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Getting Back to Business
Subject Line: Getting Back to Business
The Write Market Release
Vol. 3. Issue 5
Getting Back to Business
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CONTENTS IN THIS ISSUE
1. Editor's Remarks
2. Donations and Help
3. How to Build an Online Media Kit - Part I:
Elements of a Media Kit
4. Scumbags Highjack your Websites by Jim Wilson
5. What's New at The Write Market
6. Get Your Ad in TWM's Release!
7. Administrative Information
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EDITOR'S REMARKS
Hello Everyone,
Our thoughts go out to the victims of the Sept. 11th
terrorist attack.
Terry (my partner) and I are both located on the US
east coast. Terry lives an hour from Washington, DC.
I live near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Terry and I consider
ourselves to be lucky; our friends and family members are
all safe.
This month, we are tackling a new subject:
How to Build a Media Kit.
Last month, I said that our new tutorial would
be, "How to write and distribute a press release."
Instead, I decided to broaden the topic.
However, I won't let you down, we will still cover
press releases within the media kit tutorial.
If you're a new subscriber, each month we present
one installment of the tutorial. Each tutorial lasts
about 6 months. By subscribing, you get advanced
copies of the tutorials. They are also published on
the web. The new tutorial will be located here:
http://www.thewritemarket.com/tutorials.shtml
I also want to make you aware of an insidious disease
that is spreading on the internet called "scumware."
Basically, scumware are programs that change the
content of your web site without your permission.
If you've already heard the rants on scumware, you
can ignore our last article. If you do not know
anything about it and you own a web site, read the
article.
Write on,
Renee Kennedy
rkennedy@thewritemarket.com
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DONATIONS AND HELP
This article is dedicated to helping the victims and families
of the terrorist attacks.
Remember, if you haven't heard of the organization and you aren't
sure if they are legitimate, please find elsewhere to contribute.
There are many scams that will happily take your money. The
following are not scams:
Red Cross - To Donate by Phone: 1-800-HELP-NOW
Red Cross - To Give Blood: 1-800-GIVE-LIFE
Donate To The Red Cross Online:
http://www.redcross.org/donate/donate.html
The New York Firefighters 9-11 Disaster Relief Fund:
http://www.firedonations.com
Additional Charities: http://www.libertyunite.com
More Ways To Volunteer & Help:
http://www.libertyunite.com/more_ways.adp
Resources For Coping, Parents, Teachers, & Charities:
http://www.helping.com
Go to this site to learn more about hoaxes that surround
the Sept 11th tragedy:
http://www.urbanlegends.about.com/
Computer virus myths:
http://www.vmyths.com/
Help for viruses:
http://www.sarc.com/
http://vil.mcafee.com/
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ELEMENTS OF A MEDIA KIT
Your media kit or press kit contains information about your
business. It will allow you to give others valuable insights into your
business. You should have both an online media kit (if you have a
web site) and an offline media kit. The media kit should be an
integral part of your marketing plan and continually updated and
developed.
The online media kit may contain the same basic information
as an offline kit. Your online media kit will be seen and used by
more than just the press. It may be read by potential clients and
customers. Therefore, it is important that you write it in a
"web-friendly" format. This includes using the general writing
strategies outlined in this article:
http://www.thewritemarket.com/promotion/writestrategies.htm
To see an example of a media kit visit:
http://www.thewritemarket.com/about.shtml
This online media kit is short and to the point. Throughout this
tutorial we will give you several options for elements
of your media kit. You may need to include all of the
elements, you may choose to include only a select
few, depending on the particular needs of your business.
Elements:
1. Table of Contents:
The Table of Contents will organize your media kit. For an
online kit, you will provide links to all of the elements and a brief
explanation of each page. For an offline kit, the Table of Contents
will help the media quickly find the information that they need.
2. Backgrounder:
The Backgrounder will be a description of specific products
or services. You may also need a backgrounder for your company,
as a whole. For a product it may include what has been done in
your field before you came along, the problems your field has
encountered, and your resolution to those problems. A company
Backgrounder will include where you're located, when your company
was created, the functions of your company, information about your
products/services, and information about your industry.
3. History:
Your history will include how your business started, where you're
at and where you're going. You can get very creative with your
history. You may even choose to write it in a story-telling format -
including such details as what prompted you to start your own
business.
4. The People Behind Your Business:
Include pictures and biographies of the people that run your
business.
5. Projects, Clients, Partners and/or Works:
This option is for businesses that have associations, partners
and/or clients. Also, if you are in a field where you can present
your work (i.e. writing, art, design, etc.), in your online kit,
you might include links to your work. In your offline kit, you
may present examples of your work or list your partners,
associates or current clients.
6. Testimonials:
Testimonials are gathered from happy customers. Include their
name, their title and company (if applicable) and what they said
about you. Gathering testimonials is an ongoing process.
Whenever something nice is said about your business, save it
and ask permission to use it.
7. Press Releases:
Press releases are short explanations of what's new at your
company. They are sent out to the media. In future issues,
we'll give you several sites where you can send your release
and a format of how to write a press release.
8. Sample News Story:
A sample news story is a story that you write or have written
about your business. It should contain current, newsworthy information.
9. Articles by Other Sources:
Find every reference to your business by other sites and news
sources that you can. Include either the full story (printed) or a
brief write-up and links to the full story (online).
10. Contact Information:
Include all the ways that the media or customers may contact you -
email, physical address, phone, and fax.
Throughout the next few months we will cover each of these
elements in detail. We will tell you exactly how you can write
the elements of your media kit.
Next month we will cover the Backgrounder and give
examples.
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SPONSOR MESSAGE
Need help getting your foot in the door of the Search Engines?
Try our e-book that teaches you how to optimize for the Engines:
Search Engine Placement and Optimization
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SCUMBAGS HIJACK YOUR WEB SITES
by Jim Wilson
"Imagine how powerful it could be to widen the effectiveness
of search engine keyword advertising to the entire Web. This
will enable you to reach millions of qualified users from every
web page that contextually matches your campaign objective
and your product or service keywords, anywhere on the Web."
- eZula.com
eZula is a new Pay Per Click service and they have partnered
with you to drive visitors away from your web site. You don't
get to choose about participating and the only reward you will
get is.. well, actually you don't get diddly.
You do get something, but I can't say what in polite company.
They get to sell targeted traffic based on the content of every
web page in the world without having to resort to developing
any content, running a PPC search engine, or actually doing
much of anything. Sounds like the Web to me.
Currently, TopText only works with the Microsoft Internet
Explorer browser.
To back up a bit before continuing to vent my anger over
this issue, the story goes something like this:
There is a new file sharing system launched in the wake
of the MP3 sharing/stealing war, and the new system is
called KaZaa. You download it, install it and get right back
to sharing bootleg music files. KaZaa claims that almost 6
million people have downloaded and installed its system.
Unfortunately when you install KaZaa you also get at least
one virus installed on your computer. I call it a virus because
by most descriptions I've seen of the term, TopText qualifies
as a virus. You don't ask for it. It takes control of your browser
and makes changes to everything you read on the Internet.
TopText operates with a browser to highlight words on every
web page, inserting a yellow background behind keywords
that have been purchased through their media sales company
eZula, Inc. If a web user clicks on one of those yellow
highlighted words on a web page, the user is whisked away to
the site of the company paying the most that day for each
click-through. If a user whose browser is infected with
TopText visits your web site, they will be offered links to
competitor's web sites for every keyword they find on your site
for which they have a buyer.
This is not much, if any, different from the Smart Tags system
that Microsoft announced for their Windows XP browser. Media
and webmaster pressure and outrage caused Microsoft to cancel,
for now, their release of that feature.
This new invasion of our web sites is different because the media
appears to care not at all. Where is their righteous indignation now?
I'll tell you. nowhere. Talking about a bunch of companies nobody
has ever heard of is not glitzy enough compared to attacking Microsoft.
So, if this misuse of technology is to be beaten, you are going to have to
do it.
Word was that you can send your list of sites to
mailto:support@ezula.com and they would block their virus from
operating on your pages. That turns out to be untrue but phone calls to
eZula are showing some results. If all of you call in your list and follow
up
every day until they block it, you could probably show them a little
something about how webmasters feel about companies infringing on
their intellectual property rights.
Respected download web sites such as C/NET's Download.com are
actively helping this virus to spread on an unsuspecting world. I wonder
why they would distribute something that would place links to competitor
sites on their own web pages? After repeated attempts to enlist their
help in stopping the spread of this virus, C/NET continues to defend
their position of aiding the spread of this unethical program. Must really
need the banner impressions.
EZula claims that they have a relationship with a major ISP which
should come as no surprise keeping in mind how many ISPs are
starving for income.
The MP3 file sharing software allows anyone to share files for free.
Free is the only model that works for that whole industry. People don't
want to pay when they can get valuable content for free. So KaZaa
had to find somewhere that they could generate profits without have
to work at it. So they chose my web site and yours. If they can steal
our traffic and sell it to our competitors, that should be profitable,
right?
Sure it is. They can get (currently) from $.30 to $1.00 for every click
through and they don't have to share with anyone. Does anyone else
see the irony in this? It shouldn't come as a great surprise that a
company built on the premise that everyone should be able to get
free music and cut the musicians totally out of the system would turn
to another way of stealing content and do it in a way that cuts the
content developers total out of the system.
Why pay to advertise on my web site when you can pay these
bozos to hack into my content and send you some cheap, stolen traffic.
To add insult to injury, they deface my sites with their ugly yellow
background colors.
Maybe TopText is both a virus and a hacker at the same time.
Hackers find ways to change the content of your web pages. TopText
does it by infecting Net user's computers.
Hacus? VirCker? Scumbag?
To find out how to get rid of this stuff from your sites and how
learn more about it visit:
http://www.scumware.com
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WHAT'S NEW AT THE WRITE MARKET
Branding tutorial:
http://www.thewritemarket.com/branding.shtml
We've added a new section to Articles called Media Kits:
http://www.thewritemarket.com/articledir/media.htm
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GET YOUR AD IN THIS EZINE
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webmaster@thewritemarket.com
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