Bridging the Digital Skills Training Gap

An education serviceof the American Society ofBusiness Publication Editors

www.ASBPE.orgW ebinarW ebinar

American Society ofBusiness Publication Editors

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June 2010

for business-to-business editors

Bridging theDigitalSkillsTraining Gap


www.ASBPE.orgwww.ASBPE.orgW ebinarW ebinar

ResearchSponsors

American Society ofBusiness Publication Editors214 N. Hale St.Wheaton, IL 60187phone: (630) 510-4588fax: (630) [email protected]

Medill School/Northwestern University301 Fisk Hall1845 Sheridan RoadEvanston, IL 60208phone: (847) 467-1882www.medill.northwestern.edu/

MediaManagement CenterNorthwestern University304 Fisk Hall1845 Sheridan RoadEvanston, IL 60208phone: (847) 491-4900www.mediamanagementcenter.org

Speakers

Abe Peck, director of business-to-businesscommunication, professor emeritus inservice at the Medill School and seniordirector of the Media Management Center,Northwestern University; and a consultantin the B2B space.

Robin Sherman, associate director,American Society of Business PublicationEditors; principal, Editorial & DesignServices; and former corporate director ofeditorial development, Argus Business.

Mary Slepicka, group content director,Advanstar Communications PowersportsGroup; editorial director, DealernewsMagazine

Rita Jane Gabbett is executive editor ofMeatingplace.com, an online communityfor red meat and poultry processors inNorth America.


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� ASBPE/Medill Survey on Digital Skills and Strategies:Key findings — Abe Peck

� Ways to sell training to management — Robin Sherman

� Ideas for in-house training — Robin Sherman

� Where to get outside training — Robin Sherman

� Tales from the trenches — Mary Slepicka and Rita Jane Gabbett

� Mini-case studies — Abe Peck and Robin Sherman

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Whatwe’ll talk about



How adequate is the digital skills trainingprovided by your company?

Valid %

Very inadequate 36.3

Somewhatinadequate 31.9

Somewhatadequate 27.0

Very adequate 4.8

Total 100.0

Survey taken in November 2009



In the last 12 months, how much digital skillstraining have you received from your company?

Valid %

None 36.2

Less than one half-day 28.4

1 day total (8 hours) 16.4

2–3 days total (16–24 hours) 11.6

4–5 days total (25–40 hours) 5.6

> 2 weeks total (80 hours) 1.1

> 1 month total (81–160 hours) .7

Total 100.0

Survey taken in November 2009



How necessary are these strategiesin the next 12 months?Items rated on a 1 to 5 scale, with 1 being unnecessary and 5 being extremely necessary;

ranked by “rating average.”

Unnecessary Extremely Ratingnecessary average

Improving digital content, organization, design 0.8% 38.1% 3.96

Training in digital technologiesand online skills 1.2% 38.3% 3.94

Researching readers/advertisers 1.2% 29.9% 3.80

Resisting any loosening of editorial ethicsto maintain or increase revenue 17.1% 37.1% 3.49

Leveraging content between brands/titles 7.2% 23.0% 3.45

Redefining the skills necessaryfor current and new reporters, editors, artists 7.6% 22.5% 3.42

Being platform agnostic 8.0% 23.4% 3.32

Looking for new markets for content 8.3% 20.8% 3.29

Increasing editorial staff 15.4% 22.0% 3.22

Editorial responsibility for content marketing 14.8% 14.8% 2.96

Improving print content, organization, design 17.1% 8.7% 2.82

Training in business journalism skills 20.4% 11.6% 2.69

Moving from a largely print-firstto a largely digital-first orientation 27.6% 13.6% 2.60

Reorganizing or maintaining staffswithin broad, centralized content groupsrather than individual markets 45.0% 7.2% 2.12

Moving to digital-only 79.4% 2.8% 1.39

Downsizing editorial staff 90.3% 0.8% 1.15



B2B editors’ rating of theirpublisher’s knowledge or skill levelItems rated on a 1 to 5 scale, with 1 being poor and 4 being excellent;

ranked by “rating average.”

Poor Ratingaverage

Provides adequate amounts of training 48.1% 1.82

Really understands what it takesfor editors to run our digital media 31.4% 2.14

Provides adequate support and resources for editorial staff 27.3% 2.22

Stays current on trends about journalism 28.2% 2.30

Rewards innovation; rewards hard work by editors 29.8% 2.35

Takes steps to make the operationwork well across platforms 22.9% 2.38

Communicates strategies and decisions well;fosters collaboration among departments 22.1% 2.41

Attracts and retains the best employees 14.4% 2.54

Really understands what it takesfor editors to run our print media 22.1% 2.55

Has a clear vision and understanding of the futureof your brand and its content 13.6% 2.66

Stays current on trends about your marketand how to market content to it 8.9% 2.82

Is open to new ways of doing things;is not afraid to take some risks 10.2% 2.98

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How important are these activities to doingyour job successfully in the next 12 months?ranked by combination of “very important” and “extremely important”

Writing and editing Web content(e.g. headlines, articles, lists, category labels, use of keywords for search,navigation/links language, calls for action, instructions) 68.4%

Managing workflow/workload between Web and print 65.8%

Writing and editing e-newsletters(e.g. subject lines, headlines, articles, lists, category labels, keywords,navigation/links language, calls for action) 62.1%

Using a content management system 57.1%

Developing Internet and other digital content(and marketing) strategies 55.5%

Using Web analytics for editorial purposes; knowing what statsare useful to editors, how to use and interpret themto inform editorial content decisions 48.6%

Engaging/interacting with readers online 44.7%

Blogging(writing, posting, managing, marketing) 37.8%

Using, marketing, managing social media(e.g. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, forums) 37.2%

Developing, operating, moderating, marketing webinars 27.3%

Preparing quality images for the Internet 25.2%

Recording, shooting, editing audio/video 21.3%

Mining online databases 21.1%

Creating online slideshows or photo galleries 20.8%

Developing and implementingvirtual trade shows/conferences 17.6%

Coding HTML, CSS, XML 16.6%

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About training

� Ways to sell training to management

� Ideas for in-house organizational training

� Where to get outside training

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Ways to sell training tomanagement

� Can be inexpensive; create cost-effective budget for training

� Show the end result of training

� How it can better position you against your competition

� Get Production on your side

� Show how it might affect ROI; show how lack of training affects ROI

� Get HR on your side

� Get testimonials

� Current ideas not working

� Morale booster

� Easier and quicker to train existing staff in new technologies

� Provides marketing and sales with more ammunition

� People respect training — promote it to readers and advertisers

� Training is good time to reinforce corporate mission, strategies, tactics,standards, best practices

� Promotes more effective decisionmaking

� Promotes efficiencies

� Less disruption of work

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Ideas for in-house organizational training

� Set up training committee for internal workshops

� Pass-on training:Allow one staff member to get paid training, then train rest of staff

� Mentoring

� Bring in trainers/consultant

� Bring in vendors of hardware/software you use

� Job shadowing

� Purchase classroom-based course, e.g. Adobe in a Classroom

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Where to get outside training

National and local colleges

National and local professional and trade associations

User groups for most software

YouTube

Slideshare (e.g. conference sesion presentations, handouts)

CreativeProwww.creativepro.com/

TotalTraining.com

Lynda.com well rounded number of classes for print and digital

AdobeTVhttp://tv.adobe.com

HTML Goodieshttp://www.htmlgoodies.com/

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W3Schoolshttp://www.w3schools.com/

HTML Doghttp://htmldog.com/

Digital Tutorswww.digitaltutors.com

www.planetdigital.com/

Junta 24 content marketingwww.junta42.com/

min onlinewww.minonline.com

Poynterwww.poynter.org/training

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Institute for Interactive Journalism’s J-Lab and J-Learningwww.j-lab.org/www.j-learning.org/

MarketingSherpa “practical case studies and know-how”www.marketingsherpa.com/

Mequodawww.mequoda.com/

Sitepointwww.sitepoint.com/

O’Reillyhttp://oreilly.com/

eMedia Vitalshttp://emediavitals.com/

MediaBistro


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Books — how quaint

Magazines

SPJ’s Journalist’s Toolboxhttp://journaliststoolbox.org/

Govt grant for retraining

Knight Digital Media Center’s Web 2.0 Training for Journalists:http://multimedia.journalism.berkeley.edu/workshops/32/

Donald W. Reynolds Center for Business Journalism,businessjournalism.org

Knowledgewebb.net 30% discount

Calling colleagues who are already doing

Software “help” functions

Vendors

Google Internet marketing webinarsGoogle webmaster tools helpwww.google.com/support/webmasters/?hl=en




Inbound marketing, search marketing,Blogging for business, Social media marketing, Web site best practiceswww.useit.comwww.hubspot.comwww.webmarketing123.comwww.searchenginestrategies.comwww.seomoz.org/www.sreetips.com/www.emediastrategist.com/blog/http://bosacks.homestead.com/pmg1.html

Blogs/Web sites:Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox,Mashable,Problogger,Copyblogger,Social Media Examiner,Tech for Luddites,ASBPE National Blog,www.semanticweb.com/http://www.journalists.org/



In-house training:Mini-case studies

� Shore-Varrone, former B2B publisher, now part of Nielsen Business Media

� Argus, former B2B publisher, now part of Penton

� Engineering News-Record

� Another company-wide training program

As you now start to send in your questions. . .



With a little help fromour friends

� Bob LeBailly, researcher, Media Management Center

� Mary Nesbitt, associate dean, Medill School of Journalism

� RoyHarris, president, ASBPE Foundation;freelance writer; author, Pulitzer’s Gold: Behind the Prize for Public Service Journalism;former senior editor, CFO;former reporter,Wall Street Journal.

� Rob Freedman, vice president, ASBPE Foundation;senior editor, Realtor

� Warren Hersch, president, ASBPE;senior editor, National Underwriter Life & Health

� Martha Spizziri, Web editor, ASBPE;freelance writer/editor

� Doug Shore, Business-to-business media maven;former co-founder, chairman and co-CEO of Shore-Varrone, Inc.





Contact us

� Abe Peck, [email protected]

� Robin Sherman, [email protected]

� Rita Jane Gabbett, [email protected]

� Mary Slepicka, [email protected]

Download webinar slides at:

www.asbpe.org/

click on “webinar” button

Download full research report at:

www.asbpe.org/

www.mediamanagementcenter.org/

Send us your questions now.

Q&A

Send us your questions now.

Thank you.

