Tech PR: The Vanishing Editorial Calendar

Posted by on Mar 25, 2010 in Blog, Driving PR Performance | 0 comments

Every year, tech PR departments and their agencies begin the rite of reviewing editorial calendars for the coming months’ story opportunities. Is the ritual still worth the time in today’s fast-changing media environment?

A few thoughts to consider on editorial calendars:

  1. Ed cals were invented to provide opportunities for complementary advertising and content.  With print media — and advertising — gasping for breath, and online ads not generating anywhere near what print ads used to, maybe the good old ed cal just isn’t as important to media as it once was.
  2. Because they’re not such a big deal anymore, ed cals are either impossible to find, or have vanished altogether from many media web sites. Go ahead — try to find one!
  3. Where they still do appear, ed cals are being posted later and later.  February and even March postings are not uncommon.
  4. Even when posted in a timely fashion, many ed cals now only look out to mid-year.  Given the long lead times of some media, a story opportunity may be near deadline by the time you see it.
  5. When an ed cal only covers planned stories through June, you’ll be starting the ed cal review process a second time, well before mid-year.
  6. Story descriptions, once lush with verbiage, have gone totally Spartan.  Two-word story descriptions, e.g. “fiber trends,” are so vague they’re useless.  You (and thousands of others) then have to email or call the editor to try and flesh out the story and figure out what they want.
  7. Unless the story is slated for the next issue, chances are the editor hasn’t even thought about it yet.  You’ll have to get back to him or her when he does start mulling it.
  8. One reason editors wait so long is that they don’t want to be locked in.  This is the “news” business, after all, and a better story may come along closer to deadline.
  9. Remember the original driver of the ed cal — advertising?  In today’s economy, media (though I hate to say it) may give precedence in planned content to companies booking ads.  The Chinese screen between the ad and editorial departments seems thinner these days.
  10. But don’t count on getting a lot of space.  Ed cal opportunities most typically are features that cover a trend and include comments from half a dozen companies.  Why? — the goal of the ed cal is to generate as much complementary advertising as possible.

So should we downplay ed cals or even forget about them altogether? That may be.  Guest blogs seem to be a lot hotter, and when you place one, you own the entire space, any time, all year long.

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