Why aren't publishers counting clicks?

I had  a nice surprise yesterday that made me realise there are publications that are beginning to see the opportunities in web-based media. In my inbox was a monthly report from Building Talk (part of the Pro-Talk network)giving me the statistics for a press release they published for a client in March. It told me which of my press releases had had the most views and how many views. It also told how many visitors had clicked on the link to visit my clients web site.

It also reminded me that a few months ago I had received a confirmation email from a journalist telling me that he had used the story and here was a link to it on the web.

The fact that these two happenings are pretty remarkable indicates how poor journalists are at dialogue - especially with PR people. (remember the PR blacklisting stories of recent weeks).

Now, as we keep being reminded that advertising revenues are falling, perhaps we could use some of the above to start developing a more workable business model for the publishing industry.

As well as monetising content, how about monetising information about content? There is lots of valuable metadata slopping around publishers, but no-one wants to use it. It was only this week that a vice-president of AP told the World Editors Forum in Gothenburg that metadata should be standard in digital publishing.

As a PR person I have to pay a lot of money to get that information second-hand from companies like Cision. Why aren't the newspapers and other publications gathering together to pool and sell the information they have? Right now if I get a story in the digital edition of Børsen or Berlingske Tidende, the most I can do is send a screendump to a customer and hope for a pat on the back.

For US-based web sites I can run them through Quantcast to see how many visitors a site gets and what demographic they belong to. But still nothing at the story level.

Think how much better it would be if I could have a report showing how many views a story had and where they went afterwards like I get from Building Talk.

Perhaps that's a job for all the ad reps who aren't selling ads?

All copy should be born with metatags that can guide it through its journey to the consumer. Not just to make that journey easier, but to help create a stream of revenue for that content. Think what it could reveal to companies about their potential customers, interests, habits, etc.

Right now publishers are throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Who's afraid of the big, bad PR wolf?

The double-page spread in today's media supplement in the Danish business daily Børsen about the defection of journalists to PR in the country will nourish a feeding frenzy of media academics from years to come. What messages, what metaphors - what a load of rubbish.

Slap bang in the middle of the page is an illustration showing big business (yes he's smoking a cigar, yawn) ringed by faceless PR people in suits to keep away the poor, bemused journalist (yes, he's got a press pass in his hat bad).

And the headlines: "Media loses ground to PR", "Press departments threaten balance of power", "Course leader: We will not teach PR".

And all this comes on top of an excellent post by former FT journalist turned blogger Tom Foremski, MediaWatch: Why Some Journalists Won't Transition To The New Journalism  who references an excellent article by Amy Graham at www.poynter.org called Journalism: A Toxic Culture? (Or: Why Aren't We Having More Fun?)

Both the posts are about the inability of journalists to adapt to the new culture of internet-based media because of their unwillingness to accept change. One of the six reasons given by Graham and commented on by Foremski is:

• Priesthood syndrome: Traditional journalists are the sole source of news that can and should be trusted -- which gives them a privileged and sacred role that society is ethically obligated to support.

Now let's look at that Børsen story again in the light of the fading light of the priesthood of journalism and the growing legions of faceless PR people.

Well, as Gruppenführer in a PR company (actually,that's not my real title, but if we succeed in crushing journalism forever, who knows?) I think that the Børsen article is one-sided and under-researched.

That the demand for communications people is growing in Denmark is not in doubt, but the article fails to look at some key facts such as:

• Compared with other western, liberal economies, Denmark has a conservative business culture and has been way behind in their use of PR and communications people. The explosion of media outlets and the growing aggressiveness of primarily news journalists has meant they are playing catch-up.
• The article doesn't say how many of the newly appointed communication people are internal or external. Denmark excels in internal communication that is inclusive and comprehensive; the faceless PR people are in fact concerned and committed colleagues who have been known to walk rather than communicate badly.
• PR people on a global scale are also being challenged by the reduction in the number of journalists. We actually like journalists because they are the people we send our stories to.
• The whole traditional media model is breaking down and that will effect all aspects of the business. PR people are also struggling to embrace new PR or PR 2.0 or web PR, call it what you will.

I started in this business as a journalist on a local paper more than 20 years ago and that has always informed my work in internal communications and PR. The "us and them" model doesn't work anymore. In the networking society where PR people and journalists live side by side on a LinkedIn profile, we are just kidding ourselves if we think it does.

PR self-help in a recession

2007 was a fantastic year for PR and communication companies generally, but fear of coming recession or evening just a cooling of the economic climate in general has meant the businesses who employed them have already started cutting budgets or delaying spending. These budget restrictions often mean that these businesses suddenly find themselves without the qualified help they were used to.

So, faced with the same demands for awareness and results, how should businesses handle DIY PR?

• Make sure you know who you're talking to and why. When your time is limited it is better to spend time with the journalists and others who can really help you. Don't waste time on national dailies if you have a niche product.
• Don't disappear off the map. If the thought of a long drawn-out approval process for a press release is just too enervating, try ringing up journalists and giving them tips instead. Or just drop them an email with links they might find interesting - also about industry issues.
• Be focused. Revisit you company's business objectives and make sure that your communication objectives match them - especially in the short term.

EXCLUSIVE! New Media Release group includes amateur

It looks like that my 15 minutes of fame has arrived. The satirical PR blog Strumpette has continued its slightly peevish campaign against social media with a  new video featuring a Brian Connolly interview with the Social Media Club's Chris Heuer. But wait, there's more!

NOTE: This interview was made possible by the New Media Release Workgroup and the tireless efforts of Shannon Whitley, Alison Minaglia, Andy Arnold, Dan Zarrella, David Weiner, David Parmet, Jason Ryan, Michael O'Connor Clarke, Paul Dyer, Paul Pritchard, Steve Kayser, Susan Watiker, and Todd Van Hoosear. Special thanks to Todd Defren for inventing the SMPR.

... says Brian.

Well, I'm honoured to be in the same list and it would be lovely to think that the work will now come flooding in, but the truth is a bit more prosaic. I'm not worthy.

I didn't join the working group because I'm a guru or aspire to guru status, but because I felt I didn't know enough about social media releases. I still don't and that's why I continue to follow developments at close hand, rather than making snarky comments from the sidelines. Certainly, social media releases, rich media releases, press releases - call them what you will - are an easy target and people talking about them can have a tendency to be, erm... unfocused on occasion.

Am I an evangelist? No. Am I interested in new ways to do my job better and help my clients get their messages across? Of course I am.

The subject of objectivity

Objectivity and its implications for ethics in the PR and journalism communities is an issue at the moment and has been neatly covered by Peter Brill at Net.Mentor.

Ethics seems to be one of the new battlegrounds in the media industry. While PR and journalism have always had a love hate relationship, it seems to me that things have been worsened by the advent of social media. It was easier when you were defined by which side of the publishing fence you were on, although as Peter describes there has always been that grey area in trade/business to business publications.

But now, PR professionals and journalists are meant to be all things to all men and also have to compete with all men when it comes to breaking news, spreading news and having an opinion about. It's difficult to feel sure about yourself when the basis for your existence starts dissolving. The results?

• Established media pour scorn on bloggers and social media sites for their lack of professional rigour and pandering to the lowest common denominator
• Bloggers ridicule PR people for treating them like a 'channel' and publish their names to shame them
• Bloggers condescendingly refer to the 'msm' (mainstream media)
• Traditional PR people ridicule those who are experimenting with and even developed social media tools
for drinking too much 'Kool-Aid'.
• 'New' PR people can't quite seem to work out whether they are in PR, marketing or advertising and are trying to grab as much territory as possible to make sure they don't get overrun by the departments with the big budgets.

All in all it could be pretty depressing - I for one have a foot in all these camps and I know others as well. After years of knowing what to do and how to do it, its hard to be confronted every other week with a new idea you have to take a position on. But, you know what? I think it is pretty exciting. We are on a moving escalator and no amount of whinging or complaining or disagreeing is going to stop the escalator. (Although sometimes it is difficult to see whether it's going up or down).

I'm not depressed because I try and look for the wood and not the trees. I have a sneaking sympathy for all sides. So until things change again I'll carry a newspaper because it is still the ultimate format for readability and portability, I'll keep a tag on my industries through trade mags and the growing number of web sites that complement them, I'll post on forums, receive messages on email subscription lists, follow my friends on Facebook, keep tabs on my professional life through LinkedIn, read opinions on blogs fed to my RSS reader and use Twitter and Jaiku because I might need to know about them in the future.

Despite their differences, most people in these various camps, despite what their detractors say and what they say about others, are not looking for what's best, but what works. That can only be positive.

PR exists in Denmark - it's official

Finally, proof that public relations does actually exist in Denmark. This morning I got a letter from Danmarks Statistik, the body that categorizes companies and economic activity, informing me that public relations and communications now have a category of their own. For the past five years I've been classified under "Other company advisors".

Does this mean that PR is finally beginning to make an impact in Denmark as an independent profession rather than referring to the press releases the marketing department sends out? I hope so.