LA Communicators Share Online Newsroom Best Practices

by Warner Boutin, Account Executive & Luis Guillen, Media Relations Specialist, Business Wire LA

Business Wire LA hosted a media panel breakfast event on Wednesday, March 28^th examining best practices for online newsrooms.

Business Wire’s VP Web Communications, Ibrey Woodall moderated the panel. Panelists included Brian O’Connor, Director of Marketing & PR, Cunard Cruise Line; Serena Ehrlich, Director of Marketing, Mogreet; Deborah Braidic, Manager Website Content/Internal Communications, Children’s Hospital LA and Amanda Hedlund, Web Communications & Media Relations Specialist, Children’s Hospital LA.

L-R: Amanda Hedlund, Deborah Braidic, Brian O’Connor, Serena Ehrlich & moderator Ibrey Woodall

Based on the recent Bulldog Reporter/Business Wire Communicators Online Newsroom Survey results, panelists discussed anecdotes, challenges & overall benefits of their online newsrooms. Here are some of the highlights of the discussion:

General survey findings:

• Half (48.4%) of corporate communicators currently have an online newsroom
• The online newsroom remains a relatively modest investment for most companies
• Companies are integrating their social media activity into their newsrooms
• Two most important site features: PR contacts and search module

On building your online newsroom:

• Stakeholders should come together from the very beginning – O’Connor
• Corporate communications and web development must be on same page. “We streamlined things early, which prevented the marriage from falling apart down the road” – Braidic
• Know your audience’s needs. “We make sure our audience can quickly find our latest news” – Hedlund
• Determine what content your audience wants to see
• Journalists want quick access to your newsroom rather than searching full site

On making your online newsroom relevant:

• Customize newsroom based on top 3 most frequently accessed content type:
  • Photos, press releases & b-roll – Cunard Cruise Line
  • Multimedia, PR contacts and all social media content – Mogreet
  • Multimedia, Experts/Physicians lists and protected logos – Children’s Hospital
• Categorize your releases and list experts as well – Ehrlich
• Use inbound site traffic to create potential blog posts. “I check the web traffic analytics for blog ideas” – Ehrlich
• Analyze your online newsroom’s web page stats on a weekly basis
• Make your corporate blog accessible on your online newsroom

On online newsroom maintenance, crisis communication and security:

• Every company should have dark site ability, allowing you to prepare pages ahead of time for a potential crisis
• Dark sites need to be light on graphics and multimedia
• Some of my clients maintain 10-12 different dark sites for “just-in-case” situations – Ehrlich
• You must know your target market if you’re going to password protect your newsroom – Ehrlich
• Password protected content needed sometimes:
  • We don’t want somebody pulling a photo archive on a ship we don’t manage anymore – Cunard Cruise Line
  • Sometimes we’ll use passwords to prevent logos from being stolen – Children’s Hospital LA

For more upcoming local Business Wire events or to see what’s coming up in our award-winning webinar series, visit our events page or follow Business Wire events on Twitter, hashtag #bwchat.

New Year, New Online Newsroom

by Ibrey Woodall, VP Web Communications Services, Business Wire Florida

Click here to download the 2011 Communicators Online Newsroom Survey Exec Summary

Hopefully, one of the items on your list of New Year’s resolutions is to closely review the workings of your current online newsroom. Do you have a fully developed and optimized online newsroom? Does it have the expected features? Does it fit well into your overall set of public relations and social media tools? Does it allow you to work efficiently and timely?  If not, do you have the budget to afford one that does?

Based on the results of the October 2011 Communicators Online Newsroom Practices Survey by Business Wire and Bulldog Reporter, the majority of organizations who intended to create an online newsroom in the future expected to do so within the next three to six months. That means that 2012 will be the year that some communicators will finally take advantage of the technology available to them.

In the past, barriers to utilizing an online newsroom have included lack of resources, inability to self-publish content, inability to integrate social media, lack of traffic, lack of analytics, lack of automated posting of press releases, inability to customize or highlight content, and simply the absence of a user-friendly content management interface.

Fortunately, very few of those surveyed felt that the cost of an online newsroom was a hindrance. Both large and small companies pay less than $10,000 a year for a standard online newsroom. Use this number as a parameter when working the cost of an online newsroom into your 2012 budget.

One of the obstacles communicators have had to deal with is one I’ve seen way too often. You won’t find this hurdle noted directly on the survey because it deals with internal departmental control and strife. However; you can imagine or even relate to the situation when you see that most organizations use an internal IT department to create their online newsroom. This may explain why communicators have not been able to self-publish content, automate press release postings, integrate social media, or even highlight specific content.

An online newsroom is a means by which a communicator can perform their job more efficiently, update content more frequently, supply desired material to journalists more easily, and interact with multiple audiences more timely – especially during a crisis situation. It is not just another section within an organization’s marketing website.

Will you be able to use dedicated communications technology to meet the varied demands of 2012? In other words, are you a PR warrior with the proper battle weapons?

Learn more about Communicators Online Newsroom Practices: join us for our free webinar on Tuesday, February 28 at 1pm ET. Ibrey Woodall, VP Web Communications Services for Business Wire, will moderate the panel, which includes Cindy Haas, Director, Corporate Communications, Ryder System; Maggie Jensen, APR, Media Relations Consultant, Securian Fianancial Group; and Mike Trask, Manager of Corporate Communications, Bally Technologies. Register for the free session HERE.