Can't find the right spot for your comment? Post it here, in this open forum. Real Time Comments: parked here, 24/7. (Earlier editions.)
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
62 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."
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Hi all,
ReplyDeleteGCI has not said when or how much the dividend is for this quarter. GCI aways says about a month bsfore the x-dividend date. We are 3week away and no talk about it from the company. Last the waited , and said at a media conference the where rising the dividend from .04 to .20 . We have to wait and see if the have a media event coming soon.
Sorry about the message send from phone with auto correction.
ReplyDeleteLast year in March they waited , and said at a media conference they where rising the dividend from .04 to .20 . We have to wait and see if they have a media event coming soon.
"You will mostly ignore world events, because the small newspaper the ship prints and distributes each morning, culled from wire service reports, is as upbeat and inane as an issue of USAToday edited by cocker spaniels."
ReplyDeleteMy cocker spaniel is offended.
DeleteWhat does that have to do with my observation that GCI have not said the x-divendend date yet? I am just pointing out something could be up. And could move the stock UP!!!
ReplyDeleteSigh! They don't declare a dividend until after the end of February Board meeting. Learn about your business for heavens sake
DeleteUSA TODAY IN THE HEADLINES
ReplyDeleteDORMANT BLUE BALLS BANIKARIM ERUPTS ON HUFFINGTON POST
OFFERS REGURGITATED "news localistas," "sports analysts," "news challengers," "news digerati" and "news omnivores" AS EARTH-SHATTERING REVEAL OF USA TODAY READERS (WHAT'S LEFT OF THEM AT THE HOTELS)
BANIKARIM SAYS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING NEW FROM SAME REPORTS STILL IN OUR OFFICES FROM SUSAN LAVINGTON AND THE ARNOLD AND BRAND COTTAGE STUDIES...BUT AT LEAST GETS HER NAME OUT IN HUFF POST
BANIKARIM IS NOW SPOKESPERSON AND MARKETING GURU FOR USA TODAY, USA TODAY MARKETING VP SANDRA MICEK DISAPPEARS FROM SCENE
USA TODAY MARKETING VP SANDRA MICEK PLANNING SEQUEL TO USA TODAY ON THE FASHION RUNWAY WHICH WILL STAR HERSELF
BLUE BALLS BANIKARIM AND SANDRA MICEK FAIL TO START ANY NATION'S CONVERSATION
When Buffett buys GCI, THEN you can breathlessly type all-caps. In the meantime, learn some etiquette.
DeleteWhat a disaster!
DeleteNo one has picked up on the sports group's top sales leader has fled:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/193246/lazarus-rejoins-nbcu-as-svp-cable-ad-sales.html
Very interesting.
DeleteNot really. Lazarus was out sick for much of the time he was at the sports group. His replacement was hired some time ago. Looks like his brother has found him a new job.
DeleteSick or not, he still jumped ship or was he forced out? Who is the replacement?
DeleteMy semi-educated guess is that Lazarus left on his own, but that said: he wasn't that involved throughout '12 anyway cause of a medical leave spell, and, yes, a 'replacement' - some guy was hired from WSJ over summer when Lazarus wasn't fully back. Whether or not Laz ever came fully back, he wasn't needed anymore anyway cause of the new guy and cause his bro at NBC did prob hook him up with something, so - speaking for Laz - why muddle through with the USA TODAY crew when he gets a better gig somewhere else. Gee - remember when USA TODAY was known for stability and long-term employees?
DeleteQUOTE:: BANIKARIM SAYS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING NEW FROM SAME REPORTS STILL IN OUR OFFICES FROM SUSAN LAVINGTON AND THE ARNOLD AND BRAND COTTAGE STUDIES...BUT AT LEAST GETS HER NAME OUT IN HUFF POST::
ReplyDeleteAnd they say the grousers here AREN'T disgruntled former Marketing employees.
Give it up already. You don't work here anymore.
I wish marketing would start working here.
DeleteYou don’t have to be a former, disgruntled marketing employee to recognize how inept and out of touch Banikarim appears to be with a company she’s been hired to lead as CMO.
DeleteYet, that’s the only defense that’s ever offered whenever people question her worth which is lame at best as employees – both current and former, would like to see some measureable results beyond puff pieces and a purpose wall.
The point is that citing things like Lavington, the Arnold study and especially Brand Cottage are things known only to legacy Marketing people.
DeleteAnd their constant belittling of Maryam, simply because the regime has changed, is childish, petulant and, frankly, pretty low.
Get real.
You're right, B B Banikarimn! Let's have a burning of all the Arnold reports and nation's conversation campaigns that are still stacked in all the offices and THAT YOU ARE STILL USING. How stupid do you think we are with your smoke screens?
DeleteDon't blame Susan Lavington for this foolishness.
DeleteThis credit goes to Jeffrey Wilks, USAT SVP of Brand Marketing. And Maryam Banikarim pushed him out as fast as she could.
Can I put legacy marketing person on my resume if I am still here? Maybe that would open up a few leads for me?
DeleteMore proof Banikarim trolls this blog. Only she uses the term: legacy. How many times have we had to listen to her talk about her balance between legacy people and new people and readers who watch and read every legacy media.
DeleteYou will have to do a better job of disguising yourself in the future, BBB.
@1:02, if you seriously think Banikarim’s detractors consist of just “legacy Marketing people”, then might I suggest that it is you who needs to “get real.”
DeleteFrankly, it’s time your lot either put up why employees, departees and shareholders should trust Banikarim’s the right one to do the job, else shut up as her most recent musing demonstrates she’s still learning information that too many in this industry at much lower levels learned long ago.
Former Gannett Publisher
In a business where we go out and tell people how important it is to market yourself - truly, our sole purpose is getting them to market though us - our marketing leadership should be getting paid more than the CEO and should be worth more to our bottom line than our CEO.
DeleteThey should be driving this ship, they should be innovating. Instead we get bullshit like purpose walls and on-the-road and rehashed market research.
Doesn't Maryam even realize that her self-marketing is worthless considering all the SEO driving that is being done by people talking about her on Gannettblog? Or is SEO next month's grand 'discovery'?
The reason it's obvious that most of this nonsense is from ex-Marketing people is that the influence of Marketing is greatly hyped in all these posts.
DeleteIf USA TODAY survives, thrives or withers and fails won't be the result of anything Marketing does. Especially with the tiny budgets the department gets.
We have no mass TV campaigns, no real effort.
At its best, Marketing offers research, interfaces with Madison Avenue and helps us think about positioning and message.
But the "Maryam is in charge" chorus is silly. She's the top marketer. Not exactly running the company or the brand.
That's why all these shots at her are just bitterness and venom from ex-Marketers. Not every person, obviously, but most of it.
The Arnold study. NO ONE knows that stuff except people who used to work here.
Maryam will succeed or fail. But she is not the whole ballgame. Hardly, in fact. But I hope she succeeds in helping the brand...
Doesn't the head of national advertising sales (Mary Murcko) -- which means USA Today -- still report to Banikarim?
DeleteThe problem with Maryam is that she's both vain and ineffectual. And she treats people badly, many of whom are competent and believe in the company. The bright spot? She is responsible for advertising now, which means she has non-bullshit goals. Gracia can be snowed, but she can read a spreadsheet like nobody's business.
Delete2/13/2013 8:30 PM - yes
DeleteNo. Though she did decimate to sales team. Just ask any of the bitter legacy advertising staff that she fired, from the top down.
DeleteI agree with 4:58 and I'm a writer. It does no good for me to write the most erudite prose if there isn't any advertising to pay for the paper/website to deliver it on.
DeleteA finance person isn't going to deliver eyeballs. The press manager doesn't interest new audience in coming to us. It's the marketing team that should be hyping our products to prospectives, and instead we're getting missives like that in HuffPo telling their readership who our audience is.
How about wasting a little less time on self-promotion and instead creating a little shareholder value?
@6:17 PM – Your attempt to make this mostly about ex-Marketers (especially in a company whereby so many in it are engaged in driving sales) is comical!
DeleteHell, it’s doubtful that even Banikarim’s ego would allow her to argue what you attempt. Else, it would be an admission that despite all the energy she’s spent in seeking attention for herself since her arrival – including with this most recent article, that It’s all been for naught as few pay little attention to her at all.
So, please keep running with it and ignoring how the latest flurry of comments about her were driven by what she recently wrote as it really does provide a good laugh.
Thanks.
Larry Kramer speaking today at D: Dive Into Media “I think we still belive that print has some future,” “Can I tell you how long? No.”
ReplyDeleteOh, but I can tell you how long Kramer. Check out the green trend line on this chart: http://www.people-press.org/2012/09/27/in-changing-news-landscape-even-television-is-vulnerable/
You and the wonderful print journalism business does not have long at all.
Very interesting but I couldn't find the date that print will be declared dead in the article. I did notice that the decline has significantly slowed for print in the percentage of readers under thirty who read a Newspaper article the day before. I also noticed the New York Times had a higher percentage of younger readers than other papers. It could have something to do with the Iraq War why more young people were reading the Paper in 2006 since the Wars had a greater impact on there lives than the older Generations. Still the decline would have been less this last two years had Gannett focused on both Digital and Print service rather than only pushing Digital.
DeleteBut long enough for Kramer to ride for two more years until he retires with a big, fat package from Gannett.
DeleteMaybe it has to do with The New York Times being a real paper that has appealed to college students for many, many years. This stands in complete contrast to the newsy fluff and comic book look of USA Today which is really little news at all. It's good for sports, that is all.
DeleteYour right 4:10 I only meant that in 2006 all papers had a greater percentage of young people reading any paper. I attribute that to the Wars making the news more important to them at the time.
DeleteIt's funny to see that when a former dist. atty. the Appleton paper has covered extensively reaches an agreement with a woman to settle a federal civil suit the Post Crescent website is carrying a wire service story that quotes a Green Bay TV station. Is there anybody left in that newsroom who can cover news?
ReplyDeleteCripes, it's out of our market - go bitch at Manitowoc if they didn't have it covered. The story on the trial's expected start barely merited a brief in today's P-C, not exactly extensive coverage to begin with. It's an old story.
DeleteChilton is out of Appleton's market? Not when part of Appleton is in Calumet County. Guess the newbies should look at a map. One of many stories the P-C has missed while TV stations got it.
DeleteIf it doesn't matter to Appleton, why does it merit a large story today - two days after TV and AP had it posted.
And WLUK first had the story up at 6:26 a.m. Tuesday. P-C's asleep at the wheel.
ReplyDeleteThey should be ashamed they are getting beaten so regularly by Green Bay TV. But then again you have to have some pride to be shamed.
Deletesingle Copy still sells well at some local papers but GPS treats all sites the same and has out sourced delivery to distributors that can't meet demand.
ReplyDeleteHere is the future:
ReplyDeleteFor the next three years, we will raise subscription rates at different times across all of the properties. These will come with digital bundles.
Some daily newspapers in Gannett will change frequency where revenues can be protected in the transition.
Markets with apps will retire those apps as we convert all of the Gannett properties to HTML5 to include our own software to provide replicas of newspapers in all platforms - Kindle and all.
Our mobile sites will evolve with this, but access to all digital products will come at a price.
Our sales teams will be divided, again, into print and digital. The digital reps will sell other things with print as an add-on. And vice versa.
We will create new print products, and they will make money.
USAToday will convert into a bi-weekly print product or less within the next 5 years. Tabloid or mini is being considered as a way to avoid this.
The consolidation of printing will continue and meld with this entire strategy.
Local finance departments will be very small as most functions are consolidated and local needs are focused on expense management. In fact, good finance directors may very well serve as GMs and Pubs as part of a reorg of local properties where there are only group finance directors… this has already advanced.
News? Changes in these areas are done for a while. With the exception of centralizing all page production at corporate instead of hubs. We just have to get the Metros to go along - and that boat has sailed.
From the leading technology blog, TechCrunch, in September:
Delete"Today, Mark Zuckerberg revealed that Facebook’s mobile strategy relied too much on HTML5, rather than native applications. Not only was this a big mistake with mobile, but Zuckerberg says that its biggest mistake period was the focus on HTML5. This is the first time that the Facebook CEO has openly admitted this."
Why, then, would Gannett focus on HTML5?
Why Jim? Because Gannett leads from behind...well behind even smaller newspaper peers it is trying to catch up with now. Waiting so long to implement pay walls is but one example as circulation losses is what finally pushed it over the edge to act.
Delete2/14/2013 7:17 AM - The web sites aren't going away, at least not soon.
DeleteGreat outline here 2:03p. Here are some thoughts around a few points that you've made.
ReplyDelete"For the next three years, we will raise subscription rates at different times across all of the properties."
This will make it extremely difficult to attract new customers (especially anyone under age 30) and current customers will not renew.
"Our mobile sites will evolve with this, but access to all digital products will come at a price."
And consumers will not pay it. They will find other ways to get the news that they want on their many devices for free. And, if not, they will not care. As long as they know what the weather is going to be like, any other critical news and information about anything happening in their local community will find them.
"USAToday will convert into a bi-weekly print product or less within the next 5 years. Tabloid or mini is being considered as a way to avoid this."
This is assuming that the product will actually be in existence in 5 years. Many think that it will not.
"In fact, good finance directors may very well serve as GMs and Pubs as part of a reorg of local properties where there are only group finance directors… this has already advanced."
And, this is why Gannett is in the poor position it is. The company wrongfully assumes that someone with a finance background (think CEO here) actually has the best judgement about how a company should operate and the best vision about how a company moves forward into the future. Finance people are actually the exact opposite of the type of leader you need at a senior level to artculate and execute a vision for a company. They are only concerned about the short term. How can we add $$ to the bottomline for the next quarter, etc. They love excel spreadsheets and predictability and hate anything that has the hint of risk and/or experimentation.
Gannett has made its bet on promoting people (think CEO here) that's cut from this cloth and that's why it thinks the way it thinks and behaves the way it behaves. It will never be the type of company that leads. It will always be the type of company that reacts and structures itself around what can be done to squeak out revenue for the next quarter.
Good luck with these changes.
....and Gannett keeps promoting incompetent, lazy, abusive managers that continue to browbeat the grunts. While they give more and more to managers without laying any off, I seriously doubt they have much of a future. The managers are just busy being busy, not helping in any way.
DeleteSO right. Squeak out growth by laying people off while the finance department sends out 7 mailings per employee of their 2012 earnings. Can you say GROSS INCOMPETENCE?
DeleteBy grunts you are definitely referring to us sales people.
DeleteMy former site already has the finance manager
Deletebeing promoted to general manager.
She'e been running the show,for three years now. The papers are a shell of what they used to be.
All the experienced newspaper people are gone.
No one there knows the business or how to improve.
I predict it will close.The revenue is not half of what is was 2 years ago.
3:48 PM: Truer words have never been spoken. How many Gannett employees did Steve Jobs ever "steal"?
DeleteDoes Gannett have its own Jayson Blair? A sportswriter for the Binghamton daily is accused of making up quotes for a story involving the city's pro hockey team. His alleged fabrication was unmasked by a blog devoted to said pro hockey team.
ReplyDelete@ 2:03 pm, out paper didn't get the memo about having a digital team and print team. Under the leadership of the new online manager, all print reps are being fired and adding more online reps. Looks like we are going online..no more print subscription model needed!
ReplyDeleteWhich paper?
DeleteLafayette Indiana's Rag
ReplyDeleteWhat is the true purpose of an advertising online manager that team managers can't handle? Why would we need an online manager and an online rep, when the print managers and their team handle the same accounts? The online manager gets in the way of sales and relationships and tries to take any glory unless the rep fails with the sale, and then the reps and the print managers are thrown under the bus. You know when too many people from the same business goes after the same carrot, the turtle ( or the competition) wins.
ReplyDeleteYes. More confusion for customers that are dropping to the competition to get away from the Mickey Mouse of it all.
DeleteSo true. As we fall because we are concentrating on the wrong things, our competition ( a weekly newspaper, who was never completion before) has more than tripled in size. They gve their customer something we no longer care about...customer service and relationship building! We have become so desperate, we are biting the hand that actually feeds us.
DeleteYep it will All be done at one 888 no. Sad.
ReplyDelete???
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete