Tag: media

We May Have Voted for a New Media Landscape

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After every election there is a lot of punditry. We are not in short supply about why the winner won and the loser lost. Polls are taken, strategies are evaluated, and plans are set for the next campaign season. 

But there is something happening now in post-election 2024 that seems to a tipping point with significant change in the media landscape and public relations practice. It is on the order of FDR’s fireside chats on radio or the televised debate between Kennedy and Nixon. 

There have been many articles about the role of media and changing media platform preferences of campaigns and voters in the last election cycle. This article in the Wall Street Journal reports significant viewership declines on election night and during the campaigns compared to four years ago. The conclusion is that legacy media have lost viewership, relevance and their traditional gatekeeping function. Candidates have found new gates, or even simply broken down the fence and the gate along with it to extend that theoretical metaphor. 

This is a non-partisan phenomenon. You saw one or both candidates eschew debates, abandon press conferences, move toward appearances with entertainers, and most significantly in my view sit down for interviews with podcasters, most famously the “Call Her Daddy” podcast with Kamala Harris and the Joe Rogan Experience podcast interview with Donald Trump. These are the number 1 (Rogan) and 2 (Call Her Daddy) podcasts on Spotify in terms of views, and drew a large and specific audience that exceeded the numbers of Saturday Night Live, CNN, Fox or any of the networks.

Unlike political pundits, I am not going to make specific predictions. But I do have a list of questions that will be interesting to watch going forward. We may find in 2028 and beyond that 2024 was our generation’s Kennedy-Nixon debate in terms of change to media landscape and resulting communication strategy.

  1. Who is in WH briefing room? Will podcasters and independent journalists get passes to be part of the White House press pool, given their impact on public attention and opinion? Will there even be a press briefing given the avoidance of press conferences and PIOs avoidance of details? It may be the White House and other political agencies post statements to their web site. This has been happening on the White House Briefing Room websitefor several presidencies and may be enough. Interested citizens can use an RSS feed to read these directly and avoid the media filter. This could be the case in both campaign and governance mode.
  2. What is the role of the White House press secretary? Will there even be a press secretary if changes in number one happen. Maybe they will be engaging new media outlets one on one, or focused on writing internal tactics and worried less if at all about taking the podium.
  3. Will media availability shift to podcasters and independent journalists as the norm? As noted above, will interview availability of politicians and their staff follow the audience and we’ll see more on socials and podcasts and Substack outlets than traditional media? I anticipate we will see more of that, but it may be the case that traditional media are an afterthought to a podcast in a reversal from today.
  4. Will media relations continue to be less of a priority in exchange for paid media and in-house tactics? Early PR practitioners from Edward Bernard to Arthur Page started saying 100 years ago that the profession was far more than news releases. Some still perceive of and practice public relations as if the term PR stands for press release. That may finally erode as professionals are buying ads and sponsored articles and posts or generating their own digital assets from blogs to podcasts to socials. This is happening already and may increase exponentially.
  5. Will media targeting be increasingly ideological vs demographic? Media theorists always argue about whether the media affect public opinion or respond to it. Regardless, we have long had a partisan media (even back in the 1700s if you study your history). The question is, going forward will there be more targeting of media on ideology than geography or demographics? Some of this targeting could be to enter “hostile” territory to not just encourage a base of like-minded but attempt to do some old fashioned persuasion. 
  6. Will we see a return of long-form interviews? The Kamala Harris interview on “Call Her Daddy” was 44 minutes. Trump sat with Joe Rogan for three hours. Both are longer than typical network TV or national radio interviews. It leads to another question….
  7. Will content strategy favor authenticity vs spin? Some reports and polls indicate that people responded favorably to details and rationale based on policy as opposed to vague and emotional performative statements. Perhaps political communication professionals will craft speaking points that get into depth and making a case as opposed to creating an image and maintaining a narrative. It would be refreshing. 
  8. Will the changes in media and public relations strategy extend from just politics to the business and nonprofit sectors? My background before becoming a full-time professor was public relations in the non profit and higher education sector. Such organizations have always had a media mix, but the balance may tilt even more away from media relations to other tactics and strategies. This is due not just to public media habits but the sad reality of a shrinking news room for local media who do not have the capacity to do as many interviews or stories as in the past. 

Shortly after the founding of our republic, the First Amendment was passed, granting a set of special freedoms to citizens. The most famous of them was “freedom of the press.” But this was never about journalism. It was a response to censorship via the Stamp Act, and afforded freedom to produce and distribute information to anyone who happened to own a literal printing press. They happened to be printers, who in addition to handbills and other documents printed a new form of media called a newspaper.

Today the means of production for information is ubiquitous. That freedom is embraced by many. And the public has freedom as well in terms of to what they will attend to. The public relations professionals guiding politicians, not to mention businesses and nonprofit organizations, are smart. They will respond to changes afoot. I am excited to watch how. 

Could AI assist nonprofit news models?

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I had mixed emotions when I first heard about AI news releases. On the one hand, I had the typical professor’s worry about plagiarism and enabling laziness in students. On the other hand, I teach according to what is happening in the industry. So I had to balance educating students about this tool but also working to ensure they learned how to write news style as opposed just typing in some keywords and waiting for a result.   

It reminds me of going from banning laptops in class to requiring them for use in an active learning pedagogy. 

My rule on AI news release tools became a compromise—students can use the MuckRack AI news release generator (we use MuckRack for contact lists and other things in class so they can learn a media relations software for internships and jobs), but they must edit and show me the changes they made in their submitted assignment, using track changes of comments in a PDF.

One student so far took me up on this. She did not do the edit part. AI got a poor grade. It may be hard to do particular assignments as well, such as audio news releases, video news releases, feature release style or a pitch to a particular journalist.

I also discussed AI and the quality of its output in class. Here is an example of AI output for an actual client in class. I entered the organization’s name and what they do. I shared the output—which came in 10 seconds—with students and had students them critique it based on AP style and standards for a good news release they had learned in class. 

Here is the AI news release that resulted:

The Flourish Society Launches Intergenerational Women Mentoring Program

The Flourish Society, a leading organization dedicated to empowering women, is thrilled to announce the launch of their new Intergenerational Women Mentoring Program. This program aims to bridge the gap between different generations of women by fostering mentorship relationships and providing valuable support and guidance for personal and professional development.

In today’s fast-paced world, it is essential for women to support each other and learn from the experiences of those who came before them. The Intergenerational Women Mentoring Program by The Flourish Society is designed to create a platform for women of all ages to connect, share knowledge, and build meaningful relationships that will contribute to their growth and success.

The program offers a unique opportunity for mentees to be paired with experienced mentors who can provide guidance and advice based on their own professional journeys. Mentees will have the chance to learn from the wisdom and expertise of their mentors, gaining insights on various aspects of their careers and personal lives. By connecting women from different generations, this program aims to foster a sense of community and create a supportive network that will inspire and empower women to flourish in their chosen paths.

The Flourish Society’s Intergenerational Women Mentoring Program caters to women from diverse backgrounds, professions, and age groups. It recognizes the value of intergenerational cooperation and the positive impact it can have on personal and professional growth. By encouraging women to learn from one another, the program aims to break down barriers and stereotypes, and create a more inclusive and supportive environment for women in all walks of life.

Through this mentoring program, The Flourish Society hopes to inspire women to reach their full potential and develop the confidence necessary to overcome challenges and achieve their goals. By connecting women from different generations, the program aims to foster a sense of collaboration and empowerment among women, creating a ripple effect that will benefit not only the mentees but also the mentors.

To learn more about The Flourish Society’s Intergenerational Women Mentoring Program and to get involved, visit their website and follow them on social media. Let’s celebrate the power of mentorship and support women in their journey towards personal and professional success.

Students critiqued the output pretty well. Here is a summary of their comments:

  • No format, such as a dateline, boilerplate, etc.
  • Missing key info
  • Saying “thrilled to announce”
  • No quotes
  • Not AP style
  • Repetitive, redundant
  • Cliches and platitudes
  • No news value stressed

The bottom line I told students is what I’m hearing from professionals: AI for news releases, as well as other applications, can be a first draft and get you past a blank page. But humans with news judgment and public relations skills will still be needed to make a usable final version that journalists will find acceptable and may also draw visits to an online newsroom. 

AI illustrates an old problem with technology—efficiency for the user does not necessarily mean quality for the recipient. Journalists already complain of the overwhelming quantity and poor quality of news releases and pitches they receive. They have had their own tools to write, edit, and assess the quality of news. For example, the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) maintains a list of tools for journalists, as does the Poynter Institute. Journalists also can simply delete or block news releases that continue to come from bad actors.

Speaking of journalists, the advent of AI for news comes as media companies continue to consider the best business model. Ad support has declined. Readership has been divided with so much available online content. People read individual articles, not complete packages in the form of newspapers or magazines or broadcast outlets. There is also increasing concern by news organizations of AI deepfakes, literal fake news and images, as discussed in a recent Axios article. 

A philanthropy center at the university where I work recently had an article about three non-profit news models. Whether it’s nonprofit status, nonprofit ownership, or some form of foundation support, the media industry may be turning from seeing news as a loss leader for advertising revenue to seeing news as a public good supported as a charity. 

One can only wonder if AI will contribute more news to make a donor-funded model for news more sustainable. In other words, would a non-profit model for news employ the efficiencies of AI to generate news? But then, would people pay for news generated by a machine if they can use the same machine themselves to generate and aggregate news of their interest? 

I am hopeful that the future will be news written by people, for people, and supported by people. AI may have a place, but as of now I doubt it will be primary. 

I also hope that PR professionals who know how to write, understand news, and have a desire and obligation to inform people will be assisting their journalistic counterparts in the news ecosystem. As with all professions, a benefit to society should be the primary driver for practice as opposed to efficiency for an organization. 

The PR response to Americans overwhelmed by news

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A recent study by the Knight Foundation showed that Americans are overwhelmed by news, particularly online, and they are adapting by picking a few trusted news sources.

Few. Trusted.

Those are the key words.

I have commented on this phenomenon before, including in a previous post where I proposed social media outlets like Facebook and others divide their content into channels to separate news from noise.

But we are arriving at something else I have predicted. In time, the allure of having so much free accessible content online will become counterproductive to both the news industry and consumers. And this recent study shows that consumers have determined the volume leads to more difficulty in staying informed, not ease.

As is often the case, industry finally changes when consumers change their own behavior. And the behavior of news consumers is a lesson and strategic insight for public relations professionals.

Consumers are self selecting fewer sources of news. Instead of gorging themselves on an open buffet of headlines in a social media stream or clicking through multiple apps and websites, they are ordering off the menu and exercising portion control in their daily diet of news.

They also want trusted sources. There is much anxiety about misinformation and disinformation from unreliable and even nefarious sources online. One example of the scope of the problem is the organized professional response, such as the Institute for Public Relations 2020 Disinformation in Society Report. So consumers are starting to weed out the nonsense and amateur punditry and look for actual news.

Here’s what this means for public relations professionals.

  • media relations rises in importance. The value of news releases and pitching stories to mainstream media was considered at least in part diminished when it was possible to do an end-run on reporters and get our information directly to publics via blogs, social posts and email blasts and other means that appeared alongside traditional media content in the user’s environment. But that may be less likely to be seen if people are only paying attention to a few sources. Or, if they do see it, they may not trust it. The old fashioned notion of “source credibility” as the primary value of earned media is returning.
  • don’t flood the market. We have to remember that even with opt-in email campaigns or engagement efforts on social media, the average person is overwhelmed. Less may be more.
  • reputation precedes content. The study shows trust matters more than ever. Public relations people who know what they are doing have always worked on building and maintaining reputation, not just awareness. Now that has to come first. People evaluate whether they read a newsletter, brochure, blog post or any other content from an organization based on reputation and trust. It does not good to simply push content without building a reputational foundation first.

The bottom line is to remember the public any PR pro wants to reach is likely overwhelmed. The strategy is not to add to the problem, but solve it by becoming among the few trusted sources of information that meets their needs, not just ours.

Why the Return of Paid Content Will Be Good for PR

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For years I have been watching the economic decline of journalism. The cycle has gone like this:

  • new media emerge in droves because of the digital and social media opportunities;
  • in a rush to keep up with digital and social expansion and competition, legacy print media put their content online for free;
  • subscribers, preferring free to paid, and being overwhelmed with choices, drop subscriptions and use social platforms, RSS feeds, news aggregators and so on to access news;
  • the competition intensifies and to stay economically viable (i.e. more clicks) journalism quality suffers and goes solid reporting of important news is edged by click-bait, market-driven, entertainment value;
  • good journalists accept buy-outs and publishers seek “cheaper content” by aggregating, leveraging content from broader sources (witness MLive consolidating newsrooms and its universal desk so the content is very similar in Muskegon, Detroit, Grand Rapids, or how similar Detroit Free Press and USA Today look ) and gaining free content from bloggers, user-generated content and other “innovations” (witness the GVSU student who was paid in swag for her popular Buzzfeed quizzes);
  • smaller newsrooms put out less serious news, people keep getting it for free, favoring a stream of articles from multiple sources vs a deep read of select single sources;
  • with lower subscription and readership numbers, advertising dollars continue to decline, offering even less revenue to put into the “product” of must-read news.

There have been some alternative models. The New York Times offers 5 free reads per month and then a given IP address will have to subscribe. Others, like the Wall Street Journal and the Economist, offer some article free but premium articles are dangled out there with a notice that they are for subscribers only.

Other publications have emerged in a non-profit or donation model. In Michigan, many quality journalists from legacy media have moved to such publications such as the Bridge (“If you care about Michigan, please support our work”) or more recently Michigan Advance (heads up–I’ve invited editor Susan Demas to speak at GVSU and my colleagues are putting together an event for March 29 that will include a panel of journalism, advertising, public relations, and communications faculty including myself).

There is also a trend of nonprofits, businesses, and government offices becoming their own media outlet in the form of a news bureau or online newsroom that goes direct to public. A former student of mine who works for a state-wide association just asked me about this. I have written about this pointing to some examples on my blog previously–here’s a collection of prior posts on the subject.

But recently I noticed more media, from individual outlets to group conglomerates, drawing a line in the media economics sand and announcing a return to paywalls and subscriptions for their content. The latest example of this is a decision by Conde Nast for its fleet of publications. Some see the move as a bad one, but it is a trend to watch nonetheless.

Here’s why this is good for advertising and public relations.

  1. Survival of media. This will reverse the downward cycle I posed above. I heard a billionaire say once that if something is free, it has no perceived value. If people have to pay, publishers will have to put out quality reporting–meat, not candy. There is a hunger among the intelligent public for a less frantic media landscape, for news that is credible and quality. This will help good media–whether old or new–to survive.
  2. Communication environment. We should want good journalism to survive, first as citizens, and secondly as advertising and public relations professionals. Programmatic and targeted advertising made some economic sense, but it can lack qualitative intuition, creativity, and ethics. A recent study shows that most people don’t want tailored or targeted ads. Audiences who pay for content are more attentive to both paid and earned media (or ads and editorial content). And our ads and article pitches will exist next to good and not questionable content, which other studies shows matters to readers.
  3. Dedicated and aggregated audience. Digital media has been about both reach (quantity) and targeting small audiences of like minds and relevant interests. But returning to paywalls changes the equation. It may result in lower reach as not all current readers will subscribe. But those who do subscribe will be in one place, read each issue and multiple articles, have a natural interest in content and likely a net disposable income enabling them to respond to ads.

There are some considerations to work out as journalism returns to paywalls. One is whether subscribers–and maybe only subscribers–will be allowed to share content. Another is whether publishers will offer headlines and article summaries, or a handful of free articles each issue as a loss leader to draw subscribers. We’ll see. We are in what economist Joseph Schumpeter would call a “gale of creative destruction” in the media industry. What looks dire could emerge as a very good move forward.

I for one am eager to see what good things paywalls do for journalism, content, citizens and the ad and PR industry.

Local Media Ad Slide is Concerning

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Earlier today I received an email from the Grand Rapids Business Journal selling its digital sponsored content option.

For $1,100 companies and organizations can place their own stories online, have them pushed as sponsored content on social platforms, and remain in a searchable archive. It’s also called “native advertising” or the old-fashioned “advertorial.”

Previously I wrote an online column/blog for GRBJ. Others continue to do so on topics ranging from media to law. It’s a win-win–local professionals establish themselves as thought leaders in their industry and the publication gets free content.

It’s also a sign of the times.

I subscribe to GRBJ, as I do other local media and trade publications, because I still like the experience of reading print. But also I feel a sort of obligation to patronize local media the way I do other local businesses, so they can stay in business.

Reading this week’s print copy of the GRBJ, after getting the pitch for sponsored content, I was struck by the ads more than the editorial. In a 16-page publication there are 12 total ads, with 9 of them being house ads from GRBJ touting its events, its subscription options, and other sister publications such as Grand Rapids Magazine. In this issue there are 1.75 paid ad pages.

This may be why they’re pitching sponsored content. I mean, even Forbes has been doing that in recent years. And a lot of the media planners are going not just to digital, but to bloggers, podcasts, their own content-driven owned media, and social platforms.

I’m hoping this may all be the result of light ad inventory post-holiday, or that the sponsored content push is just reflective of new ownership and not desperation.

As a public relations professional/professor and just a member of the community, I certainly hope it doesn’t portend the end of a vital contributor of community information. Perhaps the incentive for some of us to buy ads is not just reaching audience but saving the channel.