In wonkworld and elsewhere, communicators are experimenting with long-form content. Lengthier essays, feature articles and thinkpieces are becoming another way of getting across the often complex messages we try to communicate. Of course, writing that goes over the 2,500-word limit…
Blog Archives
Long-form metrics: what to measure and how to measure it
Tagged with: digital communications, digital content, digital publishing, kings fund, longform, publications
Posted in Guidance
Posted in Guidance
Never mind the X Factor this is the So What Factor
Why we shouldn’t let them kill the policy brief like they did the press release.
Tagged with: business change, digital content, digital publishing, media, PDF, policy brief, policy briefs, research communications
Posted in Opinion
Posted in Opinion
Aviva’s recipe for twitter success
By Sue Winston and Hayley Sandford In any job, winning an award for something you enjoy doing has to be the equivalent of the cherry on the cake. In our case, that “cherry” was the CorpComms Digi Award for the…
Tagged with: awards, creativity, digital communications, digital content, social media
Posted in Uncategorized
Posted in Uncategorized
In defence of the PDF
The death of the PDF has become something of a WonkComms mantra of late. Any digital enthusiast trying to make the case to their more traditional colleagues to move away from the much-despised format will have circulated with glee the…
EVENT: Storytelling in Research Communications
Invitation to a ‘WonkComms Practicals’ webinar on 28 May 2014 ECDPM is pleased to announce the next WonkComms event, a ‘WonkComms Practical’ webinar, being broadcast and livestreamed on 28 May 2014 from 15.00-17.00 (Central European Time) on storytelling for research communications. Karen…
Find Policy: Why Institutional Websites And Search Still Matter
Find Policy targets the search specifically to policy research organizations, and thus can offer more rewarding results. Ideally we hope that we can contribute to more prominence of think tank research. It’s thus a complement to some of the issues discussed in WonkComms: in addition to highlighting particular research pieces, or the work of an institution, this search engine ideally helps make the work of the entire sector more accessible.
Tagged with: digital content, research, research communications, search, think tank, websites
Posted in Opinion
Posted in Opinion
Finding Home: How The Century Foundation Took Its First Small Step Beyond the PDF
Disclaimer: there’s nothing inherently wrong with PDFs. They work on pretty much any device, and for printing, they’re tough to beat. But PDFs on the web are a hack. They’re born of the web’s early days when putting something online…
Tagged with: digital communications, digital content, digital publishing, longform, publications, The Century Foundation, think tanks
Posted in Guidance
Posted in Guidance
Providing context: topic pages at research institutions
Although there are many other aspects to developing strong topic pages, in many ways topic pages are a means of providing context on topics. This opportunity is frequently missed by research organizations. Below I make five suggestions for providing better context to your research from topic pages. Note that although the focus (including the examples) is on think tanks, these recommendations apply to other research institutions as well.
Design Content for All Platforms, Not Just the Desktop
The web continues to fragment. Most observers estimate that the mobile web will overtake the desktop world sometime in the next 12 months. While visitors to think tanks may not be out on the leading edge of the tide, they’re assuredly…
