“Humans talking to machines — and eventually, machines talking to each other — represents the next major shift in our news information ecosystem. Voice is the next big threat for journalism.”

— Amy Webb, Founder of the Future Today Institute

Media Metamorphosis: Evolve or Die

Once upon a time, the media was an all-powerful purveyor of news. It controlled the development and distribution of stories, and we, communications professionals, relied on persuading its members to write about our clients. We did all we could to shape the story favorably. However, we were at the mercy of the journalists — and ultimately — their editors. This still holds true with earned media, but as technology has democratized the creation and distribution of information, we have more options at our fingertips. Earned media is just one slice of the pie, and it’s quickly shrinking.

So far this year, more than 2,200 people lost their jobs at digital media outlets like Vice, BuzzFeed, and HuffPo, which were supposed to replace the disappearing newspapers. However, The New York Times is reporting that its digital business is thriving with 4.3 million paying subscribers, and it’s on track to reach 10 million digital subscribers by 2025.

What does this mean for media? Evolve or die. It’s the survival of the fittest. This evolution is driven by the web, and the fact is that information is so readily available and usually “free” (many would argue you are paying with your personal data). The struggle is finding a sustainable business model, with companies trying everything from ad-supported platforms to monthly subscriptions to paywalls. Some even predict the advent of bundled subscriptions to digital news sources, similar to paying for premium channels from a cable provider. Or imagine your news streaming from Netflix or Amazon. Both are already creating original content. Why wouldn’t they get into the news business?

The tech-driven media evolution goes beyond business models to story packaging and delivery. Technology also impacts the content format and distribution:

• Hyper-personalized content. Information is get is served up by algorithms that learn your preferences, e.g., Facebook news feeds.
• AI/bot-powered reporting or news aggregating. Artificial intelligence is being trained to scan the web for news reports on given topics, filter out biases, and produce stories in a matter of minutes.
• News delivered by voice-powered AI assistants. Amazon’s Alexa and Google Home Assistant may be the future of news. The Washington Post experimented with how smart speakers can use a company’s unique voice to deliver news.
• Rise of crowd-sourced content. For example, Reddit is growing steadily, averaging over 1 billion native video views and almost 1 million video uploads each month.

The shape-shifting media requires communications professionals to also evolve and keep up with the rapid pace of innovation. To engage our audiences, we must adapt to the way they are consuming media. Perhaps it’s offering stories in easily shared videos or podcasts they can listen to during commutes. Some may want full articles, others shorter blurbs. Our job is to tailor our clients’ content to the preferred formats of their audiences.

To deliver impactful results, we need to:

1) Embrace the change

2) Know our audience

3) Morph the message and the media

The secret to surviving — and thriving — is to constantly evolve into a more intelligent, agile, and perceptive version of ourselves.