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There’s a brewing problem. Reporters are strapped an under increasing pressure to compete with bloggers. This results in reporters writing re-tweetable headlines which are sometimes misleading or stories being written with unchecked facts and inaccuracies. The solution, of course, is good journalism. But until the market sorts out the news business there’s a void that needs to be filled.
In the tech space that’s almost completely being filled by bloggers. Some bloggers are stepping up to fill that gap but most aren’t and don’t want to be burdened with the title: “journalists.”
Remember the whole TechCrunch and Last.fm blog-storm? It was really fascinating to watch. Paul Carr then of the Guardian has a great story on the whole thing and why he thinks TechCrunch got duped. (Funny that he then went to write for TechCrunch.)
The big tech blogs like TechCrunch regularly race to market with sketchy information with an inflammatory headline knowing that Mashable, NextWeb, ReadWriteWeb, GigaOm, etc will all run follow on posts with even less facts. This results in the 1st article racing up Techmeme, Tweetmeme, trending topics, Digg etc and massive link juice and traffic.
We’ve even started to see traditional media take similar “Digg bait” approaches and as their revenue and staff get even thinner you will see more of it.
The point of Carr’s article is that even if bloggers and media lead with a story they believe is true it has never been easier to dupe them.
When you read TechCrunch (especially Arrington’s) posts about Last.fm or Google buying Twitter or Apple’s iSlate rumors or any other exclusive/leaked story you usually find a line similar to “a source close to the deal said…” That could imply the guy in the office across the hall who saw Google execs on the elevator on their way up. Which happens to be in the direction of Twitter or some other company, therefore Twitter’s being bought by Google. Said informant thinks, “I’ll tell Arrington and be famous, kind of. Or at least maybe Arrington will like me and get me tickets to TechCrunch 50″.
Companies need good journalism as much as democracy does. The problem is that neither blogs or traditional media will provide this at the level companies need (at least not in the short term). The solution is that companies need to tell their own story and not rely on journalists to do it for you. Invite the media to come along but don’t wait for them to catch up.
The idea isn’t so far fetched.
Neil Benson, editorial director of the U.K. Trinity Mirror regionals is calling for newspapers to become PR agencies: “The best of PR agencies are often run by ex-editorial people. People who worked in regional press know what it takes to hit the spot in terms of press releases and they know how to package it. So why don’t regional publishers think about launching an arm’s length PR agency?”
He went on to explain that newspapers could offer SEO, microsites, and video productions services to advertisers. Essentially, certain advertisers could team up with journalists to create sites dedicated to one topic and go beyond the advertorial as we know it
This is one area where PR agencies need to evolve and offer real reporting (they have the skills), but companies can even go so far as to hire their own internal journalists.
Now the purists who read this will be quick to point out the conflict of interest and ethical issues with this approach. I would argue that they are no more compromised that journalists who can’t run a story because a company will pull their advertising.
Companies need to tell their story. Journalists don’t have the time to tell some of the best stories inside companies, both because of access and time. Corporate press sites need to evolve into news sites. (This is something we’ve been working with our clients on see here for a client example.)
I’m not talking about traditional journalism. These new journalists need to be separate from Marketing and PR. These new journalists will be able to do the deep reporting you don’t get from a press release or a marketing campaign. And while you won’t stop the inaccurate stories that flame up out of control, it will give you a way to respond with better reporting.
I would also argue a company that knows it has journalists walking around it’s halls would be less likely to do things that would get them in trouble. While these journalists won’t be writing the scandalous behind the scenes whistle-blowing articles, they need to be free enough to go off message and call a spade a spade.
