Every month or so, Catalysis hosts a media lunch for PR professionals with a leading national/technology journalist contact. These lunches enable attendees to get airtime with the journalist, as well as gaining insight into how they work and giving them a chance to network with like-minded PR professionals.
This month, Tim Weber, Business and Technology Editor of BBC News Online gave us a taste of life at the BBC. He spoke about the way that digital has changed journalism as well as giving some general advice to PRs.
BBC Online is a network of websites focusing on news, sport and other information services including the popular BBC iPlayer. The site attracts 9.5 million unique users a month, with the business pages (and sometimes technology) read by up to 1.5 million per month.
The advent of online news sites has brought about what Tim refers to as the ‘Now O’Clock News’. The news cycle has sped up and less time is spent on each individual story. This leads to the window available for PRs to contribute narrowing.
In addition, social media has changed journalism in a big way. The press is now alerted to stories more quickly than ever before. News spreads dramatically through social networks with journalists often hearing about breaking stories through Facebook and Twitter rather than press releases.
People are also consuming more media particularly with the rapid growth of on-demand TV and mobile internet usage. We are entering a world of technology multi-taskers, with significant numbers of people (particularly the young) often consuming two types of media (e.g. TV and tablet PC) at once. They want news and information quickly.
All of these factors mean that journalists have to respond promptly to each story. Although not new, he reiterated the following advice to PRs:
- Make your pitch clear. Tell him in the first two paragraphs why he should care about this story
- Don’t send attachments
- Check suitability before calling/sending a press release. Look at his stories to see what he is interested in before sending
- Always pitch in the morning, by the afternoon they may be working on something else.
Check back here for information from the next media lunch!