DON RANLY, PhD.
presents three sessions on Friday, June 22 that include Grammar, Style and
Usage, Reporting and Interviewing Techniques, and Writing the Magazine
Feature Story. This will be Don’s fourth appearance at an AHP seminar and he
is always a popular addition to the program. Don is professor emeritus of the
Missouri School of Journalism where he taught for 32 years and was head of the
magazine program for 28 years. He also taught undergraduate courses in the
Principles of American Journalism and graduate courses in the Philosophy of
Journalism. He is a veteran presenter of more than 1,000 writing, editing and
publishing seminars to corporations, associations, and individual magazines and
newspapers. Author of books and articles on the subject, Don is internationally
sought as a communications expert.
Don’s session on Friday morning
starts at 9:30 a.m. with Part 1 of “Grammar, Style and Usage: Mastering
Correct and Consistent Punctuation.” This session will cover basic sentence
structure and will demonstrate how knowing grammar and syntax will make it
easier to apply consistent rules for using commas, semicolons, colons, hyphens,
apostrophes and dashes. Learn to write and edit correctly with confidence and
how to explain your editing to others.
You will discover:
• seven nearly infallible rules to master those pesky commas
• rules for punctuating complex and compound sentences
• the difference between restrictive and nonrestrictive clauses
• the difference between "which" and "that"
• when to place a comma between adjectives
• how to know when that hyphen is necessary for clarity
• when and how to use the much-abused apostrophe
• the precise use of the semicolon
“Mastering the Pronoun, the
Verb, Consistent Style and Correct Usage” follows the break with an
hour-long session beginning at 11:00 a.m. Part 2 of Grammar, Style and Usage
will concentrate on the pronoun (number, gender and case) and on the verb
(tenses, voices and moods). You'll review the participles, gerunds and
infinitives and why it's so embarrassing to use them incorrectly.
You will review:
• why and how the personal pronoun changes its form
• how to have pronoun agreement and avoid sexism
• how to be consistent with the tense of your verbs
• how to recognize and banish the passive voice in most cases
• why the subjunctive mood is not dead and should not die
• why purists still avoid splitting infinitives
• why dangling participles confuse and amuse readers
On Friday afternoon, Don
presents a breakout session from 1:30 to 2:45 p.m. titled “Reporting &
Interviewing Techniques.” After reviewing basic techniques of reporting,
this seminar will concentrate on one of your most important assets as a writer –
your ability to talk to people and to get the kinds of quotes that enliven your
stories and give them credibility. In this interactive session, you will sharpen
those skills by listening to discussants tell what has helped them before,
during and after the interview.
You will review:
• the nature of news and of reporting
• the sources for your reporting stories, especially people
• how to prepare for and set up an interview
• when, whether and how to use the tape recorder
• where and when to conduct the interview
• how to maintain control and go with the flow
• how to get an inner view
His third session, “Writing
the Magazine Feature Story,” runs from 3:15 to 4:30 p.m. What are elements
that make up that article that you can't put down–that stays with you long after
you have read it? What do the books say, what do those who write the articles
say, what do readers say make good feature writing? How does it differ from the
typical news story? What keeps you from writing prize-winning articles?
You’ll discuss:
• Narrative style - telling stories
• Paying attention to people
• Setting scenes, appealing to the senses
• Using literary devices
ARND
BRONKHORST is
an equine photographer from the Netherlands whose breathtaking and
unconventional photos are his trademark. Arnd’s huge online library at
www.arnd.nl contains sports images, fascinating detail pictures, beautiful
images of horses in freedom, and gorgeous atmospheric photos. Since 2003, he has
been working together with three top photographers: Charles Mann of the USA,
Frédéric Chéhu of France, and Jacques Toffi of Germany.
Arnd attends his second AHP
seminar, this time as a presenter. His session titled, “Using Good
Photography in A Good Way” is scheduled for Friday morning at 9:30 a.m.
Great photographs, great layouts. Not-so-great photographs, not-so-great layout.
Using examples from mostly European magazines, the aim of this session is to
discuss ways in which photography gets used in equestrian magazines. Arnd will
follow-up his session with a photography workshop at 11:00 a.m.
RYAN
DOHRN has
been in the marketing, promotion and Internet business since 1995. In 1996 Ryan,
and his wife Andre’ followed their passion for horses and took a simple idea to
sell horses online and created HorseCity.com. In early 2000 Ryan and his wife
sold their flourishing Web idea to Fortune 1000 publishing company, Morris
Communications. Now, he is General Manager of MCC Magazines Interactive and
HorseCity.com, the Web’s largest equestrian Web site as rated by Forbes and has
been featured in USA Today and other national magazines. Currently Ryan produces
two national TV shows for RFD-TV and has produced training videos for Josh
Lyons, Craig Cameron and many others in the equine business. His equine TV work
has appeared on local NBC affiliates across the nation and on the Outdoor Life
Network.
Ryan will present a session
titled, “Beyond Pages, Developing your Electronic Mix” on Friday
afternoon from 1:30 to 2:45 p.m. We all know that the real growth is on the
electronic side of the business. But how do you expand this area and protect
your core print business at the same time? What is a realistic investment? Learn
ten action steps to putting the perfect electronic plan together. Learn how to
develop the relationship between print and the Web and stay one step ahead on
the Internet’s ever-changing landscape.
JAN ARRINGTON
will provide Media Kit Critiquing sessions on Friday for AHP members
based on first come, first served reservations. As president of Arrington Art &
Advertising since 1974, Jan has worked in all facets of the advertising business
from creative and strategy, media and sales, to art and copywriting. Born in
Colorado and raised in New Mexico, Jan is a graduate of Colorado’s Woman’s
College. Her father – who was also her business manager – was a large animal
veterinarian and Jan spent many hours assisting him and acquiring a respect and
love of the magnificence of the horse world.
A division of Jan’s agency has
represented the Western & English apparel, tack and horse industries since the
early 1970’s. She has assessed media kits for more than 30 years and has served
as a full-service advertising agency for such clients as Miller’s Harness,
Circle Y, Kenny Rogers Western Apparel Collection, Pioneer Wear and Resistol Hat
Company, as well as Stanley & English Trade Shows and Hopper Western & English
Trade Shows. She currently resides on a horse farm outside Albuquerque, New
Mexico.
RALPH WEICKEL
presents a full state of sessions on Saturday beginning with his motivational
message, “Living Your Dream,” at breakfast. His other two-part sessions
are titled, “Effective Team Performance,” held in the morning, and “Finance for Non-Financial Managers” in the afternoon. He will follow-up the
afternoon session with a Question & Answer session at 4:30 p.m.
Ralph is the Principal of
Performance Management, an appreciative consulting and training company located
in Lexington, Kentucky. Performance Management works with a broad spectrum of
businesses to amplify organizational focus, financial performance, employee
engagement and customer involvement. The company utilizes organizational process
improvement programs, employee development workshops and executive coaching to
implement and deliver enhanced performance.
Ralph brings over twenty years
of business experience in the areas of organizational development, performance
improvement, sales/sales management and financial management. He is passionate
and committed to 'turning up the volume' on organizational and individual
performance.
CARL
LANDAU is one
of the most successful publishers in the niche magazine business. He has started
and, more importantly, sold 5 magazines and 2 conferences, including the first
microcomputer magazines for professional programmers–Computer Language
and AI Expert. He also started the leading craft beer and wine hobby
magazines – Brew Your Own and WineMaker and the trade magazine BrewPub. He has taught over 3,000 publishing professionals his "Camp Niche"
creative approach to ad sales. He is famous for “sending cats in the mail,” but
has vowed to leave horses alone for the time being.
He is also the creator of the
new Niche Magazine Conference – the first event specifically for small and
medium size magazine publisher. His second conference will be held in Austin,
Texas, February 25-26, 2008.
This will be Carl’s third
presentation at an AHP seminar, and his session titled, “The Good, the Bad
and the Beautiful: Secrets to Drawing Out Your Prospects,” is scheduled for
Saturday afternoon from 2:00 – 4:30 P.M. Get inside the mind of your prospect!
You’ll learn creative techniques for drawing out the prospect and how to close
the deal. Carl has created a new video specifically for magazine ad sales
prospecting. He’ll show you a step-by-step approach to drawing out the prospect
and how to involve the prospect in the whole process. Everything from pre-call
strategy to consulting selling to closing techniques.
You’ll learn how to identify,
and strategies for working with, different prospect personality types, from
Mr.-Too-Busy to Numbers-Nancy. He’ll even conduct a mock-presentation with a cow
poke or two.
Additional sessions on Saturday include the ever popular
45 Ideas in 45
Minutes, moderated by Pat Trowbridge, BowTie, Inc., that will focus on
printing production ideas this year.
The Small, But Mighty
Workshop will be co-moderated again by Dean Jacobson of Virginia Horse
Journal and Cheryl Erpelding of Riding’s Publications. The workshop is
titled, "Run a Profitable Publication - Track your Costs and Numbers"
and
is scheduled from 11:00 a.m. to 12: 00 p.m. This workshop will be an open
discussion where small publishers can help one another. Dean and Cheryl will
share their insights/stories and then have the attendees jump in with their tips
and stories of what worked and not worked.
“Learning how to do this part right was a key to my success” says Cheryl.
“Tracking our numbers and making decisions about costs and then making changes
have been so important in our success,” says Dean. “We were mentored by some
really experienced publishers.” Some of the topics discussed will include
tracking cost per thousand pages of printing, backing into the size of the book,
the negotiations for selling your publication.
The Freelancer Workshop,
co-moderated by Affiliate members, Jennifer Bryant and Audrey Pavia, discusses
“Let's Talk Turkey: Can You Earn a Freelance Living in the ‘Nag Mag’" World?”
The horse world is a small world, and the paychecks tend to reflect that
reality. Some freelancers make a living writing mostly about equine subjects,
but it takes more than just writing catchy pitch letters. In this year's
roundtable discussion, you'll share ideas with colleagues – and you'll learn why
today's equine-publishing industry makes freelance-business savvy even more
crucial to survival.
