Media Relations Survey: Infographics and Research Show PR Pros Are Behind the Digital Curve
By Sally Falkow, PRESSfeed
In the last year, several excellent studies highlighted how the changes in media consumption patterns are affecting the way journalists find stories and how media sites publish the news. The 2012 Oriella Digital Journalism Study shows that there’s been a swing back to trusted sources and credible spokespeople. The 2012 TEKGroup Online Newsroom Survey reveals that journalists visit company newsroom regularly – 26% say every day and 28% say once a week. The Web Influencers Survey by D. S. Simon Productions shows that almost 90% of all media websites use video.
This trend can be seen in NPR station KPCC’s move to video journalism and the fact that even local newspapers like the Santa Monica Sun are advertising for video journalists. At the recent Taste of Tech Summit in New York, Sean Morgan, CEO of Critical Mention, predicted that local newspapers will soon take the lead in the use of news video.
Are PR practitioners keeping pace with this trend?
Not according to a survey just released by PRESSfeed, creators of hosted online newsrooms. PRESSfeed polled more than 100 PR practitioners in the US to find out how their activities stack up relevant to what journalists say they want. The study also looked at the online newsrooms of 300 companies – the Fortune 100, 100 of the Fortune 500 between #200 and #500, and the top 100 of the INC 500 – to see what features and tools they provide for journalists. (Download the full PRESSfeed report: http://wwwpress-feed.com/2012survey.)
The results clearly showed that both PR people and company newsrooms are not providing the news content and digital tools journalists are asking for:
- 80% of journalists and bloggers value images that are easily available and ready to use. They added that an image significantly increases the chances of that news release being used. Yet only 4% of the PR people polled said they thought images were very important to a journalists and only just over half (56%) routinely add images to their releases and offer a video gallery in their newsroom.
- 75% of journalists say they want video and 30% of media websites now use externally produced video – up from 10% a year ago. 38% of the PR respondents to the survey said they thought a video gallery was important and the study of the newsroom showed that on average only 39% have a video gallery.
One of the biggest surprises in the study is the lack of optimizing news content for search. The Pew State of the News Media Report names searching for news as the one factor that most influenced the industry in the last decade. comScore reports that in February 2012, U.S. searchers conducted 371 million news-related searches on search engines and noted that the search behavior differs when on a web search versus a news search. Yet a study of 500 press releases posted on four major wire services showed that only 14% of the releases were optimized for search.
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Note: PRESSfeed is hosting a free webinar on August 15, 2012 at 10 am Pacific 1 pm Eastern to discuss the implications of these results Sally Falkow, President of PRESSfeed and Jim Brady, former Editor-in-Chief for the Washington Post and currently Editor-in-Chief of Digital First Media, will explore the gaps and opportunities in digital media relations.
Register for the webinar: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/567807225
Download the full report: http://wwwpress-feed.com/2012survey
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Sally, thanks for this interesting post. I recently learned at a PRSA Georgia media conference that reporters want PR people to use links via You Send It or Dropbox for photos, videos and other multi-media collateral. I also read an article in Public Relations Tactics by Ann Wylie that images such as the use of comics are helpful to explain a company’s product instead of just text. It is true that we wordsmiths need to catch up to this digital world.