Posted by Katie Noonan
Today Newsweek will expand on its recent announcement that the publication plans to cut staff and modify its content to handle the decline in subscribers and ad dollars, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal. 
Newsweek is the most recent, but certainly not the only, national publication to announce the need for cutbacks in what seems to be a growing trend of readers forgoing their print media subscriptions in favor of alternative free news sources such as Internet news sites and blogs.
According to the WSJ, in addition to cutting staff, Newsweek will also focus less on hard news and more on opinion and discussion of "hot button" issues.
Read more about Newsweek's announcement here.
As print media publications continue to decline, public relations practitioners are presented with a new challenge. With slimmer publications and fewer subscribers, the question in my mind is whether pitching press releases to print media is still as effective, or whether Web 2.0 social networking sites and blogs could eventually become a better medium for issuing news.
Feedback welcome!
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Newsweek: The Newest Media Outlet to Announce the Need for Cuts to Stay Afloat
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1 comments:
I would say it already is important to start looking into new social media options. The problem we public relations practitioners will face is educating our clients who are interested and used to more traditional outlets and helping them understand the value associated with this new media. Also PR people will need to switch thier focus and understand that pitching bloggers is not the same as pitching reporters and there are dangers to clients having unseasoned social media PR folks pitching bloggers- including smearing the name of your client unintentionally. There will definitly be alot of re-education going on as this decline in traditional media continues.
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