I’ve been a long-time reader of Digg.com, but just last week it dawned on me that it would be really great if there were a Digg-like site for technical communication. So I decided to create one. It’s called WriterRiver.com and it’s pretty much a Digg clone, except that the entire focus is on articles related to technical communicators.

Check it out by clicking the image below.

How It Works

When you read something interesting online, you can submit the article’s link to WriterRiver.com through the Submit a Story tab. Everything that looks like a post on WriterRiver.com is really just a link to an article online.

When you initially submit an article/story, it appears on the Upcoming Stories tab. As other readers check out the article and vote on it — by clicking the Float link — the vote count for that article increases.

Notice how the word “Floated” appears grayed out in the lower voting button? That’s because I already floated on the article.

When enough people float an article (in this case, when an article receives 5 floats), it automatically moves to the Front Page Stories tab, which is the main page. Conversely, if you dislike the article, you can decrease its votes by clicking Sink. (Float and sink tie in with the river metaphor. On Digg.com, you digg or bury stories.)

Filtering By Popularity

More floats make the article more visible, and fewer votes (or more sinks) make the article harder to find. In the upper-right corner of the site, you can sort the articles by popularity. You can see the most popular articles (the articles with the most votes) today, this week, this month, or this year.

Tip: Set your browser’s home page to show the Upcoming Stories or some other filter. It will help you keep up with the stream of articles.

Other Implications

A few days ago I wrote a post saying I wanted to try a new path. I was mostly referring to my podcast and how tired I was getting of the interview format. The creators of Digg have a companion podcast called Diggnation, in which they discuss the most dugg/voted stories on Digg.com. The format seems to work well — stories submitted to Digg provide endless discussion for the podcast. The Slashdot Review is also a popular podcast based on the top social news sites.

I think that staying updated with the news is one of main reasons people listen to podcasts. I hope to make my Tech Writer Voices podcast more like Diggnation, Slashdot Review, and This Week in Tech. (For this, I’ll need a couple of regular co-hosts, so if you’re interested, email me.)

Pligg: The Tool Behind the Scenes

After looking at the WriterRiver.com site, you might be wondering, Tom, where did you get all the time to create this site? Well, WriterRiver.com is made using Pligg, which is a Digg clone tool. Pligg powers such sites as meaname.com (Spanish version of Digg), Kirtsy (a female-focused Digg clone), and a host of other social news sites. Pligg is easy to install and fairly robust (although it could really use a heftier user manual).

Let Others Know

Like any social news site, WriterRiver’s success depends on how many people use it. In an effort to promote WriterRiver.com, please consider writing a post about it, relaying the announcement on any listserv you’re on, or adding a link to your sidebar. It’s also the kind of site that works well as a home page for your browser (for example, you could set your home page to show the Top Stories today). The more people who submit and vote, the better the content becomes.

The Metaphor Behind “WriterRiver”

Why the name WriterRiver? Dave Winer, the guy who invented RSS, has a metaphor about a “river of news” that I’m partly using. Imagine yourself sitting beside a river watching the driftwood, sticks, fish, brush, eddies, paper cups, toy boats, etc., float by. The river naturally provides a constant stream of new content that moves along in a mesmerizing way. At any time you can reach in and grab something, bring it to the surface (“float it”) so you can inspect it for a while, and then send it back down the river.

Results I’m Hoping for

I hope that WriterRiver.com moves the tech comm. blogosophere and other online formats forward. Through WriterRiver.com we’ll showcase the most engaging articles and posts that 300+ technical writers and bloggers are actively churning out. I have a bucketful of RSS feeds that I scan through each day, and I plan to highlight the good posts in a way that makes them easily findable by others.

I also think the aggregation of the most engaging posts or articles will prove the value of the blogosphere. Certainly the articles posted on WriterRiver.com don’t need to come from blogs, but I’m betting that a good majority will. When others begin to feel the power and addiction of a well-written blog post, it will motivate more writers to start blogs and to follow them. It will also allow new writers to more quickly find reader communities, and it will enable new readers to find engaging writers.

If you have any feedback about the site, I’d love to hear it. Mostly, I’d like to see you submit article links to content you find interesting, and vote on those articles you like.

Thanks for trying this out with me.

The panel is titled “Evangelizing, Proselytizing, and Preaching: Strategies for Marketing Yourself and Your Expertise To Others.” That’s a mouthful. In simpler terms, we’ll be talking about how to market yourself in a web 2.0 world.

At first I didn’t think I had much to say about this topic. After all, it has the M word in there (“marketing”), and the last thing I consider myself is any kind of marketer (disgusting) doing any kind of marketing (repulsive). But when I changed the terms a bit to “influencer” (while talking to Chris tonight), it made everything come into focus. And I suddenly realized that I’m the perfect person for this panel.

Since only a small selection of my readers can actually attend the panel (and because recording STC sessions is prohibited), I’ve posted my panel notes below.

1) How can an employee at a company that wants to move to XML structured authoring become the domain expert in the company? What marketing tactics might they use to position themselves as the expert in the field?

First, as I indicated earlier, I dislike the term marketing. I don’t think of myself as a “marketer” or as someone who is engaged in marketing. I prefer to think of myself as an influencer.

But how can you transform yourself from the lowly technical writer who sits in a cube all day to a domain expert? Or into key influencer on the project team?

First, you need to get a foot in the door. Let your project team know that, for the user documentation, you need to be kept in the loop of anything related to application functionality or the user interface. Make sure you insert yourself into the right meetings and get on the right email loops — under the guise of staying updated.

But instead of just absorbing information in these meetings or email threads, speak up and demonstrate your domain expertise by offering suggestions, analysis, and other insights into the problems the team is trying to solve. If you’re really a domain expert, it will show.

If you have access to a corporate blog (for example, a SharePoint blog or other space), use that and promote it as much as you can in your company. Share your domain knowledge through this publishing space. The more information you share, the more others will see you as the go-to person for information on this topic.

But even if you don’t have aspirations to become a domain expert, you can still transform from tech writer to key project influencer by becoming a user expert. Your largest leverage point is your knowledge of users. The more you know about your users — their complaints, the features they want, the feedback they’re giving, their profiles and habits — the more influence you have on product design. User knowledge transforms you into a key influencer on the product team.

Without this knowledge of your users, you’re only an absorber of information. But if you’re dripping with user knowledge, it can make you one of the most valuable players on the team. Many of the priorities that developers work on for the products I document are priorities based on the user feedback I’ve given them (much of which I gathered while giving training and interacting with users). The project team often turns to me and asks what the users want or what they’re saying about such and such feature. I love that focus.

2) What can an employee of a company do outside of their company firewall to promote themselves as an expert — and why would this matter to others with whom they work?

Outside of a company, you have access to a TON of web 2.0 tools — blogs, twitter, video, Flickr, Second Life, and more. But before you jump into these tools, you have to think about your purposes and the audience you’re trying to win over.

Your web 2.0 endeavors won’t do much good if they don’t reach your audience. Is your audience other technical writers? Great. Is it companies looking to hire contract technical writers? Fine. If you’re trying to market yourself, your content needs to attract that audience.

Once you establish the audience and the content that appeals to them, you need to pump out valuable information in a prolific way. For example, you don’t increase your visibility by blogging once a week or even twice a week. If you’re planning to really crank up your visibility and promote yourself as an expert, blog as much as you can (e.g., daily) about the topic you want to promote yourself as an expert in.

Blogging prolifically comes naturally if you’re 100% engaged in what you’re passionate about. If you’re trying to promote yourself as an expert in XML, immerse yourself in journal articles, books, other blogs, podcasts, email lists, and any other content on XML. Write about what you’re reading. Reflect, analyze, and apply your knowledge.

You’ll have plenty to blog about, and the more you blog about the topic, the more you’ll teach Google to find you in search results. Those searching for information on that topic will naturally be drawn to you, recognizing you as an expert and potentially hiring you. You will saturate Google.

One key technique to increasing your visibility is to search-engine-optimize your posts. People find you through keyword searches in Google. I didn’t really believe this until I started watching my readers via Woopra. 65% of my visitors find me through Google. Those posts I’ve purposely optimized rise to the top. Stack your keywords at the beginning of your title and at the beginning of the first paragraph. Think like a searcher and the keywords will naturally come to you.

3) What things can a technical communicator do who wants to prepare themselves to leave their employer and become a consultant or self-employed?

If you want to leave your employer and become self-employed, I think you have to do more than simply blog. You have to do something that catches the attention of your audience in a major way. One web design company does this extremely well: Headscape. Paul Boag and his colleague Marcus Lillington have a popular podcast called Boagworld.com that has thousands of listeners. It’s a marketing vehicle that promotes their company (Headscape) by branding them as experts and attracting new clients.

Even my little podcast, Tech Writer Voices, has made a sizable impact on the technical writing community for me. It has allowed me to make connections with hundreds of people. Each week about a 700 people download podcasts I’ve recorded. In May I had 4,000 downloads. That’s a lot of reach, and it’s a reach that’s more personal and powerful than merely writing a blog. Wherever I go at this conference — each hall, room, or back alley — I run into someone I know through either my blog, podcast, or Twitter.

Still, despite the effectiveness of my podcast, if I wanted to increase my reach, I could make it a lot more informative. I could make it entertaining, like This American Life. Ira Glass interweaves interviews with an in-depth exploration of a theme.

I could prepare all the content myself and relay it like Jason Van Orden does with the Podcasting Underground. His podcast on podcasting helped him promote himself as the go-to guy for podcasting. He wrote a book, created a course, and provided other peripherals.

Or I could focus the podcast on a topic that there’s not too much info about (e.g., DITA, or breaking into technical writing). I could provide insights, tips, and tricks on this topic on a weekly basis, and then promote peripherals through the podcast — a book, course, CDS, and consulting services.

Another approach to increase your reach is to do a roundtable similar to Leo Laporte’s This Week in Tech, which presents and discusses the latest tech news. This roundtable format works exceptionally well. About four guys go on Skype and discuss the latest tech news. If you have some disagreement, it makes for a really engaging, entertaining show. If you were to create the same show on a topic you’re trying to promote yourself as an expert in, it would brand you as an expert.

Conclusion

Any time you provide a lot of valuable information, you’re going to attract an audience. And you can sell that audience something. The cool thing about blogs, podcasts, and other Web 2.0 marketing vehicles is that it isn’t conscious marketing. You’re unconsciously marketing yourself, building networks, and increasing your potential client reach — all without really thinking you’re doing any of it.