Submit an Article for Potential Inclusion in the Magazine
Create a Microsoft Word document with the following information and submit it with your photos and the completed Article Submission Form.
Article Title
Article Summary: 2–3 sentences describing what the article covers and why it is relevant to the Tucson optics, photonics, startup, or innovation ecosystem.
Article Content Preferred length: 600–1,200 words
Informative, insight-driven, and non-promotional
Author Bio: 2–3 sentences
Submit photos:
3–6 high-resolution photos relevant to the article (submit individual photos)
Photo Specifications:
Minimum 300 DPI
At least 2000 px on the longest side
JPG or PNG format
Clear, well-lit, and in focus
The images are not copyrighted by another entity. Furthermore, you authorize Startup Zones to use them in the magazine and for promotional purposes.
EDITORIAL NOTES
Edits will be made for clarity, length, and consistency.
Meaning will not be changed without the author’s approval.
Contributor Community Commitment
Optics Valley Magazine is built on a simple belief:
Strong ecosystems grow when people actively help one another become visible.
For many startups, entrepreneurs, researchers, and emerging companies, traditional advertising, public relations, and media exposure are difficult to afford. Our Magazine helps close that gap by providing selected contributors with an opportunity to share their ideas, expertise, achievements, and stories with a broader audience at no publication cost.
But publishing the story is only the beginning.
For an ecosystem to gain attention, people must see more than individual companies promoting themselves. They must see a community that recognizes, supports, and amplifies the work happening around it.
When you comment on another founder’s story, share a research breakthrough, repost an article, celebrate a company’s milestone, or introduce your network to someone else’s work, you help create something larger than individual visibility.
You create momentum.
That momentum causes people inside and outside the region to begin asking:
Who are these people? What are they building? What is happening here? Why should we pay attention?
And when the ecosystem becomes easier to see, everyone within it becomes easier to discover.
Your Commitment as a Contributor
If your article is selected for publication, we ask you to actively participate in helping the issue and its contributors reach a wider audience.
Each contributing author or organization agrees to complete a minimum of 25 Community Engagement Actions during the magazine’s promotional period.
These actions can include:
- Liking and commenting on articles and magazine posts
- Sharing or reposting stories through personal or company social-media channels
- Engaging with articles written by other contributors
- Sharing relevant stories directly with colleagues, customers, investors, partners, or community members
- Tagging people or organizations who may benefit from a particular article
- Helping introduce new audiences to the magazine and the innovators featured within it
We especially encourage contributors to support stories beyond their own.
Every share expands the audience. Every link gives that audience somewhere to go.
We provide free exposure, You get earned visibility + referral traffic + third-party credibility.
The purpose is not simply to promote a publication. It is to practice the behavior that strong innovation ecosystems depend upon.
Contributor participation may be considered when evaluating future submissions, invitations, and editorial opportunities.
When one of us gets noticed, all of us become easier to find.