Local TV News and Talk Shows Offer Strong PR Opportunities

Local TV remains the dominant source for news and talk. Local TV stations enjoy growing staffs, sizable audiences and healthy revenues, according to the Local TV News and the New Media Landscape report from the Knight Foundation.

While local newspaper staffs have shrunk by nearly 50 percent, local TV newsrooms staffing increased 4.9 percent in the past decade. Most TV newsrooms enjoy their highest staffing levels ever. While the future may be uncertain, TV stations are innovating to survive in that new digital environment.

TV Stations Innovate to Adapt to Changing Times

Local TV news faces challenges, the Knight Foundation report points out. Revenue for online content remains elusive, young people consume less news, and viewership continues to gradually shrink as a result of cord-cutting (no longer subscribing to cable services). However, many TV stations are innovating to meet those changes.

While half of all U.S. adults say they “often” get local news from television, audiences are slowly shrinking. The largest viewership losses are in the 35 to 54 year-old age group. Millennials consume less news than previous generations, and they often turn to digital, mobile and social content when they do. The loss of young viewers is not universal: A dozen stations across the country have kept their youngest audiences.

Stations will increasingly shift to new ways to distribute their video — and new revenue models. Some local TV stations are creating digital-only newscasts or focusing on online storytelling. Others focus on mobile apps for specific audiences or on the real-time distribution of over the top (OTT) content streamed over the internet. The development of TV station websites provides PR with multiple opportunities for story placement – on TV, on the website or both. The news editor of the website may be a different person from the TV news editor and may make independent news judgments.

Karen Rundlet, Knight’s director of journalism, told Poynter via email that she was struck by a renewal in investigative journalism among local stations. “Many top station leaders say they have to get beyond coverage of daily crime and car crashes to produce content that’s relevant to today’s audiences,” Rundlet said.

“In order to continue to engage audiences, TV news needs to move away from the crashes and crime stories that dominate their coverage to offer more value for viewers, by producing more enterprise and investigative pieces that are critical to people’s everyday lives.”

PR Implications

While some observers discount television as an antiquated media rendered obsolete by social media and online news, the report shows that local TV still offers a valuable public communications channel and will probably continue to do so for some time.

Previous research confirms the importance of TV as a news source. The Pew Research Center reported early this year that half of U.S. adults obtain their news regularly from television.  While that’s down from 57 percent in 2016, it’s still more than online news sources.

It’s imperative for corporate PR departments and PR agencies to follow best practices for winning broadcast media coverage and monitoring TV news.

Best Practices for PR

Some key practices include:

Be visual. Television reporters think first about the visuals to illustrate a story. Include an interesting visual element with any pitch. The last thing a reporter wants is to do a visually dull standup in front of a building.

Act quickly. TV reporters constantly work on deadlines. They typically produce stories for that day’s broadcast. If a reporter or producer reaches out, make sure to respond ASAP or else you may lose the opportunity.

Avoid being overly promotional. Know and respect the difference between editorial and advertorial. Television news wants to deliver information and insight – not product promotion. If your spokesperson repeats the company name repeatedly or tries to slip in a product promotion, there’s a good chance the company won’t be invited to appear on future stories or talk shows.

Be timely. Connect to seasons, holidays, local events or local personalities. A story on skin cancer and safety when in the sun will more appealing during the summer.

Monitor both local and cable TV channels and their websites. While many news organizations put some of their newscasts on their websites or on YouTube, not all stories from the live broadcast are posted and stories often are not posted in their entirety.

Integrate TV news monitoring into a comprehensive media monitoring service that includes online, print and social media. TV networks and local stations now promote their programs and engage with their audience on social media where viewers share and discuss TV news stories.

Focus on specific keywords. Select specific keywords terms to locate relevant videos. Concentrating on specific high-priority searches, such as a brand initiative, is more effective and affordable that attempting to monitor every brand mention. Include spelling variations, and common misspellings of the company, brand and top executives.

Be aware of website opportunities. Build relationships with the editors for both TV and the station’s website. A story that may not be appropriate for TV may be fine for the website which most likely includes information-heavy stories excluded from the TV broadcast.

“With television exerting this much influence, can you afford to be without broadcast monitoring in your agency? Without it, you’ll miss new business opportunities and underserve your clients. Even worse, you may put them at risk of a crisis,” states the broadcast media search engine TVEyes in its Broadcast Monitoring for PR Agencies playbook.

Bottom Line: While newspapers struggle with decimated staffs, local TV stations remain healthy, new research reveals. Local TV news and talk shows present viable PR opportunities, especially for stories that have interesting visuals. PR can take advantage of those opportunities by monitoring TV news.