Though Burrell uses never names it as such (a “web version” of “customer publishing” is the closest he comes to labeling the trend), it’s clear from his opening that he’s talking about content marketing: “Get used to it. The big publishers of the future may no longer be the news organisations of old but companies that want to sell you stuff: shoes, gadgets, holidays. Companies that have a story to tell and the money to get it told.&#. journalists moving into content marketing ) is more than theoretical. Melissa Dick, digital editorial director of Elle UK to Asos. MORE >>

If I were still an On24 customer (I last worked with them three years ago) I would be very excited about this new platform. It’s no doubt priced at a level that puts it out of reach for smaller companies, but it may well set a standard for integration and ease of use that will spread to other platforms. In one of the earliest posts on this blog I complained about the lack of social-media awareness and interactivity in most B2B webcasts. haven’t seen much improvement in the intervening 18 months—until today. The new platform offers a number of ways around that deadly problem. MORE >>

think this sums up an approach that all media companies need to employ. Over time one of those revenue streams might rise to be dominant, but during my whole career in B2B media the most successful brands I have worked on have made money in many diverse ways—whatever the customer needs. The main metric we will be monitoring in the initial phase is the level of customer registration on our sites. We plan to offer a lot of value for free but will exchange value-add services for customer demographics. Rory Brown. This makes UK-based Briefing Media Ltd. Neil Thackray. MORE >>

As Paul Conley has argued , the result is an “excellence craze”: “In B2B, where I make my living, it seems like every company in every tiny niche of every industry has become a content creator. This is alien thinking for traditional B2B content producers, notes Conley: “Both trade publishers and custom publishers have seldom felt the need to be great. It has the look of two trends hurtling toward a head-on collision. Content is getting ever cheaper, but to be effective, content has to get ever better. Was hoping to eat in 2011.”. And that means the price falls.  MORE >>

Now the company’s IDG Enterprise unit has announced it will dive into content marketing. It’s a big step beyond traditional custom publishing, which is nothing new for IDG. In that old model, the publisher is essentially saying to its customers, “You know nothing about publishing. As one of the few acknowledged leaders and innovators in B2B publishing, IDG seems always to know when to act on industry trends. The publisher of titles like Computerworld and CIO was a pioneer in China and Web-first publishing. Let us do it for you.”. Here’s how.”. MORE >>