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Thursday, June 02, 2011
76 comments:
Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."
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Score! Just got my laptop back!
ReplyDeleteWhen should we expect word on q3 changes?
ReplyDeleteOh bother! The Barbie Twins and maybe Ken are coming soon to make sure we're following their 5 steps to sales success! They're going to be doing 4 legged calls with us. We're just super excited!
ReplyDeleteNOT!
Oh boy!! If they want to help us they need to fix how horrible our systems and designers are. They need to give us better technology and more support staff.
ReplyDeleteOnly then will sales reps be able to sell more.
Our customers are only supposed to get 1 proof from the production house that doesn't care how bad what they do looks. If customer wants to fine tune ad then they should hire an agency.
What business with $700 a month budget can afford an agency? We are supposed to be their partner/media consultant but not truly act like their partner?!?!
And we wonder why great reps are frustrated and ready to jump ship? No on likes to hear conflicting messages.
"Craig Sevier said...
ReplyDeleteI've never been out of work for this long in my life. In fact, I've never been out of work. Never laid-off. Certainly never fired in my whole life ... As for being hired now? One, I'm unemployed. Steerike 1! Two, I'm 57. Steerike 2! My entire career, credibility, experience and talent all for naught ... What I do. My lifelong connection to all things media: typesetting, editing, reporting, writing features, drawing editorial cartoons, designing advertising and becoming far more savvy about digital tech than my employer ever was ..."
Not to offend someone here on a personal level, but Craig and everyone else with a similar story should stop whining about not being hire-able and go out and put your talents to work on the free agent market. Don't tell me that your age has anything to do with getting -- or not getting -- a contract job. Free agency is a 100 percent meritocracy. No race/gender quotas. Pure talent and work ethic and professionalism gets you the gig.
No, I'm not going to lay out a five-step, 100-percent success guarantee plan for anyone. You know how to find job leads online. No, you don't have to show up at an office to do the work. 99.99 percent of my clients have no idea what I look like. (So being close to 50 doesn't even matter.) Hell, I rarely talk to them on the phone. But the work is steady and well paying enough to allow for a 50 percent raise over what I was making with Gannett before getting booted.
Note to trolls: No, I'm not going to give my name or the name of my business. If you don't like it, too bad.
At my locally owned newspaper/shopper publication (non-Gannett)we are the ad agency,the designers,the advisors,and most importantly,our advertisers consider us partners in helping their business.Something the Gannett giant would never be.The Gannett owned newspaper/shopper here wonder how and why we do so well as they flounder into non-existance.Our customers, who are all small businesses, just like us know that we are local and the money stays in the community.They know that we are here for the duration and that our business needs their business and vice versa.As long as our partnerships continue we will be here for them and they will prosper as well.
ReplyDeleteNOT LEAVE TOWN, as the Gannett papers have laid-off so many, businesses and subscribers wonder how long before the doors are closed.
Ariel sells 2.1% of their GCI holdings in the last quarter:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.fool.com/investing/mutual-funds/2011/06/01/heres-what-ariel-capital-management-bought-and-sol.aspx
@9:01 makes sense and offers valuable information for readers of this blog. So, too, does Craig Sevier. My own position has a lot in common with Craig's, though I am (under)employed at the moment.
ReplyDeleteWhat any young person reading this website needs to understand can be summarized like this. Once upon a time, when companies met up with smart, hard-working, talented people like you they "bought" them. That is to say, they took them into the fold in a sort of unspoken contract whose terms meant that, if you did a good job, you would have a job.
Today, that's all gone. Companies do not "buy" employees. They rent them. And that is the fact, no matter how pretty the speech the HR operative gives you. Know it. Then, accept it and move past it.
What @9:01 is offering, it seems to me, is a sort of advice that internalizes this knowledge. What he or she is saying is, "They're gonna rent you, folks, whether you know it or not, so become a free agent who's for rent, because you will be rented anyway. Stop grieving, give 'em what they want and make money."
If I'm wrong, 9:01, please correct me. But if I've read your advice correctly, then I believe you are onto something smart. But surely you can understand that skills and mindsets vary, and not everyone is equally adept at overcoming these obstacles. Being age 57 in this world is, I suspect, something you won't experience for a long time. It's tough out there man.
I can't make heads or tails out of this, but someone thought it sounds groovy:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/news.html?d=223489
Ariel made an astute call when gannets shares bottomed. Obviously they see no upside or confidence in current management now.
ReplyDelete9:16: bum link
ReplyDeleteTotal print advertising revenues fell 9.5% from $5.25 billion in the first quarter of 2010 to $4.75 billion in the first quarter of 2011, according to the NAA -- the lowest 1Q revenue figure since 1983. This marks the 20th straight quarter of year-over-year print revenue declines.
ReplyDeleteAs in previous quarters, the losses were spread across all of the main advertising categories. National advertising fell 11% from $1.04 billion to $924 million; retail fell 9.5% from $2.95 billion to $2.67 billion; and classifieds fell 8.15% from $1.25 billion to $1.15 billion.
http://bit.ly/j63Thm
John Ariel reads this blog. He's seen the crap management pulled on compensation. He's heard about the dysfunction at Gannett's showcase paper. He's read about the disasterous Heather Frank intiatives. This guy is a professional money manager. Why invest in something run by rank amateurs?
ReplyDelete9:55 You flatter yourself. Perhaps a low-level analyst at Ariel will look at this blog, but the top level doesn't have any idea about it. They have their own blogs they follow.
ReplyDelete9:55 hate to bust your bubble. Investors don't care about the blog. They have sophisticated investment tools at their disposal to help them do their jobs...make money! Short term, long term...whatever. It's nice to believe employee morale matters to investors but that's not how they operate.
ReplyDeleteIf everyone at Apple computers hated their jobs, investors would still buy Apple stock.
Trust me, no one makes investment decisions on the basis of this blog, and that includes GCI employees.
ReplyDeleteWhile Deal Chicken is still on hold in most markets, another competitor has moved to aggregate the marketplace. Don't worry. It's only Amazon, the largest online retailer.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-local-daily-deals-livingsocial-groupon-2011-6
11:08 Yes, and yesterday Groupon struck a deal with Expedia to sell discount tickets to travel resorts. Think of the bucks that could bring in. Lots of activity in that coupon field we used to dominate.
ReplyDeleteJill Abramson to replace Bill Keller as NYT executive editor. (He'll become a full-time writer.) http://journ.us/mxvjEn
ReplyDeleteStill, GCI remains No. 1 among Ariel's 116 holdings, valued at $5.7 billion
ReplyDeleteGoogle just launched Google Offers. Portland, OR is their first market. It's getting tougher and tougher for the little chicken...
ReplyDeleteAriel was bullish on gci as recently as late march.if you google his website, you'll see how he and his team analyze potential investments and management teams. He may not base his decisions on this blog, but I can guarantee you anyone with his track record and assets under management has someone monitoring websites such as this one. It helps them base investment decisions beyond the b.s. they get from management. And Gannett is no Apple.
ReplyDeleteNew Westchester publisher... http://www.lohud.com/article/20110602/NEWS/110602004/Janet-Hasson-named-president-publisher-Journal-News?odyssey=tab%7Ctopnews%7Ctext%7CFrontpage
ReplyDeleteHere's a reader comment on the Westchester publisher story:
ReplyDeleteInteresting that there's no mention of the man she replaced. Most, most unusual not to have at last perfunctory thanks and good wishes to the vanquished. More to this story, obviously. I'll have to check the newspapers for elucidation. Oh, I almost forgot - this IS a newspaper.
I've met Abramson, who is very New York. But the Daedalus article she wrote last year is right on the mark for the future of our business, as I see it. It is linked via Romenesko today, and the reason she got the job. Recommend you take a quick read.
ReplyDeleteThose who said money managers don't look at blogs are dead wrong. There are quite a few bloggers out there who are quite proficient in their role as hosts of forums of information from unofficial channels within companies and industries. This is one of them. The best money managers have been lied to by corporations often enough that they seek out alternative sources of information. With all the federal heat on so-called "expert networks," fund managers are more reliant than ever on online information sources, including bloggers.
ReplyDeleteLets have a lottery...how long before the first negative post about the new pub in Westchester. Come on Lemmings, it doesnt usually take this long for you to disparage a colleague.
ReplyDelete9:31, I know it's tough out there. And you won't regain your entire GCI income by contracting out in the first month, or even the first year. But you can do something other than collect unemployment and contracting is 100 percent meritocracy. Your age shouldn't matter and, frankly, all of my employers prefer that I am more seasoned professionally (at near 50) as opposed to hiring some kid whose work represents more work for them with respect to making it a final product. (Not to mention the sloppy mistakes younger talent makes by not vetting their work more thoroughly ... This is the kind of value that older vets bring and you can market it.)
ReplyDeleteAnyway: I was fortunate because I built this up while working for GCI. I knew the end was going to come, so I prepared in advance. I know not everyone can do that sort of thing. (Although plenty of people in my unit did just that ... Probably nearly half.) If you're starting from scratch, get one good client and use that client to build others. Use good your good work to market yourself to others. Go to clients with best chances for repeat business and not a 'one time' job. Don't fall into the 'woe is me ... I'm too old for anyone to hire' trap. If you market yourself via email, they're never gonna know how old you are.
Another reader comment from the Westchester Publisher story points out that the Bob Dickey quote regarding Hasson was cut/pasted from another press release naming Judi Terzotis president and publisher of the Fort Collins Coloradoan"
ReplyDelete"She is a strategic thinker who executes well and has made every organization she has worked for stronger. Judi will navigate the competitive media landscape..."
...lame
Here you go @1:13 pm... Big Salary, little talent and a demonstrated history of not staying anywhere for very long. If she's not the captain when that ship finally sinks, she will have pushed children out to grab a seat on the last lifeboat just before it slips beneath the waves. Two years tops- if the paper lasts that long and i'm betting it won't.
ReplyDelete1:22 How can Robin's shop screw up a press release like this? She must be coming apart at the seams. Doesn't public relations think anyone reads this stuff. What's wrong with picking up the phone and asking Dickey for an original quote rather than putting something in his mouth that he said in March so it looks like he said it again verbatim in May. It all makes Dickey look like an absolute fool. If reporters did something like this and were caught recycling quotes, they would be out the door.
ReplyDelete1:13 I know nothing about the new pub, but I do know a recycled Bob Dickey quote when I see it.
ReplyDeleteWhat in God's name is going on when you can't trust the veracity of what they say through their public relations department anymore. These are spokespeople for this company. They cannot behave this way because it casts doubt on Gracia and Craig, Dickey and everyone else in the upper echelon.
ReplyDelete2:13, no offense, but what a myopic world view. Hello ... News is not PR. PR is not news. You make up quotes all the time for the quoted exec to read and approve. That's the way it's done in PR. You are not "shown the door" for doing so. Duh.
ReplyDelete@2:13...there is a profound difference between writing a quote for an exec. and being too damned lazy to bother to use an original quote for an announcement of this importance.
ReplyDelete2:19 No. This is the veracity of Gannett that is on the line. Newspapers run quotes from press releases verbatim. Look at any GCI paper and you will see. Good reporters avoid using the quotes in press releases because they could have been written by the flack, but the cutbacks have some of the smaller papers running these releases verbatim and -- in this case -- Westchester ran the piece on their new pub as written. Good public relations officials know how the business operates, and do their job properly. They have direct and instant access to these execs and serve as a buffer between them and reporters. They don't recycle quotes.
ReplyDeleteWasn't this press release important enough to have Dickey talk about it? Or does it show Dickey couldn't really give a damn about some underling getting the top job in one of his community papers?
ReplyDeleteDo you think Westchester or Fort Collins will ever run a company press release verbatim again? When two of your own papers are given reason to question the veracity of public statements their own company issues, what an incredible embarassment to this company.
ReplyDeletePublishers are coming and going so fast that Dickey hasn't had time to get off the golf tees to answer the phone when the company flack calls. Give him a break, it's tough looking for business in the clubhouses these days.
ReplyDeleteOMG, how unprofessional. Really.
ReplyDeleteVery naive, 2:29. Any reporter who uses a PR release quote should know darn well that it was likely written by the PR person. Please, let's let go of our utopian visions of what should be and take that big leap over to reality land, ok?
ReplyDelete26 minutes ladies and gentlemen that is all it took before a Lemming Troll trashed the new publisher in Westchester. It's a record! Thanks for not letting us down LTs. Now lets see how long it takes Jim to take this post down. Under or over 26 mintues?
ReplyDeleteMaybe it just shows the publishers in Westchester and Fort Collins have the exact same characteristics, which is why Dickey appointed them both and had little to say different about them?
ReplyDelete2:57 Where is one single word said about the pub? No, it has all been about Robin and Dickey. I doubt anyone here presently knows anything about this pub?
ReplyDeleteI think we now all realize clearly where this annoying LT poster works. Maybe it took me a long time, but at least I now know who it is as much as the CIA knew 100 percent that Osama bin Ladin was in that particular house in Pakistan.
ReplyDeleteGroupon just filed papers for a public stock offering showing it made $645 million in the last quarter. This is money Deal Chicken could have had, if it were up and running. Or at least a portion of it.
ReplyDeleteRobin.....poof
ReplyDeleteTara never did anything as bad as this.
ReplyDeleteBy the way on the subject of reading comprehension skills, I did not say "Woe is me" in my post.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, I said I'm still naturally chagrined but, me, I'm relatively fine.
I said "Woe is THEM" -- folks younger than I who have not had the sheer luck to accrue any sort of a cushion while they scramble to reinvent their life after getting the shaft from Gannett.
One place where Gannett can win over Groupon (at least right now) is in the smaller markets. Go to Groupon and see what's available in the Wisconsin markets. Maybe one or two items. That won't keep people coming back.
ReplyDeletePence is way too busy monitoring this site and rolling out Gannett's new marketing campaign. So is her staff. Why should she be doing the public relations job she was hired for?
ReplyDelete4:39, but then they'd have to call it Deal Bovine.
ReplyDeleteJust wondering, anyone have any idea how the USAT/Content One sports vertical with Tom Buesse is going. Never hear a word?
ReplyDeleteAlways considered USAT sports pretty good.
8:17 AM, I'll second that but we know that it's not the Gannett way. They would rather spend money sending a couple of bimbos around to educate us on how to sell. Something I'll done for longer that they are old!
ReplyDelete9:01 a.m. at the start of this thread is full of crap. Any of the people who claim to have started successful businesses but won't say what they are is a liar.
ReplyDeleteJim had been deleting that stuff, but he has been slacking.
Also, as this post will surely be deleted, let's tack on the murder-suicide watch list.
1. 9:01 a.m. Liar.
2. Jim. Psycho.
3. Spanky. Henpecked husband.
5:36 I asked about that, especially since Your Life is up and running under Heather, and stories are filling up the queue. I was told Busse is trying to develop a vertical that appeal to sports businesses that USA Today leaves uncovered, and hoping to exploit the revenues that are there from linking to the GCI TV stations. It sounds like a really great idea and has a prospect to be a lucrative revenue-producer, but I don't know why it isn't appearing yet. That doesn't seem yet to worry Hunke
ReplyDeleteI had the pleasure of working with
ReplyDeleteJanet Hasson when she joined Gannett and the Cincinnati Enquirer.
She is a talented and genuine person who will excel at whatever she does.
Janet is a people person and a very hard worker.
Congrats and Best Wishes Janet.
Dale Atess
While always a concern this was coming, anybody hear anything about circulation departments dramatically reducing draws to avoid returns? Not just normal adjustments, dramatic cutbacks in contractors, cutting draws 10-25% to reduce a couple percent average returns. I'm hearing retail stores complaining about customers' complaints that they're out of papers at 7:30-8:00am. This eliminates the ability for contractors to make money and reduces the value of allocating empty space to retailers. In short, initiating the elimination of single copy sales.
ReplyDelete7:40 I posted an item about this after noticing USAT was no longer displayed with the newspapers at my supermaket. If they are not dropping off enough copies, that could explain it. Whose bright idea was this? It makes as much sense as cutting off circulation outside of the advertising area. Unfortunately, that was there the money was in my town.
ReplyDelete9:01 looks fine to me, so why would 7:09 call him a liar. He's just posting some helpful information for those laid off. I think 7:09 just used that as an excuse to try and lay into Jim again. Same techique as the LT poster, no?
ReplyDeleteHeadlines no longer match the stories. Look at Your Life today and the e-coli story, which quotes some expert as saying it's likely to burn out in Europe and won't spread to the U.S. Yet the headline says:
ReplyDeleteE. coli outbreak shows gaps in U.S. food system
So how? We don't have this particular problem, and we are trying to scare people.
Almost all of Heather Frank's hires have nothing to do with the actual content on Your Life. They go to meetings and plot their future takeover of the print product. I doubt any of them actually know our operating system or even how to physically post anything on the site. Quality control? Not here.
ReplyDelete9:55 I know, and I've been wondering what they all think of what they have gotten themselves into. They know they're not part of the club, and everyone watches them when they come and go. Imagine what it would be like to go to work each morning knowing the people who sit near you really hate what you stand for. I don't think any salary could make me do that for long, but they come in each day and surprise me.
ReplyDeleteWhere is the outrage over calling two professional women "Barbies?" Sexism is alive and well here. Nice going Jim
ReplyDelete6th year of newspaper ad collapse:
ReplyDeletehttp://newsosaur.blogspot.com/
Professional? Lmao! Guess you didn't have to sit through theit presentations.
ReplyDelete11:18 so that gives you the right to employ sexist comments to voice your displeasure?
ReplyDelete10:25, keep in mind that most were unemployed (or were "consultants") at the time they signed on to six figure jobs here. I think they are laughing at their good fortune and stress free lives. They are accountable to no one but Hunke.
ReplyDelete10:54 There is none. You are upset with someone being called Barbie? Guess you haven't known about this blog long enough to know people have been called far worst. You can call them whatever you want, hell we all can. Someone earlier used Bimbos, does that work for you?
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteMost anyone who has worked at a newspaper has highly transferable and sought-after skills. It takes a bit of hustle and a new way of looking at your life, but you can build a freelance business without a lot of cash investment.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, if you still work for a Gannett paper, you should already be laying the foundation for this.
I know more than a few people who have shed the psychological yoke of employee and made the leap to freelancing. So to demand ad nauseam the name of a business is to demand the name of the person posting.
Obviously you're just stirring the pot hoping to put a little swagger in your step. You know aren't going to get someone's name anymore than you're going to reveal yours.
So give it a rest. It's a straw man -- not to mention a post hoc fallacy -- and you're wearing yourself out repeatedly knocking it over and declaring "victory."
8:03...Yet last Friday they almsot doubled the draw due to memorial day and the races I suppose. What a disaster. One carrier had 65 percent returns...up from a usual 30 on Friday. sales are dropping, mostly due to the thin, nothing USA has become, for a dollar each, but only giving 3 or 4 to a store that usually sells 6-8? Store and carrier requests for mor papers just get lost in the ozone. Yet blame is put on everything and everyone but where it belongs.
ReplyDelete6:44: Wow.
ReplyDelete6:44 They have to listen to the people who know. I'm not in circulation, but I do know the effort they used to make back in the days when we had street boxes all over the place. I once talked to someone about it, and his eyes came alive talking about the art of placing those TV boxes on the right corners. I'm not sure I understand it today, but it really worked. But then they had the hotel program, and they chased after huge circulation gains rather than looking at what they had with the bread and butter boxes. So circulation declines, and it has to be the fault of what the paper is covering, or isn't.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteinteresting post !
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