To be successful in the public relations industry, it is important to understand how news works, how it is written, how it is sourced, how it is produced. Since PR often works through the news media, it makes sense that we have a basic understanding of news. Newspapers came about in the 1500s, but it wasn't until the 1900s that folks like PT Barnum and later Edward Bernays figured out how to use news media for public relations and to leverage relationships with journalists to ensure favorable coverage. News organizations were originally created to be a watchdog on government and elected officials. News is supposed to be objective, free from bias. News is information on current events. News is supposed to report on happenings in an objective way so that the public can make decisions on how best to live their lives. News can be disseminated through different communication media. Though the outputs of these communication media channels are different, the professional norms of journalism guide the production of news. Objectivity is expected of journalism, but is difficult to achieve. Journalists are inherently biased due to their own personal biases. Then there are added commercial and, or political pressures. Additionally, the objectivity of news organizations owned by conglomerate corporations should be questioned, especially given the conglomerates financial interests. Just a side note to say, as a consumer of media, I always read multiple sources of the same story to ensure that I'm actually taking in objective information. One source is just not enough for me. In a recent survey conducted by Edelman, only 46 percent of Americans trust traditional media. That's the lowest number ever recorded in the 20 years that Edelman has conducted the survey. The Edelman survey found that 58 percent of Americans, the most news organizations are more concerned with supporting an ideology or political position than with informing the public, 56 percent of people believe the news media is purposely trying to mislead people by saying things that are false or exaggerations. Now, as a PR practitioner, it's a good thing that news is not objective. There is so much opportunity here for us. You've seen this side-by-side comparison of journalism and public relations in a previous video. I wanted to use it again here. You can see that journalism school is to inform, whereas the goal of public relations is to advocate for our clients. In very recent years, journalism has begun to switch from informing to advocating. This is one reason the public has lost trust in news media. Is it journalism's role to advocate for an issue or a cause or a point of view? I would say no way. But you might also disagree. Peer seeks to be strategic and is never objective. We're being paid by a client or an organization to have a certain opinion on a topic or to advocate for a particular issue or brand. Journalism is often written for a mass audience, like the New York Times is written for all, not a specific market segment. However, in recent years we've seen the splintering of media based on partisanship and various segments of the American population. Peer segments publics because we want to connect with them on a self-interest, which is how we are appealing to them, getting them to tune in to our message. We use Insights and Data Analytics to get to know the publics and understand what messaging will quote land with them. You know what news is. You probably consume it every day. If you don't and you want to work in public relations, you better start taking in as much news as you can. We use the news to do public relations. But more than that, we want to be part of the conversation and being up-to-date on current events will help us to identify opportunities for our clients. Let's take a look behind the news to see how it is created and produced. Journalism has been on the decline for a long time. Since the advent of the Internet, journalism has struggled to find a business model that works. Use to advertising dollars would support the news organization. But the Internet allows audiences to search for and find news and most of the time it's free. With economic declines like in 2008 and even recently in the days of COVID-19, we have seen legacy organizations let go much of their news staff, the Denver Post, the Commercial Appeal, the Los Angeles Times, the Tampa Bay Times, and there are so many more. Community newspapers have been closed. Daily newspapers have moved to printing three or four days a week. This is just newspapers. This doesn't even take into consideration the television news, local news, radio, all have made substantial changes and cutbacks. Many of these cutbacks include beat reporters. Beat reporters specialize in a topic and tend to be almost experts in that topic area. For instance, sports reporters cover sports and often have one in particular, like basketball that they stick with. Another example is a health reporter. This reporter would cover health news stories. Look at the decline of journalism. We've seen the opportunity and rise of public relations, because news outlets cut health reporters, for example. That leaves an opening for our public relations news story on our client Weight Watchers. PR practitioners can and often do. They've role for these specialized topic areas. PR practitioners are pitching stories and suggesting reporters cover certain topics. Hopefully if we are good at our job, our client that is part of that health news story. Journalists all gather for a budget meeting. This meeting might happen every day depending on the news outlet and printing schedule. For instance, a budget meeting occurs most days in a daily newspaper like The New York Times. It might only occur once per month at a magazine like Vogue. The editor comes together with the various journalists and they go around pitching their ideas. Here is a story I can do on X or Y is launching a new brand. Journalists throughout their story idea is in the editor says yes or no or tweaks the story angle a bit. At this meeting, it is determined what news the organization will cover in the next issue. You need to understand the news making process because ultimately, PR practitioners are striving to get in the news and to please a story about our client or our organization. We want to work with journalists to get news coverage. We want to pitch journalists story ideas and story angles. This is one way of trying to control the narrative or the angle used by the journalists to tell the story. PR practitioners want to influence that angle so that it's positive for our client or organization. Research has suggested that 50 percent of news begins from public relations. This is a major reason why I know news is not objective. How can it be when it is informed by public relations? As a consumer, this is an area that journalism needs to improve upon, but budgets limit news media's ability to truly be objective. Public relations then fills that gap. We are pitching journalists news and story ideas. The more we can help a journalist and provide sources, accurate information, the more a journalist is going to call upon us, the PR practitioner. Our relationships with journalists should be mutually beneficial. We provide them a story, or the research and background information. We even write in associated press style. We basically do the journalism for the reporter only from a strategic point of view. This is helpful to a busy journalist, and so that's the relationship. As news continues to decline, this only creates more opportunity for public relations.
