that are willing to look it over to see if you missed any mistakes. Use your network to ask for help.

If you have any problems creating your resume, or you just want to perfect it, find professional help. There are some online tools that will help you, such as Monster and About.com, but a simple web search will help you find professionals in your area.

Résumé components

Name and contact information (phone number and address)

Make sure your contact information is large enough to notice at the top of your résumé. Enlarging the size of your name may help your name be remembered.

Résumé objective

This should be different for each job you apply to. It’s obvious your objective is to get a job at ABC Company, so tell the employer what about you will help you succeed in this specific position, at this specific company. “To obtain a head __________ position at a company” is not a good objective. A better example might be: “To use my three years of experience decreasing company expenses by 12 percent as a __________ to succeed as a ___________ at ABC Company.”

Work history

Your relevant jobs, yes. Your dishwashing job in high school, no. List applicable jobs you have held, or ones you have held for longer periods of time after your education. Don’t leave out periods of time by skipping a few years, just take a look at your past jobs and see if any of your duties will directly apply to the job you seeking.

Education

College or high school, if it applies. Any other certifications or continuing education can be listed here (or in its own section if there is more than one being listed.) If you have a college degree, there’s usually no need to list your high school.

References

List at least three references on a separate page. It is OK to note “references available upon request.”

5 reasons why you should include images in online articles

By Joelle Harms | Senior Digital Editor

Seeing is believing.

And lucky for us, we live in a world where taking images or finding free images, illustrations and photos is as easy as 1- 2-3. (Just make sure you check usage rights before posting and editing.) Lone text isn’t acceptable to stand alone anymore — especially when you consider all of the visuals that are competing for your audience’s attention.

Getting your article read is (obviously) the main reason you write an article. But, it could be the best article in the world and not be seen because, well, your audience didn’t actually “see” it.

Here are the five reasons why you should always include a visual component to your online article:

1. Articles with images get 94 percent more total views. Optimind Technology, a digital marketing agency, published these results. Even if the numbers may not be as high as 94 percent for your website, chances are it’s more than 50 percent, which means this is pretty much a no-brainer.

2. It’s easy. “I wouldn’t do it if it was easy” is not the case here. Finding images to complement your topic is simple (and fun). See the bottom of this article for a list of resources I regularly use.

3. Not everyone is an avid reader. People or potential customers that visit your website may not be there to truly read. Most will skim — if that. Adding an image can really put words into meaning for those who are visual learners.

4. It makes the complicated uncomplicated. Not everyone is a wordsmith, and not everyone sees words the same way. Most writers have had work on their desk that requires meticulous wording because the topic itself is confusing. For articles like this, consider infographics or images that show steps.

5. The world of images is at your fingertips. Don’t be afraid to think outside of the box. Image allow for so much creativity and it allows us to experiment where sometimes writing does not.

Three free stock photo and image resources:

5 dos and don’ts of social media

By Joelle Harms | Senior Digital Editor, North Coast Media

Social media is a blessing and a curse.

Promoting valuable and relevant content through personal, professional social media channels — Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and others — will help drive traffic to you or your company’s website, increase demand for your content and raise your visibility.

“Social media was once thought of as a mere pastime for teenage procrastinators,” writes Sports Marketing Surveys in a blog post. “It then developed into a dubious marketing scheme whereby businesses barely considered it viable and worthy of considerable time and resource. Today it is a huge promotional machine that no real business can do without.”

There’s no clear strategy to managing a personal social media account, especially when using it professionally, but there is a way to avoid social media disasters.

Keeping up with best practices and techniques for effective social media can be a challenge, but it’s very rewarding. Social media is indispensable. You can view social media as a free tool for you or you or your company to gain awareness, respect, attention and, most importantly, community.

Below are a few tips to keep in mind when posting to social media.

Dos

1. Post often. Staying active raises your credibility and allows you to share your passion with like-minded peers.

2. Use photos. I’m not talking about your average selfie. We love seeing your work, we love seeing your dog and we love seeing what you did after work. Yes, we love all of the visuals.

3. Share your successes. People do want to see you shine. Sharing successful results may motivate others to improve or could give them the answer they are looking for.

4. Mix up your content. Try new social media channels. Some superintendents are even trying out Vine!

5. Ask questions. If you have a question and no solution, chances are someone in the Twittersphere has the answer.

Don’ts

1. Brag. It’s one thing to show us the result of hard work that’s paid off, but no one cares about your trillion-dollar budget. An easy way to alleviate bragging is to share what others are doing by retweeting or posting a link to a cool blog.

2. Complain. Social media is not a forum for you to complain about life. It’s OK to bring up concerns you may have, but also be open-minded to what others are trying even if you don’t agree with them.

3. Be obnoxious. Liking and sharing others’ posts shows you’re interested, but don’t go on a “liking” spree on Instagram to make it seem like you’re interested. Liking a photo or tweet from 63 weeks ago is a red flag. It’s generally easy to tell if someone genuinely likes your post or if they’re just one of those “likers” who “like” everything.

4. Show us your wild (and I mean wild) side. It’s nice to get a glimpse into your personal life, but some things are not meant to be posted to social media. If you have to think twice about whether it’s appropriate, it’s probably OK to post, but if you have to think three times about it… I’d steer clear.

5. Take it easy on the selfies… and meals. Met LeBron James? Cool! Post that selfie you and him took together, but not the selfie you took of yourself holding a thunder stick in the crowd — we get it, you’re at the Cavs game. Have an amazing Thanksgiving? Cool! Don’t post your dinner plate — trust me, we’re all eating the same thing.

If you have any questions about social media best practices or how to make your accounts shine, I’m here to help. Email me at jharms@northcoastmedia.net for more tips and ideas.