vendor as publisher

Check out Cisco’s newly launched content site, “The Network.” If you've got a seven-figure budget, this is how it's done. The site showcases how much engagement a given item has generated. Readers can easily share content on Twitter and Facebook and embed a widget into their web site. Among the site's many freelance contributors are names you know: Bill Bulkeley. Betsy Corcoran. Marc Gunther. Steve Wildstrom. Herding these cats is former Forbes.com editor Wendy Tanaka. Cisco even has three IT pros dedicated to the site's infrastructure.

With all this, what does success look like?

What do Bill Bulkeley, Betsy Corcoran, John Dodge and Marc Gunther have in common?

These veteran business journalists all have turned up as freelance writers for Cisco.

Embarking on his third year at the helm of Technologizer, Harry McCracken will take us behind the scenes at one of the industry's most successful tech blogs. As successful as he is, Harry remains approachable, but his success raises the bar for tech PR pros. Here are the latest keys to pitching paydirt.

Here is the latest subscriber-only feed from @SWMSTweet:

A collection of vendor media examples and news.

 eWeek at long last has launched "eWeek Labs," a community web site that lets users, vendors and PR pros submit content for publication. Any "enterprise" product is fair game -- but what exactly is an enterprise product these days? Could be about anything, right? Join us Mar. 30 as Ziff Davis Enterprise's Debra Donston and Jason Brooks describe how it all works and how PR pros can get visibility for their clients.  

IDG edit. dir. John Gallant: Social media drives between 10%- 25% of IDG's enterprise site traffic. IDG's home pages (IW.com, CW.com) get more traffic than its other pages.

The era of "vendor-as-publisher" is here. The trick: finding vendors who grasp publishing's editorial values: clarity, credibility, service.

Got 2 min. to see some good vendor content? It's a primer on botnets -- funny, smart, with a call to action. http://bit.ly/bkfE7h 

An off-the-record response from a trade reporter to yesterday's SWMS Alert on the true costs of journo ethics lapses.

SWMSTweet from the week of 2/7/09