Hello!

Welcome to GMT's monthly e-newsletter for July, 2010. We send this e-newsletter on the first Monday of every month to members to share feature announcements, membership tips, links to recent articles from environmental reporters, new members, and other helpful resources.

Word Count: 1,883
Read Time: 8 minutes

In this issue you will find:
1. Member Connections
2. Be in the Know – How GMT Tools Can Help Your Group
3. Buzz from the Beat
4. Link(s) of the Month
5. Community Coverage- Newsroom Notes
6. GMT Welcomes 1 New Member
7. Support: Database Do’s and Don’ts
8. Opt out instructions

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. What’s Happening @theGMT: GMT hits the decade mark, Support contact update

GMT Hits the Decade Mark: That’s right, in May, GMT celebrated 10 years of working with an amazing group of members and clients. We thank you for your ongoing support as it is our members who help us succeed. We look forward to continued work together in the years to come!

On Wednesday, May 26th, we brought together members, clients, and friends to celebrate at the 18th Street Lounge in downtown D.C.

See Marty Kearns, Executive Director, and Bobbi Russell, Associate Director, comment on GMT’s 10 years of accomplishments. We have two live videos from the celebration.

Change in GMT Support Contacts:
On May 7th, GMT bid a big farewell to Michelle Kohn, Special Projects Manager. As we find and train a second support contact, please be in touch with Nina Schwartz for all media database questions. Nina can be reached at (202) 659 – 7710 x10.

Should Nina be unavailable during an urgent need, please reach the Vocus Support line at 1-866-675-2525.

Enter your Tagline in the 2010 Getting Attention Nonprofit Tagline Awards
The 2010 Getting Attention Nonprofit Tagline Awards program is accepting entries. Nonprofits and grantmakers can enter their taglines here. The deadline is July 28.

This is an excellent opportunity for GMT members to improve and gain recognition of their taglines. GMT members have successfully participated in previous Tagline Awards.

The description and submission details from Nancy Schwartz of GettingAttention.org are in our member center.

GMT Summer Hours
From now until the end of August, the Green Media Toolshed office closes at 2:00 p.m. Eastern each Friday. Please consider this schedule when submitting support requests.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Be in the Know - How GMT Tools Can Help Your Group: The Who, What, When, Where, and How of the most unknown feature in the media database

We’ve received several questions this month about what features are available to tag and find reporters who work on very specific topics. This is an excellent question because it draws our attention to a feature in the database that is critical to media contact tracking but we often can’t cover in depth during our introductory training.

While reporters are labeled by their respective beat codes (subjects), members are able to tag reporters who cover more specific topics, or who need to be identified by other information. For example, you can tag reporters who covered news from your organization and the date of coverage, or energy reporters who specifically covered the Gulf oil spill.

Tagging a reporter is equivalent to placing a note in their media database profile. We have directions in the Support Center on how to place and save a note. Then, when running an advanced search, you can type in your tag – or words you used in the note – into the Notes or Proprietary Pitching Profile criteria fields to locate your designated reporters.

So,

Who can be tagged?
Reporters or outlets. They can be tagged on specific topics or important reference information.

What do you tag them for?
Tag the reporter by topic, coverage, or other important information for by which you need to identify them. These are tags generated by you as a unique user, so if you have a team of people from your staff who use the media database, you should create a list of tags that you’ll use as an organization.

When?
Anytime - tagging will help build relationships with reporters and track who’s covering you.

Where can you place the tag?
In the Notes and Pitching Profile sections of each profile.

How do you place the tag and look up designated contacts?
Using a very simple edit process. See the steps in our Support Center.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Buzz from the Beat: The Changing Face of Freelance

The April 30th contribution to Vocus’ Media Moves Blog draws attention to how cutbacks at media outlets are changing the position of freelance writers and putting more marketing responsibilities on reporters who contribute content. Outlets who cut staff are now looking to freelance writers as a “free-er” source of labor, rather than as a reporter who contributes independent content.

“As freelance once entailed having the free-dom to choose what to write and for whom, freelancers left without any choices are now being equated with free labor,” write Rebecca Bredholt, Janelle Zara and Nicholas Testa. They give an example of how Business Insider reported earlier this month that Forbes Magazine fired half a dozen editorial staff and brought them back on a freelance basis.

In addition, as magazines trim their marketing department, they make the reporters more responsible for “both good reporting and getting the most clicks on their articles.” Reporters are now held accountable for the quality and marketing results of their work.

Read more information and commentary in the full article at: http://www.vocus.com/invocus/blogApril10.html#

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. Newsroom Notes: New Bloggers at The Hill and Senior Editor at New York Observer

The Hill welcomed bloggers Sara Jerome and Mike Lillis to their staff at the beginning of June. Sara Jerome, a former National Journal technology reporter, will cover “the intersection of policy and technology as a Hillicon Valley blogger.” Mike Lillis “will join the paper as a health care reporter and blogger.”

The Hill is published twice a week and reaches an approximate audience of 22,800.

Pitch The Hill at (202) 628-8500. www.hillnews.com

The New York Observer welcomes Christian Lorentzen as the new senior editor. Previously, Lorentzen was a contributing editor for Harper’s Magazine. The New York Observer is a weekly publication that reaches approximately 60,000 readers.

Pitch Lorentzen at (212) 755-2400. www.observer.com

Get more media updates on Vocus' Daily Media Moves blog.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. Links of the month: Staying Afloat in a Sea of Social Media: Better Manage and Monitor your Social Media with this Guide from Cision

This 5-page PDF from Cision gives excellent guidance on the more advanced steps for using social media in a marketing and advocacy campaign. It walks you through the four steps of prioritizing social media tools, targeting blogs, joining the conversation and engaging the audience, and analyzing the results.

The PDF is available in the GMT member center.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
5. We welcome 1 new member to our GMT community

ETC Group…or Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration… is dedicated to the conservation and sustainable advancement of cultural and ecological diversity and human rights. To this end, ETC Group supports socially responsible developments of technologies useful to the poor and marginalized and it addresses international governance issues and corporate power.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
6. Media Database Q & A: The Lightning List: How to Build a Media List in 30 minutes… (and avoid having to do it again)

Everyone is familiar with this situation:

A sudden media opportunity arises and you need a new, sure-fire media list as quickly as possible. Your current media lists are not quite built for this particular send. You rush to Vocus but are not quite sure where to start.

With minutes ticking away, it is tempting to run a list of reporters on your general beat code and hope that the most important are included in the crowd. Since this “umbrella” mode of attack often produces an overwhelming number of media contacts, we’d like to suggest a few steps from the opposite approach: to start small and add, rather than to start big and reduce.

1. Take 2 minutes to define your audience: In other words, what portion of the public are you trying to reach and where are they located? A few examples are lawmakers for new energy legislation; elementary teachers on the east coast.

2. Take 10 minutes to find a selection of media outlets that your target audience(s) read. To do this, go to the Media Outlet section of Vocus, open the Advanced Search, and select a few matches based on subject, geography, outlet type, and any other criteria that you feel most necessary.

3. Take 5 minutes to run your search and do a quick scan for duplicates and any outlets that can be removed by title.

4. Return to the Media Contacts section and click on the Coverage Wizard link (located in the minor blue navigation bar). The Coverage Wizard identifies the best contact at each of those media outlets according to your bead code priorities. Take 5 minutes to complete the two simple steps:

a. On the Outlet Page, select your Media Outlet list as the criteria.
b. On the Media Contact Page selection, select your three priority beat codes for reporters at these outlets.
c. The Coverage Wizard search will yield the best reporter at each of your media outlets according to these beat code priorities.

5. Use the final 8 minutes to review these media contacts and manually add, remove, and change them. You don’t need to worry about de-duping, because the Coverage Wizard will bring up only one contact at each outlet.

6. After this final review, you should have a decently targeted media list that is framed by both geography and topic. The total time was just 30 minutes.

While these steps offer a productive and efficient plan of action in an urgent situation, we also recommend that you build a few “master lists” that can be used as a resource when an urgent list is needed. A master list encompasses a broad range of good media contacts that can then be refined according to one’s needs at a particular time.

For example, you can keep a master media list on east coast oceans reporters that includes people of all topics of oceanography and conservation, and then filter the list to get a sub-list of marine conservation reporters, fisheries reporters, beach reporters, and more.

Need help with your lightning list? The GMT Support Team is ready to assist you at (202) 659-7710, x10.