Directions Media: A New Look with a Focus on Continuous, Pervasive Contact with Our Readers

By now you've noticed some changes to Directions Magazine, as well as All Points Blog and the Location Intelligence Conference website. Indeed, it is not business as usual for us here at Directions Media as we have been looking at many ways to make our content available to you. We continue to explore ways to maintain continuous, pervasive contact with you, our readers. Via a multitude of delivery formats, our primary goal remains to serve our readers and support our advertisers.

We've redesigned our Web properties for easier navigation to the many resources you will find at Directions Media's sites. You will discover that we've created some new menu categories to help you retrieve articles or news in a more intuitive manner. We've designed specific areas of the website to be more visible so that you can give us feedback on polls, sign up for webinars and download white papers, to name just a few. To highlight those advertisers who allow us to bring you the news everyday, we've improved the visibility of some of our banner space by accommodating larger banner sizes and repositioning space "above the fold."

Whether you are a new reader of Directions or among those who have been with us throughout the ten years we have been in business, let me point out some key features we offer:

• We offer two daily newsletters:
• Directions Magazine publishes the latest technology news and applications articles every business day, plus commentary from our team of editors.
• All Points Blog is the source for finding information that other publications overlook. Miss it for one day, and you've missed important, breaking news.
• No other publication offers more news on a daily basis.
• Press releases are posted for free. Others charge you for this service; we think it should be free.
• We offer you expert analysis. Yes, we're opinionated. We stir the pot, but it's based on experience. Our editors are GIS practitioners as well as journalists and have a combined 100+ years of experience. And we invite you to stir the pot as well by taking a position you believe in, be it controversial or unique, and sharing your views.
• We have the most comprehensive Career Center available in the geospatial market sector. Directions Media partners with the most popular geospatial job sites from around the world, in addition to those jobs directly posted to our site, to inform you about as many career opportunities as possible. We provide a wide assortment of job listings, saving you the time of endless Web searching. And did you know?
• You can post job announcements for free (registration required)!
• You can post your resume for free, too (registration required)!
• Job seekers can search by geography or job type.
• Recruiters can search resumes by job experience.
• We offer free webinars on Jobs and Careers. See the webinar we hosted last September (registration required) and stay tuned for information about our next one in May.
• You can sign up for free webinars or learn about how you can become a sponsor. As a service to our readers, every month Directions brings you two information-packed webinars from some of the biggest names in tech: Microsoft, Google, Oracle and Pitney Bowes Business Insight, as well as from the new players in geospatial including Netezza, Mark Logic and others.
• You can "consume" the news the way you want itï¿1⁄2
• Visit our Web properties:
• Directions Magazine
• All Points Blog
• LBS360.NET
• Map Hawk Blog
• Receive our "opt-in" free newsletters
• Subscribe to our RSS feeds
• Follow our properties on Twitter
• Directions Magazine: @directionsmag
  
• All Points Blog: @directionsapb
  
• Map Hawk: @directionsmh
  
• Location Intelligence Conference: @locationintel
  
• Join the LinkedIn Group for the Location Intelligence Conference
• You can "listen" to "our take" on what's happening in geospatial.
• Every Tuesday, you can listen to "Directions on the News," a podcast by editors Joe Francica and Adena Schutzberg that tackles news, trends and topics. You may agree, you may not agree, but we will get you thinking.
• You can hear directly from the geospatial technology industry's most creative thought leaders with sponsored podcasts from ESRI, IBM and Autodesk.
• Do you speak French? Or Spanish? Directions Media now offers its news and information in these local languages. But these publications are not just translations of news that you'll find on Directions Magazine. Each magazine will report on the geospatial trends, events and jobs happening locally in the countries where each respective language is spoken.
• Directions Magazine franï¿1⁄2ais covers the news from Quebec to France and beyond to the francophone countries.
• Directions Magazine Espaï¿1⁄2ol is our new publication reaching the many Spanish-speaking countries from around the world.

Directions Media also offers one of the most comprehensive archives on geospatial technology from the past ten years. It is organized in a way that makes it an excellent reference for anyone who works in a particular industry such as local government, natural resources, exploration or utilities. For example:

• You can find content by industry. Our "My Industry" page collects a single industry's:
• press releases
• articles
• conferences and events
• books
• ï¿1⁄2all in one place!
• You can see how others have done it. Visit our mapping technology galleries to explore:
• Web mapping and mashups examples
  
• satellite imagery and image maps
  
• for "great maps" visit our Map Gallery
  

This redesign was many months in the making. We hope you enjoy the new look and utilize the new functionality. As always, we appreciate any feedback you have. Whether you are a regular reader or you just browse Directions occasionally, we want to be your primary source for news, information, jobs, webinars, and "all things location." Contact us at editors@directionsmag.com - and be sure to tell a friend.

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