On February 6th, Erin and I will be giving a presenation at the Magazine Publishers of America offices in NYC on the use of the Internet by magazines.  We will talk about how aggressively magazines are adopting Web 2.0 features, review examples of best practices and speculate a bit about what will come next.

The MPA website has the details.

Today we added a new section to our corporate website called The Lab.  Over the last year we’ve completed a number of studies and written a number of articles about topics we’re interested in.  The Internet’s Role in Political Campaigns.  How newspapers and magazines are using the Internet.  Stuff like that.

We’ve highlighted all these materials on our blog in the past, but we wanted to create a permanent home for this stuff so that people can more easily find it.  So check it out. 

And for those of you who haven’t followed us that long, I’d recommend you take a look at our 2002 studies on the use of the Internet by political candidates.  Some tidbits to whet your appetite:

• Only 29% of House and Senate incumbents running for reelection had campaign websites in 2002. 
• Only 42% of House and Senate incumbents with websites accepted online donations.

Times have changed a little, huh?

BlogBurst is a service that makes content from a pre-screened group of blogs available to a network of publishers, including the likes of USA Today and Reuters. We signed The Bivings Report up with BlogBurst right when it launched in May in an effort to get more folks to read our content. Since then we’ve had a few stories picked up by Reuters, which has generated a lot of headline views (around 850,000) and a modest number of post views (around 1,500).

From our perspective, there is no real downside to BlogBurst. That is 1,500 post views we wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. The more people that read our stuff the better.

Then today I got an email from BlogBurst saying that during the fourth quarter of 2006 we were their 45th most popular blog based on headline views. They also offered us $100 as a reward, with the option to donate the money to charity (Periwinkle Foundation) or keep the cash for ourselves. After reading up on the Periwinkle Foundation, we chose to donate the money.

Obviously, $100 is nothing for a full quarter of blogging. But seeing as we signed up for BlogBurst for exposure and not money, it is a nice bonus.

Here is a list of our posts that have been picked up by Reuters so far, from most to least in terms of headline views.

• MySpace Welcomes Magazines
• AP Names Top 10 YouTube Videos in ‘06 (But Forgets the Video Part)
• Want to be President? Step 1: Buy a Video Camera
• Print Media Websites: Who’s Getting it Right?
• Reporting from the “Trends in Political Blogging” Panel
• The Results are in!
• In-Text Ads – Ensuring Contextual Appropriateness
• Hotsoup is a mess
• What is Daylife?

In the most recent volume of Communique Magazine , TBG’s Gary Bivings authored a featured article. “Watching the Web” is a great piece about how PR and marketing techniques are changing to incorporate the monitoring of various new forms of media, primarily the Web. The article cites several examples of how the Web has affected PR and customer involvement in the pharmaceutical industry, and discusses how content tracking platforms can be an effective addition to any PR firms strategy (this includes our very own ImpactWatch !).

Among other issues, Gary listed the Top Seven Online Media Monitoring Practices in his article:

1. Get involved sooner rather than later
2. Implement a platform that will track online media for you
3. Categorize online activities of target markets/information seekers–blogging, message board posting, etc.
4. Make a list of the top sites to monitor per public/target audience
5. Track site statistics (eg, how often the site is visited)
6. Track bias of various sites with regard to your product
7. Decide how you will respond to the circulation of negative information about your product

You can read the article in its entirety here.

Wireless users in the United States aren’t really using the their mobile devices to browse the Internet. At least not yet. A study conducted in April of 2006 found that 18 percent of wireless users had tried mobile Internet browsing and that 6 percent browsed the web from their mobile device regularly.

While the numbers are low, I think the emergence of the mobile Internet is inevitable. As phones get better and download speeds get faster, people will start surfing the Internet on their phones.

As a website developer, that means it is increasingly important to build websites that work on mobile browsers. Fortunately, if you are a WordPress user this isn’t much of a problem. We made a mobile version of The Bivings Report using a great plugin developed by Alex King.

To access our mobile version, simply type www.bivingsreport.com into your mobile browser. That’s pretty much it.

<Rant: All mobile websites should work this way, meaning they should auto-detect whether you are browsing from a mobile phone. Sites that have separate URLs for their mobile versions are missing the boat, in my opinion. Who is going to memorize a separate mobile URL?>

If you are a web developer working on a mobile version, you might try out this mobile phone emulator software from Openwave. It’s free and allows you to see what your site looks like on a mobile phone without having to look on a mobile device.

A couple of months ago we ran a demo of our ImpactWatch™ product that analyzed media coverage around the 2006 Senate race in Connecicut.  Today we’re launching another demo that looks at coverage on major gaming websites of the launches of the Playstation 3 and Nintendo Wii gaming consoles.  By signing up, you’ll get access for 5 days to a fully functional version of our ImpactWatch system that covers this topic. 

Please sign up now to get access to the Playstation 3 vs. Nintendo Wii demo.  For more information, visit ImpactWatch.com.  Check back later in the week when we’ll release our first report analyzing coverage.

For the uninitiated, here’s our one sentence summary of what ImpactWatch is.

ImpactWatch™ is a web-based media management platform used by public relations and corporate communications professionals to continuously observe, track, gather and analyze high-volume media coverage of any brand, product, issue, event, or industry.

We launched a new look and feel for our ImpactWatch™ product a couple of months back.  We are in the midst of rolling this out to our clients now.  One cool feature we’ve added the last few months is a "Dashboard" version of the ImpactWatch homepage. 

ImpactWatch users can now choose whether they want a "News" or "Dashboard" view of their ImpactWatch data from their homepage.  We decided to add this feature in recognition of the different ways people use the system.  Some folks login multiple times a day to read articles about their company.  Others login less frequently and are looking more of an overview of what’s going on instead of to read the days news.

You can see screenshots of both views below (click the image for a bigger version).  Both of these versions of the homepage are customized based on the clients needs. 

News View

Dashboard View

You can learn more about ImpactWatch here and sign up for a demo here.

TBG has recently completed a research study called "Analyzing the Presence of Magazines on the Internet". In the wake of success surrounding our previous newspaper study, "The Use of the Internet by America's Newspapers ", we decided to conduct similar research on the magazine industry. Our study reviews the websites of the top 50 most circulated magazines in the United States and evaluates them based on the presence or absence of various Web 2.0 features. After finishing the research, it became clear that magazines are not making use of Web 2.0. Despite their failure in terms of Web features, it should be recognized that magazines have taken on a more effective general strategy than newspapers when it comes to the Internet. Instead of replicating printed content online, as newspapers do, magazines have made efforts to publish unique, Web specific, and easily digestible materials on their websites. In this way, magazines are using the Internet as a supplement to, rather than a replacement of, their printed publications. Magazine websites limit their article content and focus on pushing customers to purchasing printed subscriptions. Here are some key findings from our research:

• The most common online feature offered by magazines is RSS feeds (48 per cent). All of the RSS feeds offered by magazine websites are partial feeds. In addition, none of the magazines are including advertisements in their RSS feeds, while just 28 per cent of magazines divide their RSS feeds into different sections.

• Message boards/forums are offered by 46 per cent of magazine websites. This seemingly old-fashioned form of communication is extremely popular on magazine websites, particularly on the sites of women’s magazines.

• 38 per cent of the magazines require registration to view all of the site’s content. While this feature is only present on 23 per cent of the nation’s top 100 newspaper sites, it seems that magazines are still heavily reliant on website registration. It must be noted, however, that newspaper and magazine online registration is very different. The large majority of the magazines we investigated allow users to view article content free of registration. However, to participate in forums, registration is required. This seems to serve as a mechanism for monitoring content that people post on message boards rather than to collect demographic information, as is the case with newspapers. Thus, this 38 per cent figure largely represents magazines that require forum registration, not registration for the purpose of reading articles.

• 40 per cent of the magazines offer at least one reporter blog. Readers can comment on 17 of the 19 magazine blogs, while eight reporter blogs offer blogrolls, or external links to other blogs.

• Video is an offering on 34 per cent of websites.

• Just 14 per cent of websites use podcasts and bookmarking; eight percent allow comments on articles; and six per cent use tags.

You can read the report in its entirety here and view our data sheets here Please take a look and let us know what you think!

On Friday, our pro-bono client the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project (MAIP) launched a redesigned and revamped version of its website, www.exonerate.org.  MAIP is a member of a network of non-profits around the country that works to provide legal services for people wrongly imprisoned for crimes they did not commit.  The Project uses DNA evidence to exonerate and clear the names of people that are victims of shortcomings of the US judicial system. 

By embarking on a new Web program, MAIP hopes to spread awareness of DNA exonerations and garner support from interested lawyers, students, volunteers and professionals.  To do this, MAIP has integrated a blog, online volunteer and contribution forms, and methods for supporters to take action on behalf of the project via the Web.  The Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project depends on the assistance of volunteer students and lawyers, so be sure to check out their website and consider lending a helping hand. 

Some interesting tidbits about the MAIP site:

• Our design and programming teams worked together to build the site entirely in WordPress. One of the problems MAIP had with their past website was that content became outdated and links to news stories died as the years passed.  We tried to battle this problem by setting up the Innocence Project so that they can control what content appears on their site and develop the ability to change their website as they see fit.
• The Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project plans to communicate with volunteers and supporters via their blog.  Check this site for updates on exonerations, case information, and guest blog entries from board members or people the project has helped in the past.

We wish the folks over at the Mid Atlantic Innocence Project the best of luck with their online program–they are a great group of people who are doing exceptional work for those who need help. 

As a designer, I’ve struggled as how to best contribute to our blog. Most web design articles speak to people who aren’t designers and tend to focus on the obvious. I don’t intend to add to that.

So I decided to attempt a redesign of the USA Today homepage as companion piece to our recommendations to the newspaper industry. Senior designer Jei Park and I sat down and figured if we’re going to talk the talk, we might as well start walking as well. A couple of notes:

(1) In putting this together, we included every element of the current USA Today site. We wanted to come up with something that could actually be implemented, not something so conceptual that it could never see the light of day. In other words, we didn’t take the easy way out.

(2) We chose USA Today because it is the most circulated paper in the country, and which has had the same design for a couple of years. The point is to show what we think these things should look like. As a designer, the last thing I’m interested in is criticizing the work of other designers. That isn’t the point here.

(3) We want to hear your thoughts. If you like it, say so. If you hate it, say so. If you have changes you’d like to see, say so. If you think we’ve missed something, say so. We intend to act on the feedback and come up with a revised version in the next few weeks that takes into account what you have to say. The goal of this is to start a conversation about what newspaper websites should look like.

The design process almost always happens behind closed doors. Let’s see what happens when we get lots of good feedback from cross section of smart people. Click here or on the image above to see the full view. You can read Todd’s explanation of the features presented here. Tell us what you think.

The DC Examiner has an article this morning about the use of blogs by Washington-DC based non-profits. The article highlights the blogging efforts of our client, the Washington Area Women’s Foundation, and features a quote from me as well.

I’m of the opinion blogging is a no brainer for non-profits:

• It’s inexpensive. You can get a basic blog for free. And it is really not that expensive to hire a professional (like us) to put together a custom blog for you and help you get the most out of it..
• It’s easy to do. Technology has gotten to the point where anyone with basic computer skills can post. So anyone in your organization can quickly write posts.
• It’s a great way to tell a story. Many non-profits are doing great work, but nobody knows about it. Blogging is a great way to share your triumphs and struggles with the world.  You’ll reach people you wouldn’t have reached otherwise.
• It’s a great way to raise money. If your blog is done well, people will read it and more people will learn about your organization. And if they believe in what you are doing, they’ll make donations.

The Society for New Communications Review hosted their Inaugural Symposium and Gala last Wednesday and Thursday in Boston. I attended and am happy to report that your favorite blog, The Bivings Report, won SNCR's coveted Award of Merit in the Business category ! It is a great feeling to be honored by one's peers, particularly on a team effort like our blog.

SNCR followed their awards and anniversary ceremony with a really interesting symposium on, you guessed it, new communications. Highlights, extremely biased my own by personal and professional interests, are below:

• Paul Gillin gave an interesting summary comparing blogs and social media to traditional media.

New media: Outsource everything, leverage free content, involve the community, go after niche markets, market virally, low overhead, few staff, new web creating a robust set of operating principles, little to no barriers to entry.

Old media: Large infrastructure, supported by very expensive advertising, increasingly relies on blogosphere for niche news content, broader markets, subjective editorial decision-making necessary, significant barriers to entry.

If you want to dive really deep into this sort of thing you might want to check out Paul Gillin's book, The New Influencers when it's published early next year. His study comparing new media to old, was quite compelling, and was the first time I had heard so many things that I've come to take for granted strung together in such a logical way.

• SNCR had a panel of executives from IBM, EDS and Novell discussing blogging a la corporate. Topics included policies and monitoring of employees blogging publicly, internal behind-the-firewall corporate blogging successes and policies, brainstorming via blogs, and public blogging in highly regulated environments. Of particular interest to me was the different ways in which blogs were being leveraged internally in organizations, and the new corporate challenges that blogs are giving corporate communications and PR professionals.
   
• I met with Ted Shelton, CEO of Personal Bee, and one of the sponsors of the event, who was kind enough to give me a personal presentation of his new news aggregator. It's got some great ideas — if you can imagine a categorized feed aggregator, where the categories are created and added to socially, with the results presented in a combination of tag clouds and meme-type groupings then you get the idea. The interface is really slick, and is one of the coolest news products I've seen lately. Anyone interested in RSS feeds or news aggregators should definitely check it out. We might have a review on that one for you soon so stay posted…
   
• A panel of university communications executives explained how they had all tried to leverage student blogging as a recruitment tool with varying degrees of success. While corporate communicators can hammer blogging policies home, this panel reported having a hard time dealing with the transparent nature of blogs and trying to keep the image of their university intact.

• There was a discussion on selling the idea of blogging to corporations and the challenges involved there.

• Finally, there was a discussion on the use of copyrighted music in podcasts and the legal implications of doing so. It seems that the jury is still out on this one, but if you podcast, I would strongly advise against using copyrighted work as part of your podcast without consent.

SNCR will be posting the individual panelist findings and the case studies of the other award winners if you're interested in reading more about them. I can't seem to find them online yet, but will post a brief entry when they're up. I had a great time and would strongly encourage other web communicators to check out their next symposium.

We've just published the second in a series of reports on media favorability in the Connecticut Senate race. The race isn't nearly as close as it was a couple of months ago, but come election day surprises are always plentiful! Even so, as a niche case study in media favorability on a major Senate race, we think it's probably one of only a handful out there. We used our ImpactWatch(TM) web platform to generate this report — those interested can obtain access to a demo showing the nuts and bolts of the system here.

Key findings in our second Connecticut Senate race report covering the period from October 1, 2006 to November 5, 2006:

• Campaign Tactics, a category we created for articles about overall strategies employed by the candidates, particularly advertising strategies, was the most written about subject with 18% of all articles.
• The subject most written about in the last reporting period, the war in Iraq, was written about in 16% of the articles in this reporting period.
• Overall, coverage for both Ned Lamont and Joe Lieberman was predominantly negative at 47 and 48% respectively.
• Local Connecticut publications favored Ned Lamont in the Campaign Tactics and Iraq War subject categories much moreso than national publications which tended to slightly favor Joe Lieberman.
• Poll results seem to directly affect the overall positive or negative media coverage of a particular candidate in a very significant manner.

To view the full report click here. We blogged about our previous report here.

The following graphs illustrate some of the trends in coverage available within the full report.

Lieberman Favorability Breakdown: 

Lamont Favorability Breakdown:

Lamont vs. Liberman Average Favorability: 

The Best of the Blogs (the BOBs) awards program has narrowed its 5,500 nominees down to 150 finalists in fifteen categories. As the result of some sort of oversight, our blog, The Bivings Report, is a finalist in the Best Corporate Blog category.

The BOBs gives out two different kinds of awards:

(1) The User Prize for each category is determined by user voting. You can vote here. Voting is open until November 11th and by voting you’ll be entered in a drawing to win an iPod.

(2) The Jury Prizes will be voted on by a panel of respected journalists and bloggers, including Lisa Stone of Blogher and Mark Glaser of Mediashift.

Anyway, I’d encourage you to check out the nominees and vote for your favorites (by favorites, I mean The Bivings Report). And while you’re at it, vote for Ze Frank in the Best Podcast category too.

As mentioned previously, we are currently running a demonstration of our ImpactWatch™ media monitoring platform that tracks mainstream media coverage of the Connecticut Senate Race.  As part of the demonstration, we have used ImpactWatch™ to create a report on media coverage of the race during the month of September.  This is the first in a series of reports we will release in the days leading up to the election.

Following are some of the reports key findings:

• Iraq was the subject of 20% of all stories written about this race, making it the most popular frequently mentioned topic.
• Overall, coverage of Ned Lamont was slightly more favorable than the coverage of Senator Joe Lieberman. 
• However, Senator Lieberman's coverage became more favorable as September went on due to the release of positive poll numbers at the end of the month.  During this same period, Mr. Lamont's coverage became more negative.
• Connecticut media had a larger proportion of positive articles written about Mr. Lamont and negative articles written about Sen. Lieberman than the national media.

The following graphs demonstrate some of the trends in coverage.

Subject Breakdown

Lamont vs. Lieberman Avg Favorability

You can view the full report here. 

If you are interested in learning more about ImpactWatch™, please sign up now for our free access to our demo on the CT Senate Race.