Consumer pubs losing influence, go trades

Down 11.7% in 2008.  That's the drop in ad pages for 2008 in consumer magazines.  It doesn't take a public-relations trend genius to anticipate the short shelf life in store for this outlet for publicity for clients.  So, where is PR to go to place stories?

No slouch when it comes to jumping on what's emerging, I went to Manhattan yesterday.  There I interviewed Joel Pomerantz, a principal at The Dilenschneider Group.  He's an expert on trade media, those publications - print and digital - which function as business-to-business communications vehicles. 

Bottom line: Out-of-the-box strategists can probably place any kind of story, opinion-editorial, news item in the trades.  And thank to the viral nature of the Internet, those placements can function as a platform for an infinite number of links and commentary.

"The trades exist for industry coverage," Pomerantz told me. "That means that by definition they are totally open to us in public relations.  They want and need our press releases, angles for stories, case histories of success, personnel announcements, and executive-bylined articles and opinion-editorials." 

The material, once it is published in a trade, can be recycled as a reprint and distributed to the client's constituencies.  An added payoff:  Key reporters in top-tier media monitor the trades.  They see a piece about Company X.  That will probably make them more receptive to a pitch from the PR agency.  Or they might even contact us directly.  In addition, since the larger trades sponsor trade shows and conferences, public-relations agency clients can be booked as keynote speakers or panelists. 

With trades going digital, this placement opportunity is exploding.  How to research the market?  Surfing the Internet is one way.  Also, BACON'S media guides, both the print and real-time online updates, are worth the investment. 

Warning: Pomerantz put in a word of caution about the competition's great interest in a client's case history that will appear in a trade.  Of course, the details have to be included, but trade secrets shouldn't.

Pomerantz's discussion of trades in the publicity mix will be a chapter in The Dilenschneider Group chairman's coming book on how the Internet has been a game-changer in communications.  Published by the American Management Association, that guide by Bob Dilenschneider will be an update of the Fourth Edition of "The Dartnell Public Relations Handbook."

Disclosure: Now and then I do digital assignments for The Dilenschneider Group.  My e-book on how I reinvented myself via the Internet is dedicated to Bob Dilenschneider, who has been a mentor Download Geezerguts.