Welcome to PR Vibes™, created by Calysto Communications to provide you with key insights into the publications and events in the telecommunications industry. Today, we’re featuring a short interview with Monica Alleven, editor-in-chief of Wireless Week, which provides intelligent and in-depth information addressing the people, companies, technologies and ideas that are transforming the wireless industry.
To help you better understand Wireless Week’s focus this year and in the future, we asked Monica to share some of her insights on the publication and on the future of wireless telecommunications in general. Enjoy!
What is the editorial mission of the publication, and how has it evolved?
From the beginning, Wireless Week’s mission has been to cover broad aspects of the wireless industry, including business, regulatory and technology. Those three are all connected, and that remains the case today. We try to make sense of what’s going on and deliver that information in a way that’s useful to our readers, whether it be via news, features or other. We’re no longer just the publication; that too has evolved; we really now focus on our brand mission with equal importance given the publication, website and newsletter.
How long have you been at the helm of Wireless Week?
I’ve been in my current position for about a year and a half, but I started at Wireless Week back in February 1996. A couple of my first beats were paging and SMR. It was considered a promotion to add PCS/cellular to my beats! Later, I was business editor for a while and then moved up to news editor.
What are you charged with accomplishing?
The brand is charged with providing valued wireless content, including up-to-the-minute news, (original content and from other sources) via our daily e-newsletter, updated features, blogs, videos and guest opinions. Our website is updated as frequently as possible on a daily and weekly basis, and we cover major industry trade shows with show dailies and produce print issues about six times a year.
What is your vision for the future of Wireless Week?
Our vision is to be all things to all people. Just kidding! Seriously, we want to accurately reflect what’s happening in the wireless industry and anticipate what’s coming, and as you know, it changes fast. We are striving to get more people engaged in our website, to be a “meeting place of ideas” if you will, and bring more industry professionals into the conversation. Like pretty much everyone today, we’re putting much more emphasis on our website than ever before.
Who is the key target audience?
Our target audience always has been and continues to be wireless operators and the ecosystem that serves them. However, we are compiling more reviews on products, services and apps that we hope our core traditional audience will find of interest, as well as general consumers who want to learn more about the products and services that are out there.
What changes have you put into place (or plan to put in place) at the publication to be more effective?
Like I mentioned earlier, we’re updating our website much more frequently with news, features and interactive forums. We redesigned our website almost a year ago with the idea of making it easier for people to join the conversation. We’re on Twitter and Facebook, too.
What other special features do you offer, i.e. Webinars/events/podcasts?
We offer webinars and are expanding our selection of staff-produced reviews and videos.
What is the most popular section of your product family and why?
News in general and Andrew Berg’s device reviews are our most popular right now. I think people are simply interested in devices these days, and there are so many choices available. Industry professionals want to see how their devices are being received, and consumers in general want more information to make decisions on what they’re going to buy. Our feature articles get sizable hits as well, with Maisie Ramsay leading the charge on the networks beat.
How does Wireless Week try to distinguish itself from other industry publications?
We pride ourselves in creating original content, whether it be in our daily newsletter, news posted throughout the day on the website or feature stories. We know it’s a Web-centric world, but if everyone is an aggregator, who’s writing original content? We want to be the go-to source for anything wireless.
What do you see as the most impacting technology/trend for the next 12 months?
In a broad sense, social networking and how that intersects with wireless. We saw early on that Twitter was going to be a huge player in wireless. I don’t see that letting up anytime soon. And on an industry-specific scale, of course, everyone is watching the rollout of LTE and how that’s going to factor into, well, just about everything.
What are some of the key topics you plan to cover in the next year?
Some topics on our editorial calendar are mobile marketing, security, transportation, customer care, 4G and mobile apps. There will be many more subjects we cover over the coming months. We’ll keep abreast of the aforementioned LTE rollouts here and abroad and device rollouts for both 3G and 4G. Of course, we’re keenly interested in what happens in the mobile advertising space as some bigger players get into that. This summer will once again see another new iPhone, and we’ll be all over that like a blanket.
What is one thing about Wireless Week that most people don’t know?
I hope they’re starting to see us do more with our website and check back more often during the day as we post news. Other than that, we’re pretty “transparent,” to coin an over-used term.
If you could interview anyone for the publication, who would it be and why?
Well, there are a lot of people I’d like to talk with, but if I had to say just one, I would have to say Steve Jobs, in part because he rarely gives interviews and because I have a lot of questions for him!
If you weren’t in telecom, what would you be doing?
How about “rock star”? Then again, maybe being a doctor, engineer or dog walker sounds intriguing – anything where you’re not glued to a desk most of the day. But the nice part of being in journalism is you can talk to people in many walks of life and live vicariously through them.
Who do you consider a role model or inspiration?
A lot of people inspire me, but I’d have to say Oprah Winfrey is a great inspiration.
What was the latest book you read?
The last book I read is Robert B. Parker’s “Split Image,” a Jesse Stone novel.