Doug Poretz

The Speech Newspapers Need to Hear

There is another part of the communications industry that has "blown it" -- that is the advertising, p.r., interactive, new media, etc. agencies. [Fair disclosure: I am in the business -- you can check my profile linked above to understand my bias.] The agency business has two basic flaws: 1) time is the fundamental criteria for billing, remuneration, and measurement of efficiency -- that is just plain crazy -- clients don't care how busy you are or not -- they care about value received. You can check out what Washington Post Pulitzer Winner Steve Pearlstein wrote about that model here: tinyurl.com/ylobdq 2) agencies are siloed by virtue of distribution channel (advertising, pr, digital, events, etc.) --- why would agencies encourage segmentation in an era when content/message is king and you can deliver that message through a variety of ways in coordination to maximize expense and effectiveness.

It ain't only newspapers that have "blown it" in the communications business.