Around noon today, Gannett's smallest daily newspaper -- the 2,358-circulation Port Clinton News Herald -- issued this Tweet:
Port Clinton has just 10 people in its newsroom and God love 'em, all but the news clerk lists a Twitter handle in the staff directory.
But here's what drew my attention to the hardly overstaffed daily: That tweet up there is the 66th posted to its Twitter page in just the past week alone.
Now I invite you to examine the date on the last tweet posted on Corporate's official Twitter feed, the very same Corporate that's leaning on the Port Clintons to do more with less every day:
So, the score is Port Clinton, 66 -- and Corporate, zip. (By the way, this isn't the first time, either.)
Ohio owes its residents more than $30 million in business tax overpayments. http://t.co/jdiJlxyWiO
— News Herald (@pcnewsherald) November 21, 2013In and off itself, that wouldn't seem especially remarkable. After all, Corporate is pushing dailies of all sizes to shoot video, update Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr -- and tweet, tweet, tweet like there's no tomorrow. This is all in the service of Gannett becoming a digital powerhouse while shedding its image as a fuddy-duddy newspaper publisher.Port Clinton has just 10 people in its newsroom and God love 'em, all but the news clerk lists a Twitter handle in the staff directory.
But here's what drew my attention to the hardly overstaffed daily: That tweet up there is the 66th posted to its Twitter page in just the past week alone.
Now I invite you to examine the date on the last tweet posted on Corporate's official Twitter feed, the very same Corporate that's leaning on the Port Clintons to do more with less every day:
USA TODAY GM @derekjmurphy (2nd from left) was honored as a #CUPCatalysts Change Agent at last night's Media Forum. pic.twitter.com/mYYqErS3CE
— Gannett (@Gannett) November 14, 2013So, the score is Port Clinton, 66 -- and Corporate, zip. (By the way, this isn't the first time, either.)
In no particular order, here are the things that often drive me crazy about Corporate: hypocritical behavior, double standards, and self-dealing.
ReplyDeleteLOL. Here's a simple and self-evident solution for your mental hygiene: MOVE ON!
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DeleteWonder how many twits, newspaper will be sending out, when Twitter started charging for business related twits.In would not surprise, me since Twitter went public this question is going to be asked by stockholders?
ReplyDeleteThis comment shows just how little you understand about Twitter. A message is called a tweet, and Twitter would never charge businesses to post. They profit off our actions. If every news outlet and business went away Twitter would have problems.
DeleteSure, they might follow Facebook's lead, and charge us to expand our reach, but they'll never charge for every single tweet.
Never charge businesses? What do you call promoted tweets?
DeleteAnswer, according to Twitter: "Promoted Tweets are ordinary Tweets purchased by advertisers who want to reach a wider group of users or to spark engagement from their existing followers."
Read, Jim. The poster said "every single tweet.
DeleteRemember, Jim, we're here to help. When you fail to comprehend something, we'll help fill in the gaps.
Excellent observation.
ReplyDeleteExcept, it should be remembered: Corporate has ABSOLUTELY NO audience.
Tell that to its 6,403 disappointed followers.
DeleteI'm one of those 6,403 followers. But I am -- and I suspect at least 3,000 of the other followers are just like me -- a laid off and thereby former Gannetter.
DeleteHuh? What possible comparison is there between a consumer news publication's news feed and a corporate PR feed?
ReplyDeleteI'm comparing work ethics.
DeleteOld dogs...new tricks?
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Twitter charges two ways: 1) promoting a Tweet; and 2) Promoting your Twitter account.
Facebook does the same thing.
As a journalist and a consumer of news...I can scan Twitter and get a pulse for all the news happening this instant and never wait to read a newspaper. As more journalists are leaving platforms like Gannett, and Tweeting sound bytes of their stories, isn't the Gannett flag actually speeding up the demise of their print edition?
Jim,
ReplyDeleteYour point is well-taken, but here's what you're missing. Considering the stupidity that exists at Corporate, who the hell wants them communicating anything? Rather have them just shut the hell up. Nothing Gannett does at Corporate EVER helps. Less is much, much more!
Clicking LIKE button.
DeleteAgree with 10:09. We have been hell bent to homogenize our brands into one meaningless umbrella catch all called "Gannett" which no one knows about or cares about. All because a couple of senior people in the tower who have nothing better to do thought this would be a good idea. The advertising community and our readers couldn't give a rat's ass about Gannett. Stop wasting money trying to shove it down their throats.
DeleteNobody in corporate marketing has a clue about social media. Exhibit One: Banikarim. The news twitter feeds are run by journalists who actually do have a clue about social media.
ReplyDeleteCorporate doesn't have serious communications, public relationship, social media, or marketing strategy. They never have and they never will. This is the result of not having someone in a senior leadership and management role at the company who has the knowledge, experience, and skill set in the Marketing and Communications space to develop a strategy and build a team that is capable of executing that strategy while working in conjunction with the overall strategic vision of the company.
ReplyDeleteIf anyone (including Gracia) thinks the CMO they have currently is capable of doing any of the above, they are extremely naive or living on another planet. It's obvious that the way the company communicates anything internally or externally is an utter cluster $#% and disaster by even the most modest of industry standards. Exhibit A: The Blue Balls Memo. Gracia should have known that anyone who would share this in a major company meeting and then email it to all the employees lacks the judgement and decision-making ability needed for a CMO gig - let alone a lower level marketing manager job.
So, Gannett is now reaping what is has sown in terms of marketing and communications from top to bottom. One poster was right, who cares if Gannett tweets anything because who really cares about Gannett? No one. The only people that really care about Gannett are the people that hold significant shares of the company. That's all. They just want to know how much their dividend will be. As long as they know that, what else needs to be tweeted? They are certainly not going to tweet that they just laid off 300-400 people.
This is exactly why we should all be happy that corporate doesn't tweet much. They have nothing to say and no one is listening.
DeleteIm willing to give our CMO a pass on the blue balls memo. It was a bad choice publishing a employee memo, but lets just call it a bad decision. I am not willing to give her a pass on a nearly two year effort that has done virtually nothing for the company. If tooting yournown horn and managing to come off as some sort of expert sage in the business press and at media conferences are measures of standards, she gets a solid 7, though.
ReplyDeleteThere are dozens of Banikarims who should be shown the door. The only thing that would be missed are their hefty paychecks.
ReplyDeleteJim, the tweets are an interesting comparison, but Port Clinton hasn't had 10 people in its newsroom in many, many years. Compare the Port Clinton staff directory with the staff directory of its sister paper in Fremont. Seven of the 10 people listed on each are the same, and I would bet that most of those seven -- if not all of them -- are based in Fremont.
ReplyDeleteI wondered if that was the case. But as you say, the paper's website doesn't make that clear at all.
DeleteActually, the staff is even smaller than I thought. Three of the people listed on both staff directories are listed as enterprise reporters and enterprise editor, and they must be based at the Newark paper.
DeleteNovember 14th was the day they laid off their twitterer.
ReplyDeleteI find some dark humor in the fact that corporate can't even make 2 tweets a day - the very bare minimum metric it holds it's information center employees to. Will this be reflected in the performance reviews of the CEO, the CFO, COO and CMO? Will they be held to a 1% or 0% annual salary increase for failing to the a standard as so many regular workers were this year? Here's betting they get the fat cash anyway.
ReplyDeleteAs a veteran "Gannetteer" I'm amused when the bosses try to berate the workers when the "next big thing" is unveiled by promising that "This isn't the flavor of the month" and "this isn't going away in a month" and my favorite "if you're not on board, there's the door."
The paradox I've witnessed is that the workers in the trenches are the ones who pick up the "flag" of the latest initiative and carry it out better than the so-called leaders.
For the record, and to beat the critics to the punch I do not view the digital changes and use of social media as a flavor of the day. It is here to stay, I'm on board and I can see a demonstrable change in the metrics of own work when I promote it on social media. I've also turned to social media to get and "broadcast" breaking news ( after verifying of course) simply because it is faster than waiting to get news posted on our own slow ass websites.
Why does corporate have nothing to post? Because we've already read the truth here on the blog. Epic fail, corporate!
If you want an even funnier Gannett twitter feed and the epitome of lazy, take a look at @gannettsocial Corporate marketing people are embarrassing themselves.
ReplyDeleteThose endless, identical tweets must be going out automatically as those issues of the news and sports "dailies" are updated. No wonder this Twitter page has only 2,800 followers.
Delete