A contributor network (or contributor platform) is an arrangement in which an online publication releases articles authored by freelance writers, known as contributors, who are not part of its staff. Depending on the program, contributors may be paid or unpaid; paid contributors are typically compensated based on the volume of articles they produce or the amount of web traffic their articles generate. [1] [2]
Online publications use contributor networks to inexpensively expand their content selection. Because contributors are freelancers, publications can increase or decrease the number of contributors in their networks more easily than they can hire or fire employees. Some publications that use the contributor model exercise limited editorial oversight. For example, online articles written by Forbes contributors are not reviewed by editors prior to publication. [2]
Contributor networks are vulnerable to conflicts of interest. [2] Public relations agents and marketing companies have advertised their clients by submitting promotional articles to the contributor networks of Entrepreneur , Fast Company , Forbes, HuffPost , Inc. , Insider , and Mashable. [3] [4] [5] [6]
Forbes is an American business magazine founded by B.C. Forbes in 1917 and owned by Hong Kong-based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairperson and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes, and its CEO is Mike Federle. It is based in Jersey City, New Jersey. Competitors in the national business magazine category include Fortune and Bloomberg Businessweek.
Reputation management, originally a public relations term, refers to the influencing, controlling, enhancing, or concealing of an individual's or group's reputation. The growth of the internet and social media led to growth of reputation management companies, with search results as a core part of a client's reputation. Online reputation management, sometimes abbreviated as ORM, focuses on the management of product and service search engine results.
Earned media is content relating to a person or organization, which is published by a third party without any form of payment to the publisher. It includes articles by media outlets, interviews with the person or representatives of the organization, or bylined editorials in trade press and other publications. It may also include social media sharing, unpaid mentions by podcast hosts and guests, or word-of-mouth marketing.
User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), is generally any form of content, such as images, videos, text, testimonials, and audio, that has been posted by users on online content aggregation platforms such as social media, discussion forums and wikis. It is a product consumers create to disseminate information about online products or the firms that market them.
Shutterstock, Inc. is an American provider of stock photography, stock footage, stock music, and editing tools; it is headquartered in New York. Founded in 2003 by programmer and photographer Jon Oringer, Shutterstock maintains a library of around 200 million royalty-free stock photos, vector graphics, and illustrations, with around 10 million video clips and music tracks available for licensing. Originally a subscription site only, Shutterstock expanded beyond subscriptions into a la carte pricing in 2008. It has been publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange since 2012.
Kate Bohner is an American journalist and author. She was a correspondent for CNBC, associate editor for Forbes magazine, and co-author of Trump: The Art of the Comeback with Donald Trump. Bohner has also been a vlogger, investment banker, and businessperson.
Digital marketing is the component of marketing that uses the Internet and online-based digital technologies such as desktop computers, mobile phones, and other digital media and platforms to promote products and services. Its development during the 1990s and 2000s changed the way brands and businesses use technology for marketing. As digital platforms became increasingly incorporated into marketing plans and everyday life, and as people increasingly used digital devices instead of visiting physical shops, digital marketing campaigns have become prevalent, employing combinations of search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), content marketing, influencer marketing, content automation, campaign marketing, data-driven marketing, e-commerce marketing, social media marketing, social media optimization, e-mail direct marketing, display advertising, e-books, and optical disks and games have become commonplace. Digital marketing extends to non-Internet channels that provide digital media, such as television, mobile phones, callbacks, and on-hold mobile ringtones. The extension to non-Internet channels differentiates digital marketing from online marketing.
Upwork Global Inc., formerly Elance-oDesk, is an American freelancing platform headquartered in Santa Clara and San Francisco, California. The company was formed in 2013 as Elance-oDesk, after the merger of Elance Inc. and oDesk Corp. The merged company was subsequently rebranded to Upwork in 2015.
Leaf Group, formerly Demand Media Inc, is an American content company that operates online brands including eHow, livestrong.com, and marketplace brands Saatchi Art and Society6. The company also provides social media platforms to existing large company websites and distributes content bundled with social media tools to outlets around the web.
True/Slant (T/S) was an original content news network. It was based in a loft in SoHo in New York City funded with $3 million in capital by Forbes Media and Fuse Capital. It was acquired by Forbes in May 2010.
Vox Media, Inc. is an American mass media company founded in Washington, D.C. with operational headquarters in Lower Manhattan, New York City. The company was established in November 2011 by CEO Jim Bankoff and Trei Brundrett to encompass SB Nation and The Verge. Bankoff had been the CEO for SB Nation since 2009.
Bright Market, LLC, dba FastSpring, is a software as a service (SaaS) company that offers a full service e-commerce platform for companies that sell software and other online digital products.
Native advertising, also called sponsored content, partner content, and branded journalism, is a type of paid advertising that appears in the style and format of the content near the advertisement's placement. It manifests as a post, image, video, article or editorial piece of content. In some cases it functions like an advertorial. The word native refers to this coherence of the content with the other media that appear on the platform.
Jon Bond is an advertising executive, author and entrepreneur in New York City.
Odyssey is an American internet media company that operates based on a crowdsourced model, receiving articles from a base of thousands of volunteer authors and edited through their teams of volunteer, outsourced, and professional content strategists. The platform produces material covering topics such as politics, sports, fashion, technology, entertainment, business, science, and health.
Brent Freeman is a serial entrepreneur who's passionate about using business to generate both financial returns and social impact at the same time. He is an American digital entrepreneur, startup advisor, contributor at Entrepreneur.com and INC.com, Entrepreneur in Residence at early stage venture capital firm Crosscut Ventures in Los Angeles, and Founder / President of Stealth Venture Labs. While still an undergraduate at the University of Southern California, Brent launched a commodities trading firm with offices in Dubai and Los Angeles.
The Information, legally the Lessin Media Company, is an American technology industry–focused business publication headquartered in San Francisco. Founded in 2013 by journalist Jessica Lessin, the publication publishes content behind a paywall that allows subscribers access to the site and access to global networking events. Lessin has stated that she aims to "build the next Wall Street Journal over the next 50 years" with the publication.
Kai Falkenberg is an American lawyer, law professor and media executive, currently the general counsel at G/O Media. Previously, she served as Acting Commissioner and First Deputy Commissioner of the Mayor's Office of Media & Entertainment in New York City and was the editorial counsel at Forbes and a media and entertainment lawyer in private practice. She is a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School where she created and teaches the nation's first class on the Law and Regulation of Social Media.
Brian Timpone is an American conservative businessman and former journalist who operates a network of nearly 1,300 conservative local news websites. In 2012, Timpone stated that articles on his websites are partially written by freelancers outside of the United States, although he described the writing as "domestic" in a separate interview. According to The New York Times, Timpone's "operation is rooted in deception, eschewing hallmarks of news reporting like fairness and transparency." His sites publish articles for pay from outside groups, and do not disclose it.
Amanda Claire Cassatt is an American entrepreneur, marketing executive and author. She was also the chief marketing officer at ConsenSys from 2016 until July 2019. Cassatt is the founder and CEO of Serotonin, a Web3 services company.
