The media business is changing fast. Public relations is changing along with it -- but in different ways. Technology, the web and people getting their news on portable devices is bringing great change -- and opportunity -- to public relations, which is expanding worldwide.
Media May Be in Flux - But PR Business is Booming Again
Newspapers, the internet, radio and TV are all in flux, with everybody trying to figure out their place in the new order of things. Old mass-media powerhouses are being bought up by Silicon Valley wonders that didn't exist two years ago. Despite all the change, public relations firms are rebounding quickly, according to a new report by the International Communications Consultancy Organization.
Don't Believe the Hype: Newspapers Are Alive and Kicking
For years, the mass media have been busy writing the obituary of newspapers and throwing around theories of who killed print. But that obituary is premature. The media business is changing fast, but newspapers aren't dying dinosaurs. In fact, newspapers around the world are growing. If you go by real numbers instead of trend stories and anecdotes, newspapers are still strong.
Mobile News Consumers Are Opinion Leaders
People joke around that every young person now runs into walls, because they're staring at their iPhone or Droid instead of looking where they're going. Yet the young people of today are on the leading edge of how news and information is consumed. It's changing news gathering, advertising and public relations far faster than even supporters of digital media expected.
News Collectors Are Turning Into News Gatherers
Three trends are building upon each other, like three little waves joining to form one big wave. First, people are shifting how they get their news. Second, web ad revenues now exceed newspaper ad revenues for the first time. Third, news aggregators are taking their new found audiences and ad revenue and doing something with it: they're moving into the news gathering business themselves.
The Shift to Hyper-Local Media
In the old days of the web, people saw it as a way to reach the world. Yet the web, and the media, is changing. There are millions of web sites and blogs, Facebook pages and Twitter feeds, YouTube channels and Tumblr accounts. Instead of reaching a global audience, people are trying to reach a local audience, or a specialized one, or an audience that's both local and specialized.
The Shift Toward News on Portable Devices
How people get their news is changing rapidly, that will forever change the face of news gathering and public relations. New statistics were just released in the State of the News Media 2011, an annual report by the Pew Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. The most striking finding is how fast people are migrating to online news, whether it's on their smart phone, a tablet like the iPad, a laptop or desktop PC.
What Are News Aggregators, and How Will They Change Public Relations?
You've probably heard of news aggregators like Huffington Post, which was just bought by AOL for $315 million. These are popular sites for online news. With more people getting their news online, these sites are becoming a huge part of the distribution of news. Who are these news aggregators, and how will this affect public relations?