Ready, Willing, Able...and Innovative.

Chris Morton, Independent Business Communications Professional

I'm a highly qualified marketing communications / technical editor, author, proofreader, layout artist, and publisher who has been engaged in the medical device, medical imaging, information security (infosec), technology, manufacturing, and general B2B/B2C realms for over 25 years.

I've worked for companies large (HP) and small (Eigen), both as an employee and a contractor. My titles have included managing editor, marketing director, senior technical writer, contributing author, instructor, seminar speaker, webmaster, blogger, desktop publisher, computer VAR entrepreneur, publishers representative, prepress technician, and radio broadcaster.

All of this experience equates to my likely having a unique insight regarding your business communications needs. But my being able to consider it from the point of view of your prospects, clients, and/or readers is of even greater value to your enterprise.

In effect I become a highly trusted extension of your staff—without your organization having to take on another employee compensation package. I always strive to provide exceptional value to my clients, hence their eagerness to recommend me—even as they move on to other companies.

I've massaged any number of topics— from medical devices and imaging to internet cloud security, oil & gas exploration to the global paint & coatings industry, municipal water / wastewater controls to electricity markets, and from software to PCs and peripherals.

Did I mention general business marketing, branding, and manufacturing?

Within 30 days of joining the Editorial Freelancers Association (EFA) I landed my first ongoing client—after having been chosen from a pool of 68 respondents and winning a semi-finalist editing shootout.

Other companies have since joined my roster of regulars. Some found me through my EFA profile and read my extensive LinkedIn profile, then follow up with a short phone interview. Upon request I visit regional clients in person.

Backstory—Having the Renaissance mind of an engineer, author, and artist, I follow in the footsteps of my forebears as an autodidact (an inherent family trait).

I was tinkering with movable type when I was in short pants. In elementary school I was writing business letters to agencies such as J. Walter Thompson—and getting results.

In AP English I got an A+ on my term paper about Sir Francis Bacon and the scientific method. Regarding thesis flow and organization, my teacher wrote on its cover page, "You have the mind of a lawyer." That and the grade were the only markings she had to make.

Years later, publishers and marketing chieftains have repeatedly told me they love my submissions, as they can "publish them verbatim" — eliminating the need for more editing.

In the mid-'80s I was a very early adopter of desktop publishing, intently studying typography and page layout (e.g., Roger C. Parker's Looking Good In Print). Soon I was both an Aldus PageMaker and AutoCAD reseller, in addition to moonlighting as a vocational school desktop publishing (DTP) instructor.

During this period I won two regional marketing awards while promoting my business via direct mail collateral and a B2B magazine.

My byline and cover stories have appeared in several periodicals. Being an active member of its Windows and DOS beta testing programs in the late '80s, Microsoft chose me from a pool of 8,000 candidates to be a technical editor for three of its user guides, with over 100 of my edits being published in its Windows 3.1 manuals. And Que Corporation selected me as a technical editor for its book about CorelDRAW!, the popular vector graphics software that competes with Adobe Illustrator.

Through the '90s I criss-crossed the US several times while leading IT classes and seminars for Fortune 1000 and governmental employees. Beyond the numerous public events, this included solo onsites for Boeing, Exxon-Mobil, Dow Chemical, Sprint, Nortel—and even Navajo Indian Health Services in Window Rock, AZ. That led to another engagement at an annual U.S. Coast Guard computer security conference.

Professionally trained as a broadcaster, I began my career as a radio advertising salesperson / copywriter / producer. One quickly learns how to compress an effective sales message into 30 seconds, without sounding hyperventilated.

Within two years I switched to newspapers and trade magazines, with titles ranging from The Detroit News to Great Lakes/Seaway Review. I've moonlighted in Webb offset prepress operations, dealing with impositions, Rubylith, color overlays, and screens while stripping negatives. I've frequently leveraged that experience as a commercial printing liaison for the professional works I've created.