By Mark Buckshon
Publisher, Ontario Construction News
Ontario Construction News values editorial integrity — and appreciates the commercial value of positive editorial publicity.
These two statements don’t need to conflict; if readers are fairly informed that editorial content backed by advertising is sponsored.
We welcome your news releases and announcements. Our criteria for publishing them is simple. Is the news content likely to be of much greater value to readers at large than the organization seeking publicity?
In simple term, a planned future project or groundbreaking will be newsworthy because downstream suppliers and subtrades can work on the job, and the organizations already working will see future benefits. Completions are, well, old news.
(Topping off ceremonies present an interesting challenge. We’ll generally report them if we receive great graphics, solid detail, and not too much puff.)
Personnel or hiring announcements are almost always newsworthy primarily to the organization seeking publicity, so these need to be sponsored. However, if you decide you want to hire Michael Cohen (Donald Trump’s former lawyer) as your executive vice-president, let us know — we’ll publish the news. (However, whether that is a wise business decision is up to you.)
If you win an award or recognition, we’ll generally provide publicity if the organization sponsoring the award issues the news release – and all relevant award winners are recognized. Stand-alone coverage requires advertising support.
You can get some idea of our rules regarding free editorial coverage from this story I wrote for the Society for Professional Services (SMPS) Marketer Magazine. It may be helpful to you regardless of where you plan to pitch your news releases.
If you decide to sponsor your content with some advertising, we’ll do our best to make your paid message truly effective. We’re good at making sponsored announcements genuine, credible, and sincere, and will help you disseminate the news as widely a possible. Rates are quite reasonable.
If you wish, you can also become a contract advertiser/sponsor. In this situation, you can send us all the news releases and announcements you like, and we’ll publish them all — subject to minimal (but reasonable) editorial controls.
For more information about sponsored editorial publicity, contact Chase at chase@ontarioconstructionnews.comor phone him at (888) 627-8717 ext 212. You can send your news releases to Robin MacLennan at rmclennan@ontarioconstructionnews.com. Or you can reach me at buckshon@washingtonconstructionnews.com, phone (888) has 627-8717 ext 224.
