Webinars Bring Product Information Any Time Or Place
By Shawn Zuver, editorial/content director
In April of 2007, my partners and I started working to put together a website for the metal construction industry that launched that July as DesignandBuildwithMetal.com. Soon afterward, we kicked off a weekly email newsletter and followed up the next year with monthly ezines.
Now in 2011, we’re responding to the increasing need for online education with our introduction of free online webinars. Covering a wide range of topics concerning metal design and construction, the DesignandBuildwithMetal Webinars will allow architects the opportunity to earn AIA CEU credits, without leaving their offices, in a live webinar environment or by viewing archived program with interactive test modules. To ensure that everything will be conducted in a smooth, professional manner, the webinars will be moderated by Scott Kriner, LEED AP, and president of Green Metal Consulting Inc., one of the most knowledgeable and experienced speakers in our industry.
As I mentioned in my recent column that discussed our 1 million visit milestone on DesignandBuildwithMetal.com, we’ve been pleasantly surprised by how quickly the architectural and construction communities have migrated to the internet for information. This trend is reflective of what’s happening with most facets of electronic media. For example, I read recently that e-books have taken over substantial market share from traditional paper books, with e-book sales expected to go from $1 billion in 2010 to $2.5 billion by 2015. That information came from a Wall Street Journal article titled The Year Ahead for Media: Digital or Die, and it probably won’t be a surprise that I read it online from a January 4, 2011, posting.
Just as the Pony Express and telegraph were usurped by new technology, apparently so have most forms of print media for an ever-increasing amount of people around the world. As my partners and I look back to where we started our careers – two in newspapers and one in telephone directory sales – we find that those industries have been especially hard hit; meanwhile, our next step – trade magazine publishing – has also recorded many casualties.
There's also no doubt that the way people use electronic media continues to change. When we started our business four years ago, many people were still using flip phones with those small antennas that were particularly uncomfortable when carried in a pocket. Like seemingly everyone else in the world - we’ve since evolved to touchscreen smart phones with internet access, email, texting and countless apps that allow us to perform a breathtaking range of tasks. Notebooks are nearly as robust as desktop computers while netbooks fill a lower end of that realm, and electronic tablets are carving out a niche for those wanting a level of portability in between smartphones and notebooks.
A few years ago, a great deal of concentration was placed on search engine traffic, but that online market is gradually being caught up to by display advertising as more users adapt to the world of expansive (and archived) online content and its accompanying advertisements. According to David Hallerman, analyst with eMarketer, spending for online display advertising will outpace search advertising over the next four to five years. While he expects both categories to rise, he sees display advertising jumping from $8.88 billion to $15.92 billion as search expenditures will continue to be a larger share but will see slower upward movement from $12.37 billion to $18.84 billion.
It’s also been fascinating to watch the emergence, and rapid evolution, of electronic social networks. Coupled with existing technologies like email and text messaging, it’s little wonder that the use of the postal service has dropped significantly and is leading to a reshaping of the entire business model.
Even watching television is stepping away from modes of the past. Far beyond the obvious digital video recording (dvr) use, I’ve seen many reports of drops in the number of people who watch television shows on their television, instead opting to stream their favorite programming on laptops, tablets and smartphones. I’d expect that even George Orwell would be impressed.
Where does all of this leave us? At DesignandBuildwithMetal.com, we’ve continued to adapt to the changes while maintaining our focus on bringing the news and benefits of the metal construction marketplace to a worldwide audience. Our website has undergone significant design and structural changes over the past 12 months, with more to be unveiled during the upcoming year – and frankly we don’t see a slowdown to those changes anytime in the future. We’ve also begun daily postings to our Facebook and Twitter accounts, to offer immediate access to information that's posted on our website and in our weekly email newsletter and monthly ezines.
And let’s not forget those webinars. They’ll be starting within the next few months. Don’t worry about remembering, we’ll be sure to give you plenty of notice on our website, in the weekly newsletters and through social media.
Where does it go from here? Four years ago we had absolutely no idea of how expansive electronic media's reach would become and how essential it would be in the world's minute-to-minute culture. With that as a backdrop, it’s hard to imagine what the next few years will hold, but it’s certain that technology won’t stand still.
Shawn Zuver is editorial/content director for DesignandBuildwithMetal.com. He has been covering the metal construction industry, including residential and non-residential construction, since 1985. To contact Shawn, call (419) 581-2051 or email shawnz@designandbuildwithmetal.com.
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