In their 2011 State of the Media report Pew Research highlights the fact that the media landscape is still in flux – consumers decide what news they want to get and how they want to get it. Each new technological advance adds another layer of complexity. In 2010 digital news media, like AOL and The Daily, hired almost as many people as were laid off from traditional newsrooms. And even those left in the traditional newsroom are now expected to provide images, audio and video with their stories.
Journalists’ jobs have changed dramatically. Since a large part of PR is working with the media and pitching news stories to journalists, we need to keep up with these technological changes.
Early in the last decade forward thinking companies added an online newsroom to their website to help journalists find and cover their news content. Yet even back then (2001) we rated only a “D” from usability expert Jakob Nielsen. “Corporations spend millions on PR, and yet the press sections of their websites often fail to meet journalists’ most basic information needs.”
It seems that as fast as we try to catch up, technology is still ahead of us. The 2011 PwR Journalists Survey shows that
- 88% want images with a news release
- 35% want video with a release
- 31% asked for embed codes with visual material provided with a release
So back to the online newsrooms – do we still rate a “D”? You be the judge. Our recent study of Fortune 100 and INC 500 online newsrooms shows some glaring gaps:
Some sectors are doing a little better – for example the INC 5000 Food and Beverage category:
And while this is much better than the average INC 5000 company, it’s still a far cry from what journalists are looking for.
If you want to increase your media coverage, give the journalists what they need.
Isn’t it time your online newsroom measured up? Go for an A this year.
