Change those bookmarks: your magazine now has its own Web site

Concrete Producer, The, March, 2005 by Tom Bagsarian

I'm amazed by the abundance of information I find for this monthly column on how producers can use the Web to improve their businesses. The number of providers offering Web-based services to help producers and their contractor-customers become more efficient and compete more effectively seems to grow by the day.

Case in point. Attendees strolling along and visiting some of the booths at the World of Concrete's Technology for Construction area in January in Las Vegas might have been over-whelmed by the diversity, and just as importantly, the low cost of many of these Web-based opportunities. I can't help but think how producers who were not able to attend the show will learn from so many of them. Keep reading in the months ahead about Internet- and Web-based products from these exhibitors and other companies.

But this month, I found a tool all of you can use 24 hours a day, seven days a week, at the office, the airport, or home. And I didn't have to go far. It was right in my own backyard.

Our www.theconcreteproducer.com is new and improved, and all of us here at Hanley Wood are excited to bring it to you.

We haven't really had our own Web site before. To find our magazine, you had to go to www.worldofconcrete.com first. This will save you a step.

But www.worldofconcrete.com is still up and running year-round to provide you information about the nation's largest annual construction trade show devoted to concrete. In fact, you can link to the trade show Web site and the World of Concrete Bookstore at www.theconcreteproducer.com.

Along with developing a site of our own, we've improved and simplified the site's organization and navigation. People come to the Web site for three main reasons, says Tom Klemens, our magazine group's senior editor of engineering. Tom was instrumental in developing the new site. He has made it easy to read articles from past issues, to get information about products and to find and contact the manufacturers who make them, and to communicate with THE CONCRETE PRODUCER's staff. The new Web site simplifies each of these activities.

Belier searches

The article/Problem Clinic search feature has been redesigned and preserves the ability to limit the search to THE CONCRETE PRODUCER or to include our sister Hanley Wood magazines, CONCRETE CONSTRUCTION and MASONRY CONSTRUCTION.

The Industry Sourcebook search enables visitors to search the entire Hanley Wood Commercial Group database, going far beyond the products and manufacturers listing in the printed edition each June. And with the addition of another Hanley Wood magazine, PUBLIC WORKS, to the group, your search database now includes listings for many more products and manufactures, including links to their Web sites. Additional product information will soon be regularly available online.

Can't think of the exact name of that concrete- or construction-related association you're looking for? We have 21 pages of associations with convenient links to each of them.

But I have to warn you. You may become addicted because you will be able to find links directing you to all 21 Hanley Wood magazines, including BUILDER, REMODELING, and JOURNAL of LIGHT CONSTRUCTION.

Finally, contacting the editors and other magazine staff has never been simpler. Various links provide complete contact information organized by editorial, circulation, and advertising departments.

Feel free to let Tom (tklemens@hanleywood.com), editor in chief Rick Yelton (ryelton@hanleywood.com, or me (tbagsarian@hanleywood.com) to let us know what you think of our/your new Web site. A Web site is a work in progress and is never really finished. We'd love to hear your ideas.

Visit www.theconcreteproducer.com.