No single industry has embraced social and digital technologies like the press – and to their benefit too. This, however has created a stylistic split between news that’s crafted to find you vs that which you seek out. This edition of The Clip Report, the second in a series on the future of media, further explores this widening “Continental Content Divide.” It is culled from briefings with dozens of leading media industry innovators and observers. It is my contention that every public relations, content and digital strategist can learn a technique or two by studying the media and unpacking their best practices. That’s the goal of this report.

1. Insights on the Future of Media
Volume II - August 2012
The Continental Content Divide

2. Introduction
If there’s an undisputed truth in the digital age it’s that content is
infinite, yet time remains finite. This makes it challenging to craft
compelling narratives that span screens, captivate audiences and
leave a lasting impression.
No one understands this difficult task more than the press. Yet, the
media is innovating even as it stares down disruption. Any business
can learn to communicate more effectively by unpacking its best
practices. That's the goal of this report.
The media's rapid evolution, however, has curiously created a stylistic
split - a “Continental Content Divide,” if you will.
Some publishers see social networking as their primary path to
growth. As a result, they are mixing journalism and web culture in
clever ways that get their stories shared so they find you.
Others, meanwhile, believe the future is in immersive experiences
that audiences seek out and, perhaps, even pay for.
Very few media brands are equally adroit. The reason, according to
Darren Burden from Australia’s Fairfax Media, is that “news you
read is different than news you say you read.”
This report, the second in a series, is culled from briefings with
dozens of leading media innovators and observers. It explores this
widening divide and the tech companies at its nexus. (An expanded
edition for the Edelman network has specific recommendations for
PR, content and digital strategists.)
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3. News That Finds You:
Journalism and Digital Culture Blur
As social network use skyrockets, the public is growing more
accustomed to seeing serious alongside silly. This is encouraging
publishers to blur news and memes so content finds you. Some call
this social discovery.
One manifestation of this trend is the growing use of infographics,
slideshows and “listcles” (list articles). The press has embraced these
formats because audiences find them emotionally rewarding to share.
This, in turn, drives traffic.
This subtle, yet important, stylistic shift may sound familiar. It
mirrors a time, during Google’s ascendency, when the press
embraced search-engine-friendly editorial. Headlines mapped to
common queries - e.g. “What Time does the Super Bowl Start?”
Today there’s a similar focus on Internet psychology. Stories are
written in a style designed to trigger sharing. Headlines that are easy
to scan and share are more pervasive - e.g. “The 25 Super Bowl
Parties You Will Never See In Your Lifetime.”
In a more social world, the most successful content creators are both
experts in their beats as well as the culture of online communities.
Professional communicators should take note.
Nowhere is this ethos more apparent than at BuzzFeed where the
content is crafted to make you look good for sharing it.
The site, which initially started as a place to find fun videos, is fast
becoming what co-founder Jonah Peretti describes as “a collision of
web culture and news.”
BuzzFeed execs Jon Steinberg and Jonah Peretti 3

4. To that end, in recent months BuzzFeed has recruited a host of Many BuzzFeed campaigns are “native.” Ad creative looks just
digitally savvy beat writers, including Ben Smith (formerly with like editorial except it is labeled “sponsored.” A recent
Politico), Amy Odell (New York Magazine), Matt Buchanan campaign for Pepsi Next, for example, featured “10 Beautiful
(Gizmodo), Doree Shafrir (Rolling Stone) and more. Places in the World that Actually Exist.” (Pepsi is an Edelman
client)
In addition, BuzzFeed continues to hire some of the best
“meme creators” in the business. In April it scooped up Stacy Another company that's fluent in online culture, although not
Lambe, whose claim to fame is “Texts From Hillary.” The to the same extreme, is Mashable.
Tumblr meme, which riffed on U.S. Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton, made headlines worldwide and was eventually “Community is every (writer's) responsibility,” said Adam
embraced by Clinton. Ostrow, Mashable's SVP of Content. During a recent tour of
Mashable’s offices, Ostrow explained that the entire editorial
This infectious blend extends into BuzzFeed's ad programs too. team is encouraged to devote 80 percent of their time to
content and 20 percent to cultivating a following across various
social networks.
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5. The strategy appears to be working. A growing share of Mashable’s
traffic now comes from social network referrals. This, in part, is due to
the team's pioneering spirit. “Journalists are the new early adopters,”
explained Mashable Community Manager Meghan Peters.
While it’s easy to label upstart digital natives like BuzzFeed and
Mashable as an unusual breed, this approach is widespread.
“Today’s journalists must be equally adept at their trade and in the art
of ‘putting on a good show’ to engage an audience,” said CBS/CNET
Editor Dan Farber.
Slate Group CEO Jacob Weisberg agrees. “Everything relevant
happens first on Twitter.” To that end, Slate is using a suite of analytic
tools (including one built by BuzzFeed) to study social networks. The
goal: increase viral distribution.
TV news networks are also embracing the same blend.
CNN's iReport is staffed by a new breed of professionals that are half
journalists, half community managers.
During a recent visit to the CNN Center in Atlanta, Participation
Director Lila King described her team as “professional hallway
conversationalists” who spend a whopping 60-70 percent of their time
"managing relationships on the web.”
All of this may be just the beginning as social rivals search and direct
visits as a primary pathway to news. The Huffington Post, for example,
is pushing the envelope even further with the launch of “HuffPo Live” -
a highly participatory video network.
Not everyone in news, however, is gunning for social network traffic.
Some are choosing a different way forward. CNN’s Lila King and Members of the iReport Team
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6. News You Find: The Economist shares this point of view, too. This year it
launched a major marketing push under the “Lean Back 2.0”
A Renaissance in Immersive Storytelling umbrella to underscore the demand for long-form journalism.
Although social networking’s hold on the news business looms It’s not just stalwarts, however, that are addressing the hunger
large, some publishers are making depth, context and visual for context.
experience the cornerstone of their strategy. The goal: enchant
audiences on tablets, where brand preferences are still nascent. Upstarts like The Huffington Post, The Next Web and
Engadget have all launched magazines on Apple’s iPad
This is the modus operandi at the Financial Times, where newsstand.
digital subscriptions recently surpassed print circulation. Rob
Grimshaw, Managing Director for FT.com, said he believes Hyperink, meanwhile, is helping indie bloggers unlock the
“quality media,” rather than a “wild chase for page views” will value of their archives by turning them into eBooks. Some earn
prevail. upwards of $50,000, according to Hyperink CEO Kevin Gao.
There are mobile natives banging on the gate, however.
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7. Newcomers Flipboard and Pulse, which aggregate content from
around the web in a highly visual way, are rapidly racking up users
across all of the major mobile platforms.
Pulse co-founder Akshay Kothari projects the service will reach 35
million users by year’s end. The Pulse audience is highly engaged.
They’ve read two billion stories so far this year, he said.
This growth has prompted some publishers to ally with these apps.
The New York Times and Wall Street Journal formed premium
content partnerships with Flipboard and Pulse respectively.
Other media execs, meanwhile, view the category with trepidation.
They still syndicate content to them but privately voiced concerns
over their growing influence on traffic.
Another class of apps that’s also growing aims to help people time-
shift content for reading/viewing in an ad-free zone. This group,
which also reflects the appetite for reflective reading/viewing,
includes Instapaper, Pocket and Readability.
Pocket co-founder Nate Weiner sees Flipboard as a tablet newsstand
and his app as its nightstand. Weiner said that Pocket users squirrel
away one million new pieces of content each day. Much of it,
notably, is long form and how-to content, he said.
With demand for depth growing, the media is also facing competition
from corporations and NGOs. Many have hatched their own content
platforms for engaging customers directly. Qualcomm's Spark and
GE Reports are two such examples. (GE and Qualcomm are
Edelman clients.)
Pulse’s Akshay Kotarhi (top), Pocket’s Nate Weiner (bottom)
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8. This is even creating new career opportunities for veteran scribes.
Forbes Chief Product Officer Lew D'Vorkin calls this “the full
employment act for journalists.” Forbes Advoice is helping firms like
Northwestern Mutual publish on Forbes.com.
Agencies too are hiring journalists in content roles. Britt Godshalk
(CBS Evening News and NY1) and Joanne Colan (Discovery and
Rocketboom) are now two Edelman senior content strategists.
Others, like Forbes’ Melanie Wells and ABC 20/20 co-creator Victor
Neufeld, also bolted the news business for PR.
Regardless of whether publishers are going for what USC’s Dr.
Henry Jenkins describes as “spreadable media” vs. “drill-able
media,” five technology companies loom large.
The Nexus:
Five Tech Companies Guide News Discovery
As this report details, social and mobile technologies are reshaping
the news business. Some publishers are betting on social discovery.
Others are doubling down on context. Few do both well.
At the nexus of this divide there are five companies – Twitter,
Facebook, Apple, Google and Amazon. Together they influence the
flow of all digital news.
On one side there’s Twitter and Facebook. They control the social
discovery of information - but in different ways. “Twitter is for your
head, Facebook is for your heart,” said BuzzFeed's Peretti.
Twitter CEO Dick Costolo (top) and
8
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (bottom)

9. Apple CEO Tim Cook (l), Google CEO Larry Page (c) and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos (r)
On the other side there are the various app and content stores. Mahalo, a how-to media company, successfully pivoted away
With more content consumed on tablets and phones, Apple, from the web toward iPad apps when Google changed its
Google and Amazon wield great influence. (Google too runs algorithms.
the world's top two search engines - Google.com and
YouTube.com.) Finally, when Facebook tweaked its news feed, several media
companies saw their referral traffic plummet without warning.
The media must adhere to every move these companies make -
although some may loathe to admit it. In the near term future, the media companies that understand,
adapt to and partner with these five players will be in the best
The FT, for example, pulled its mobile apps off the iTunes App position to succeed going forward.
Store when Apple began to demand a 30 percent cut of
revenues. It has moved to HTML5-based web apps, which are Businesses and NGOs too must adopt the same mindset and
growing rapidly. master the five rivers that run through the divide.
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10. Conclusion
The bets that media companies are making today - the pursuit of
social discovery vs. doubling down on immersive content - will have a
tremendous impact for years to come.
It’s not necessarily a zero-sum game either. A few are straddling both
worlds.
Reuters, for example, is seeing a lot of success with its highly
engaging live blogs. These are quickly set up for breaking stories that
require context. Anthony DeRosa, the newswire's social media editor,
calls this a “hover and dive” approach.
Whether there will be others like Reuters remains to be seen. The
skill sets required to straddle both worlds are different.
Regardless, PR, content and digital strategists must not only
comprehend this widening divide, but they must also appropriately
map their programs to and/or mirror the media’s approach in a
more social and mobile world.
The challenge: tell compelling stories across what Edelman calls the
“Media Cloverleaf ” that find an audience and are worth finding. (An
expanded edition of this report for the Edelman network outlines
specific strategies.)
Edelman’s “Media Cloverleaf ” comprises (clockwise from top left)
traditional, hybrid, social and owned spheres with search and visual ###
content at the center.
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11. Credits
Steve Rubel is EVP, Global Strategy and Insights for Edelman - the
world's largest independent PR firm. In his role, he helps teams and
clients understand the future of media and develop appropriate
integrated strategies. Rubel can be contacted on Twitter
(@steverubel) or via email (steverubel@gmail.com).
(The opinions expressed within this report are his and do not
necessarily reflect those of Edelman or its clients.)
Photo credits: practicalowl on Flickr (p2), LoggaWiggler on Flickr (p3), David
Berkowitz (p4), yuhwangwu on Flickr (p5), DG Jones on Flickr (p6), Feliciano
Guimarães (p6), Emily Steffen (p7), Roadsidepictures on Flickr (p7) and niko
on Flickr (p7).