Services that promise more aren’t necessarily promising better

CisionBlog frequently discusses how to target the media effectively without using ’spray and pray’ tactics. Social media has given voice to journalists who are now bringing attention to deep-seated bad habits of some PR professionals. Basically, journalists want you to read what they write, understand what types of pitches they are looking for and know their beats and writing styles. Just take a look at a few selected quotes from top journalists in Cision’s database:

Lawrence Armour, Fortune: “Please make sure you know what I cover before making any unsolicited pitches.”

Therese Poletti, MarketWatch: “Do research before you pick up the phone.”

Barbara Staurch, New York Times: “The best thing PR people can do is to get to know which reporters cover what, and try to develop a relationship with that reporter, giving them useful tips on real news.”

This stuff is important. Journalists tell us day in and day out that their biggest gripe is untargeted pitching. I know it sounds basic, but it still happens all the time – and I still hear about it every day. Read it all..

Using the # symbol can help media relations pros filter conversations on Twitter

At least two or three times a week, someone asks me to show them how to use Twitter. In about 20 minutes, I can usually show someone (depending on their Internet savvy) the basics of interacting on Twitter, the difference between DMs (direct messages) and @Replies (now Mentions), a few great people to follow, Twitter Search and more before sending them out into the world of 140-character-or-less interaction.

Inevitably, however, almost all of them return to me in a week and ask, “So what’s the story with hashtags?”

For those of you who aren’t familiar with hashtags, here’s a quick guide: Read it all..

Favorable environmental mentions in the news disappearing from the first paragraph

Green-related news has been an important area of growth for the PR industry for many years now, but recently, there are several indicators that interest in green news is shifting. A recent examination of Cision Index data shows that environmental news appears to be less of a driving force that it once was in media relations, yet at the same time, the total number of environmental-related mentions doesn’t appear to shrinking.

Positive environmental stories about companies were mentioned in lead paragraphs 53% of the time in 2008, but just 41% of the time in Q1 2009 (see chart below). So, those environmental news mentions that had previously appeared at the beginning of a story are now increasingly showing up in the middle or end. While green news itself is still a hot topic, it’s now appearing with a slightly toned-down persona.

This observation seems to be confirmed by other sources, such as Gallup Polling data reported in the New York Times, which shows that for the first time in 25 years, American consumers think the economy is more important than the environment in a tradeoff scenario.  In addition, PR Week has a new article highlighting hybrid-story tactics that PR professionals are using to keep the green messages relevant. Read it all..

One way the magazine industry can remain a relevant medium

You don’t have to read CisionBlog to know that the media landscape is rapidly changing. We are always discussing the future of print media and what print will look like in five years or so.

That conversation usually seems to revolve around newspapers. But what about magazines? How will they fare in this era of a tough economy and online explosion? To start, there were a lot of interesting findings about the country’s top newsmagazines in the Pew Research Center’s State of the News Media 2009 report published earlier this month. Here is the Executive Summary on magazines:

“For American news magazines, 2008 may be seen as the year when the traditional mass audience model finally collapsed. U.S. News & World Report effectively abandoned the print news magazine format in favor of producing monthly guides, leaving news coverage to its website. Newsweek, following multiple layoffs and tweaks to its print and online editions, announced in February 2009 that it was remaking itself into a niche publication aimed at a smaller, high-end subscriber base. Time continued to straddle two worlds, keeping a smaller but still large audience base while shifting to more thematic coverage driven more by columnists and analysis.” Read it all..

Will the next daily newspaper to fold be another one that shares its city with a competitor?

You know that old Western movie quote, “This town ain’t big enough for the both of us?” Well, it seems that the newspaper industry is experiencing the proverbial gunslinging shooutout.

Earlier this week, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer announced that it would cease print production and go online-only. Late last month, the Rocky Mountain News published its last paper. Fortunately, the Mile High City and the Emerald City still have the Denver Post and the Seattle Times, respectively.

This all got me wondering who would be the next to go. We’ve all heard that daily newspapers are struggling – but who will stay afloat? I took a look at all daily newspapers in the U.S. and Canada with a circulation of over 100,000 (I did not include the free commuter dailies like Chicago’s RedEye or the now-defunct BostonNow and Baltimore Examiner). Here are the three 100K-and-up dailies that have folded in the past year: Read it all..

This post is written by Cision guest blogger Annette Arno. Annette is a Research Director and analyzed the survey data and prepared the final report for a study released yesterday by Cision and George Washington University: How the Press Uses and Values Public Relations and Other Media Resources. She has more than 15 years of experience in market research.

Exploring social media usage by editors/journalists

Social media —the myriad ways in which individuals create and share information and ideas on the Internet, using such entities as blogs, social networks like Facebook, hybrids such as Twitter, and the venerable podcast (audio/video files distributed via the web)—is for everyone. And why not? These resources make great use of great technology – which can sometimes be isolating – to instead foster connections to others and share information. This is fine for personal use, and many corporations have entered the fray in order to become closer to their constituencies.

What about the journalists?

But what about the media? Specifically, the editors and journalists who are the gatekeepers of more traditional media? Do they use social media in their editing and reporting? You know, the NEWS?  That is the question Cision and George Washington University set out to answer when we launched a study of 12,337 editors and journalists, recently accomplished via online questionnaire. Read it all..

Online community for PR professionals re-launched with new and enhanced features and content

Cision just launched a new and enhanced version of its Cision Navigator website and CisionBlog would like to offer the virtual welcome basket to its new neighbor!

“The Nav” (as we affectionately call the site here at Cision) is an online community for public relations professionals. Its new mission is to establish an open online community that combines the daily media updates with articles, white papers and blog posts from Cision thought leaders, research staff and outside industry experts; social media links and research; new outlet information; media spotlights on influential journalists; and an enhanced operating platform. The new Web 2.0 functionality will enable subscribers to customize site content to suit their preferences, rate articles, and create a community that improves online dialogue among Cision, PR professionals and the media. Read it all..

Tough times call for extra effort

The wind chill factor was -27°F as I pulled a third layer over my head this morning. I thought to myself, “I bet a lot of people will call in. It’s going to be a quiet day in Cision’s research department.”

CisionBlog bloggers brave the bitter cold in Chicago to bring you the latest media news

Well, to my pleasant surprise, I can happily report that only two researchers are taking a sick day and everyone else (after unwrapping themselves and regaining feeling in fingers and toes) is working away to find changes in the media industry.

It takes extra effort to come in to work on the coldest day in Chicago in a decade. But that’s exactly what these tough economic times call for: Extra effort.

I often have people ask me what they can do to keep their job secure during a time when everyone knows someone who has been laid off, offered a buyout or is having a really tough time finding a job. There is lots of advice I can offer, but above all, I will always say that a small additional time committment goes a long way… and if you put that extra energy into social media, it might also be the thing that separates you from the pack and gives you an edge in your career.

When I speak with media relations pros at conferences or just with clients over the phone about social media, I frequently receive a response like this: “But we don’t have a position dedicated to social media. I just don’t have the time to do all of this. My boss wouldn’t understand.” Read it all..

Can I use my RSS reader to keep an eye on The Long Tail of social media? And what is open source, anyway?

Technology is changing so rapidly these days that it’s hard to keep up with all of the new terms and concepts. Below I’ve compiled a few common tech terms that impact public relations and media research in a significant way, along with a brief definition for reference. Do you have any other terms that confuse you? Any definitions you’d like to share?

RSS (Really Simple Syndication): An XML-based system that allows users to aggregate content into a reader (kind of like an inbox). Put simply, if you have an RSS Reader (you can just Google ‘RSS Reader’ and download one or use Google Reader from your Gmail account) you can subscribe to your favorite blogs and other news sites and receive notification every time something is updated or newly posted to each site. I also find my RSS reader helpful for Twitter Search - I am notified every time someone mentions a search term that I entered. RSS readers can help PR pros monitor the dozens (or hundreds) of sites they work with regularly without visiting each site individually on a regular basis.

The Long Tail: Originally coined by Chris Anderson in WIRED in October 2004, The Long Tail is a phrase that is tossed around often, but I am frequently surprised at how few people truly know what it means. Traditionally, mass market products that quickly sell in large quantities in stores have dominated the marketplace. However, with the growth of the Internet, Anderson argues that we are moving to a more niche marketplace model where less-popular products can be sold in smaller quantities, just with a larger number of products – and still turn the same (if not greater) profit that the mass market model turned. In a nutshell, as Seth Godin says in the title of his latest book, “Small is the new big.” Media relations people should remember these concepts with specific PR campaigns and not ignore the little guys. Read it all..

Social media provides a plethora of places to find out about media changes – are they all accurate?

There are more changes going on in the media than ever before and having accurate information on the media is crucial to media relations professionals. At Cision US, we have recently received quite a few queries from our clients asking how Cision is tracking all of the changes, layoffs and buyouts that are being announced every day. This is typically our response:

“Because of the growth of online media and a struggling economy, our industry is currently changing at a more rapid pace than ever before. One of the unfortunate side affects of these changes is the layoffs and buyouts affecting nearly every daily newspaper in the nation, as well as a number of magazines, broadcast outlets and news services. The research team at Cision knows how important this information is to you.

To stay on top of these changes and provide you with the most accurate information possible, we are tailoring our research to ensure that we are providing you with the tools you need to communicate effectively. Through developing relationships with key contacts at major outlets, increasing the frequency of research at outlets affected by layoffs, monitoring hundreds of industry sites and thousands of media sites, and a variety of other research methods, our research team continues to provide you with the latest changes. We always strive to offer you the most accurate media database in the industry.”

At Cision US, we have dozens upon dozens of researchers working to verify these changes. We also keep an eye out on changes that are reported elsewhere online. Social media has allowed a plethora of users to post changes to a variety of sites, from wikis to Twitter to group pages on social networks. And although Cision monitors many of these sites, we don’t change anything in our database without verifying it directly ourselves.

One of the up-and-comers in posting media changes is @themediaisdying  on Twitter. The concept? Anyone can submit changes to an anonymous email address and the changes will then be posted on Twitter.

“So, Heidi,” you ask, “Can I trust the changes there?” Read it all..