{"id":91111,"date":"2016-08-05T13:33:11","date_gmt":"2016-08-05T13:33:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/?p=91111"},"modified":"2016-10-13T14:41:34","modified_gmt":"2016-10-13T14:41:34","slug":"blurred-lines-when-publishers-become-pr-agencies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/blog\/blurred-lines-when-publishers-become-pr-agencies\/","title":{"rendered":"Blurred lines: When publishers become PR agencies"},"content":{"rendered":"

A newspaper\u2019s credibility is built on its editorial integratory. Every editor worth their salt should (and most do to a certain degree) insist on a clear division between editorial content and paid advertising. However, in recent years, the dividing lines between editorial and commercial interests have become somewhat blurred with native advertising (we used to call them advertising features or advertorials) and clickbait posing as editorial content.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The debate about \u201cthe separation of church and state\u201d recently turned into something of a social media shouting match<\/a><\/u>\u00a0when an award-winning journalist accused bosses at his former title of \u201crunning crap listicles in the paper on consecutive pages\u201d and \u201cbeing a thrown together collection of clickbait written for the web\u201d.<\/p>\n

As commercial pressures continue to push publishers to new extremes to protect the financial futures of their businesses, lines are going to continue to be blurred (if not completely obliterated).<\/p>\n

So the news<\/a><\/u>\u00a0that a regional newspaper publisher has recently launched their own PR firm, will undoubtedly raise a few eyebrows amongst editorial purists out there.<\/p>\n

The new PR agency, formed by the Midland News Association which publishers titles including The Shropshire Star and Woverhampton\u2019s Express & Star, will be based at the companies Telford print centre and over a full range of PR services including strategic consultancy work, media relations, crisis management and event planning.<\/p>\n

While the agency insists they are an \u201cindependent PR agency, sitting under the MNA umbrella and benefiting from its 149 years of history and business\u201d, competitive organisations might be concerned that these benefits could give them an unfair advantage in terms of local media coverage.<\/p>\n

Graeme Clifford, MNA\u2019s print managing director, told journalists: \u201cBusinesses trust our brand and we are delighted to be able to offer additional services to enhance our portfolio.\u201d<\/p>\n

Will editors feel obliged to run stories pitched to them by their \u201cin-house\u201d agency which they would normally decline when presented by outside sources? Conversely, will they be more willing to spike (or water down) potentially reputation busting articles featuring their PR firm\u2019s clients?<\/p>\n

The first challenge facing MNA\u2019s new PR firm is maintaining the entire company\u2019s reputation and credibility by not crossing too many editorial lines.<\/p>\n

Can newspaper publishers offer PR services and maintain their integrity?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A newspaper\u2019s credibility is built on its editorial integratory. Every editor worth their salt should (and most do to a certain degree) insist on a clear division between editorial content and paid advertising. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":423,"featured_media":91112,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[350,7272,3729],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91111"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/423"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91111\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}