The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

A rare and mystical event happened this week – almost on a par with one of those comets that swings by the earth once or twice a generation.

A new newspaper launched in the UK.

The left-wing Canary hit the shelves in 6,500 newsagents (price £1.20) offering a different perspective to “corporate media” and explaining that “the threat of a Reform government in 2029” was a driving force behind the launch. It has plans to expand its operation in June and unlike the rest of the media has been recruiting staff. It ultimately wants to reach a point where it can sell 100,000 copies a day.

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It’s a bold move. The last UK national newspaper launch, Trinity Mirror’s positive newsbrand The New Day, was in 2016 and lasted a mere two months before the bosses made the decision to stop the presses.

And in a previous life, as I’ve mentioned before, I was part of the team that set up The Sportsman - a sports betting and horse racing paper that was taking on the Racing Post. It lasted about seven months before the funders pulled the plug.

This launch is interesting and, dare I say it, just slightly more likely to survive than its predecessors. It’s not commercially driven like other launches (included in that list Murdoch’s California Post earlier this year which we covered here).

Yes, it would like to make money but the aim, as the editor explains here, is to attract the older, largely working-class audience not being served by print media in the UK (around 11 million people the Canary believes do not vote consistently and are not politically engaged by “corporate media”).

So, why is it likely to survive and even thrive?

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Pictures in a press release can be just as important as the words themselves. I’ve seen brilliant stories with all the ingredients for a double-page spread end up squeezed onto a single page because the accompanying images weren’t strong enough. I wrote about it on LinkedIn a few weeks ago.

Sometimes a media outlet will send its own photographer but that’s far from guaranteed. If you’re organising a stunt, campaign or overseas story, it’s vital to invest in a good photographer who can capture sharp, high-quality images that editors will want to use.

We’re planning to do a whole edition soon on what makes a great media picture, so I’ll save the deeper dive on that for another day. For now, this is all about how to properly sell the photos you already have in a press release… complete with real examples from my inbox. I’ll also cover the best formats for sending images to journalists and picture desks. In other words: I’m giving away all the trade secrets!

I’ll do a separate edition on video soon too, because that’s becoming increasingly important to modern newsroom storytelling. So stay tuned because there’s plenty more to come.

But for now… back to pictures!

The easier you make a journalist’s life, the better your chances of coverage. If we have to request access, hunt for captions or chase credits then you’re already creating friction.

Great pictures won’t rescue a weak story but weak pictures can absolutely hold back a great one.

Should you refer to the pictures at the top of your email?

This is something I’ve often been asked in the last few months and the answer is ABSOLUTELY YES! If you have fantastic images, shout about it! I work for a tabloid so pictures are especially important to my outlet but they also matter to broadsheet titles and online-only publications too. Broadcasters will like anything visual too but are likely to be more interested in moving pictures.

I would say it’s worth mentioning great images high up in an email pitch. Second to fourth paragraph would be absolutely fine. No need to include it in the very top sentence of a pitch.

Example 1: This organisation put this in the fourth paragraph of an email pitch. It would have been ideal to link to the images where they’re referenced too.

Example 2: Another organisation highlighted this sentence in yellow - although admittedly this sentence was in the 11th paragraph so a tad bit too low down I think.

Example 3: This charity opted to use bullet points fairly high up in a pitch to mention videos and pictures to link to their new campaign

These all work well because they were mostly quite high up in a press release. The yellow highlighter, bullet points or bold formatting were used to shout about the accompanying attachments. If a journalist is short on time and skimming a release, all of this can be incredibly helpful.

What format should you send images in?

Now, let’s get into the actual format that reporters like to receive images in. WeTransfer? Dropbox? PDFs?

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Hello hello! It’s Steph here! I’ve taken over Dan’s usual Thursday spot while he enjoys a break. We’re doing something different this week… a good ol’ fashioned Q&A.

I thought I’d answer a few questions about the nuts and bolts of how I prefer to receive pitches, what topics I’m most interested in currently and how to make visit work best for me.

I dive a bit into how video has changed my reporting and a bit about how to make Sunday for Monday stories for for me.

I’d suggest all comms pros ask journalists these sorts of questions when you have a chat with them over lunch or coffee. Every reporter has their own way of doing things but if you understand how they work or their preferences, you’re on your way to a better relationship!

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It’s quite common to find former journalists in the comms world. What’s much rarer is to find a comms pro who has made the switch to journalism… but that’s exactly what we have here today!

Meet Aaron Newbury! He’s a former press officer for the Conservative Party and now has the pleasure of spending his working hours sitting beside me in the Daily Express’s Parliamentary office where is he a reporter.

Aaron is one to watch. He’s fresh to the world of reporting (after six years in on the other side of the fence) but he’s taken to it like a duck to water. There is no doubt in my mind that his former job makes him an ever better journalist because he can spot spin a mile off.

So, having seen things from both sides…

Aaron, what are the biggest misconceptions each side has about the other? Press officers are naturally cautious when dealing with “hostile” outlets, namely those that didn’t endorse their team last election, and as such they tend to believe that journalists from those outlets always have an angle and are just trying to trip them up.

On the flip side, press officers are not always trying to be evasive or not answer the question. A lot of the time they might just not see the story in the same way a reporter does, or could simply not be aware of a change in position - of different data being out there that disproves what they’re saying.

If you had to go back to being a press officer with the experience you’ve now had as a reporter, what would you do differently? I’d go back with much more of an understanding of how online media works, and the importance of making people available to speak to the press more easily. Often you end up acting as a gatekeeper when you’re a press officer, and a lot of the time that gate stays closed. But it is often to the detriment of the person you’re working for.

How has your time in communications influenced the way you deal with PRs today? I think it’s fair to say I can sniff out when I am being spun a line - after all I used to do it. Newbies often make it very obvious, a literal change in their tone of voice, refusal to send things on WhatsApp or email (preferring a phone call).

Real pros find a way where their interests align with the story you are writing or a campaign your paper is running. They work with a reporter and are open about doing it, not trying to throw them off a scent, but offer them another one they can both run after.

Having seen both sides, do you think journalists and communications professionals understand each other well enough? No. Communications professionals are there to sell a product, protect a brand or advance a campaign. Journalists are there to find the truth and present it to their readers.

Anything else you’d like to add? Remember that journalists, and press officers at the end of the day, are just trying to do their jobs. That means remembering they are people as well! One of my favourite moments during my time as a press officer was when a team of journalists from the political lobby had to wake up at silly-o-clock to get a coach and head across the country with only one lonesome press officer (me) herding them in.

Nobody knew who they would be interviewing or where they were even going. So we found out their favourite snacks, and stuffed the coach with them. A small thing for sure, but one that made the early morning a little less of a chore. (Steph here, I’m pretty sure I was on board that battle bus journey and found a KitKat waiting for me. I’m also happy to confirm that to this day, it seems he still remembers several reporters’ favourite treats! Oh, and as for the politician…it was then Prime Minister Rishi Sunak we were off to see.)

Quick fire...

Inbox zero or 10,000 unread emails? Zero!

Three words that guarantee you’ll open a pitch? “Exclusive for your”

Three words that guarantee you’ll ignore a pitch? - “Have you seen?”

How many tabs do you have open right now? -12

Best place to contact you? - Email first (aaron.newbury@reachplc.com) and then WhatsApp.

Remember folks, keep this just between us! We’re off the record.

Thank you for reading Off the Record! We want to make our newsletter as helpful as we can, so please get in contact if there’s anything specific you want to see.

We offer media masterclasses for brands/PRs/organisations looking to sharpen their storytelling, improve their relationships with journalists and boost their media coverage. If you’re interested, please email us at info@offtherecordmedia.co.uk

• You can follow Off the Record on Instagram and TikTok.

• You can follow Steph Spyro on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter/X and BlueSky.

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

The FBI has reportedly opened a criminal investigation into Atlantic journalist Sarah Fitzpatrick, following an article she published last month about the bureau’s director Kash Patel and concerns about his unexplained absences and alleged excessive drinking. Kash has also launched a $250million lawsuit against Fitzpatrick and the publisher for defamation.

It comes as we are starting to see more state and big corporation intervention and obstruction to journalism and publishers.

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Last week the editor of the Wall Street Journal said powerful figures were increasingly threatening to sue media outlets before they have even published a story. Emma Tucker, whose title is being sued by Donald Trump over its reporting of his relationship with the late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, said the tactic of threatening to sue newspapers before they had published a story had become an established PR strategy of the powerful.

President Trump’s dislike of MSM has been well documented but we are seeing increasing difficulties in the UK.

It’s not quite like the US yet but it’s certainly true that many publishers and broadcasters are having to fight off a range of legal claims, including for breach of copyright, defamation and vexatious complaints to regulators such as IPSO.

It made me think about the risks to comms pros and the world of PR at a time when litigious players are threatening legal action at the drop of a hat. There is no doubt that although the risk is smaller than for publishers, they can potentially be dragged into the legal net.

And it’s particularly pertinent when the opportunity to be the creator/publisher is open to PRs more than ever – whether it is messages on X or Facebook, video on YouTube or appearances on podcasts.

It’s also an issue close to my heart as one of my other roles is chair of the law board for the National Council for the Training of Journalists.

We offer bespoke legal courses for Comms Pros – please drop us a line if you are interested. But for those who don’t want a law lecture just yet, here are a few thoughts.

• Defamation: Traditionally the biggest legal threat to journalists. The test of whether someone can sue for libel is: has it been published, are they identifiable, is it defamatory. So, a tweet is going to count as being published along with any other social media post (ask Sally Bercow, the wife of the former Speaker of the House of Commons who was one of hundreds who were sued for tweeting about a member of the House of Lords who had been wrongly accused of sexual offences). Remember you can libel businesses – and they are likely to have the money to take action. And is it defamatory – use the common sense test. If it makes people think worse of a company or individual, then it will meet the threshold.

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Fishermen and farmers have long been some of my favourite people to interview. Without fail, every single one I’ve spoken to has been punchy and passionate. There’s never any mincing of words (a journalist’s dream). Due to the nature of their jobs, it’s always made for great pictures. I guess that is a pretty good summary of what makes the perfect case study.

These real-life stories of an individual or a group is a vital tool in a reporter’s arsenal to illustrate a broader issue or trend. I’m biased, of course, but I think it’s something the Daily Express does brilliantly. As a tabloid, we have a knack for taking nitty gritty topics and “humanising” them, often with the help of case studies.

These human features also provide evidence. Policies, statistics and trends can often feel abstract. A well-chosen case study turns those abstractions into something tangible. It answers the question every reader is asking: What does this actually mean for someone like me?

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The government’s inheritance tax raid on farmers, which the Daily Express led the calls for U-turn on over 18 months, was a perfect example of the power of case studies. Families spelling out the real-world impact of the tax policy changes were brilliant to showcase what the effect of the policy changes would be. As for that U-turn? It did eventually come one sudden December day last year.

Some case studies sit beside a main article while others sit as solo stories. The answer to which road a news editor chooses to go down is not simple. It depends on the issue, the relevance of it to the publication’s audience and the strength of the story/interview. The farmers were such a key campaign for the paper that we often highlighted powerful case studies as individual stories across the paper and even as our front page articles. But, more often than not, you’ll see them featured beside the main news story.

Before I get into my top tips for things that make the best case studies, I would point out that some media outlets use them more than others. It is always worth offering one up if you have the access to people willing to speak.

So, now, what are case study essentials? The things that are non-negotiable? The things that make a journalist more likely to use a case study?

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

Have you voted today? Or have you already marked your cross on the ballot paper in the lazy way like I do with a postal vote.

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I’m quite geeky on democracy – so much so that in the 37 years I’ve been on the electoral register I’ve never missed a vote, including in a European election on my 18^th birthday.

I’m thinking turnout today will be pretty high for a local election, unless you’re a diehard Labour supporter. And even then, a vote to keep others out may well be incentive enough.

As someone who has worked in media and government, it feels like interesting days. Both sectors are seeing sea-changes that are shifting the shape of politics, culture and society.

So, before a vote has yet been counted, here are my six hot takes on what these local elections will mean for the comms industry and what they signal about the wider state of the UK – and what might follow.

• The changing face of Brits’ views. Old ways of voting have changed. The two main parties have seen the percentage of the electorate supporting them dwindle in the last five years – such that both now are getting under 20% of the vote. But it is also indicative of a wider societal way of life. Party loyalty is almost dead (some 60% of voters have changed who they vote for in the past 10 years compared to around 10% pre-2010). We are seeing that variety and change in people’s interests and what they care about. Brand loyalty similarly is out of the window. That’s definitely true in the media but also everyday life. Loyalty to a product is being swept aside by concerns around cost, customer service and quality.

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We’re going to dive into all things local elections but I must warn you that we have an Off the Record FIRST! Ladies and gentleman, this edition features a topic I didn’t quite envisage discussing when I started this newsletter for comms pros. So, let’s talk about… sex. Zoë is the journalist behind the “summer of sex” headlines that recently swept across the world’s media after she interviewed Labour MP Samantha Niblett. She shares the inside story behind the scoop.

But before all that…

Zoë, where do you think comms pros have the most opportunity to get involved in local election coverage? It depends on the publication and the journalist being pitched to, but from a PoliticsHome perspective, the strongest pitches are those that go beyond individual races and speak to wider trends. We’re particularly interested in insights on how campaigning and political communication are evolving, or exclusive data that reveals patterns across different parts of the country. Comms professionals who can offer clear, evidence-based analysis that fits into our existing reporting are far more likely to cut through.

What about the Welsh Senedd and Scottish elections? The same concepts apply. For those, I will be particularly interested in evidence-based analysis of any cross-party coalitions in the Senedd and Holyrood in the months ahead.

What words or phrases instantly raise red flags for you when you interview a politician? It’s always a red flag when a politician says the public “does not care” about a topic, or that it “never comes up on the doorstep”. While there can be a fair point about Westminster chasing stories that don’t always resonate with the electorate, this framing is often used by politicians to shut down scrutiny rather than engage with the question.

Certain phrases have become so overused that they have lost meaning. “Hardworking families” is a good example, as it’s vague and rarely defined. Likewise, “delivery” is repeated so often that it becomes an empty buzzword. Voters don’t care about “delivery” in the abstract: they care about tangible outcomes and how policies affect their lives.

If you could ban one PR tactic during elections, what would it be? Repetitive, non-personalised press releases and follow-ups, especially those labelled “exclusive” when they clearly are not. If something is genuinely newsworthy, it should stand on its own merits without inflated framing.

During elections, journalists’ inboxes are flooded, and releases that recycle lines about the Labour and Conservative vote collapsing do not tell us anything new. Similarly, offering a generic “local elections expert” does not draw me in – what in particular are they offering analysis about, and what are their conclusions?

How can comms pros get involved with local election coverage from May 8? At PoliticsHome, our focus after polling day will be on thoughtful, in-depth analysis of the results and what they mean, both immediately and in the weeks that follow. We prioritise quality over speed, so we’re often more receptive to pitches once the initial rush has passed.

The day or two after results begin to come in are extremely busy, so it’s helpful if comms professionals establish relationships in advance, before polling day, and clearly set out what insight or data they will be able to offer.

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Is there anything else you want comms pros to know that I haven’t asked? I can probably count on one hand the number of times I’ve followed up on a press release that isn’t either directly and clearly personalised to my reporting or genuinely exclusive.

The most effective pitches come from people who have taken the time to understand my reporting – identifying themes in my work and offering a thoughtful way to develop that coverage further. I appreciate that this level of targeting takes time that many comms professionals are short on, and isn’t always scalable, but it does make a significant difference. And if in doubt, suggest a coffee, and I’ll usually try to make time.

Zoë, we’re going to pivot slightly. I usually do a quick fire round at this but I want to talk to you about sex. You’re the journalist who brought us “summer of sex” headlines. What was that interview like? Can you share the story behind the story please? I have a feeling this is going to follow me around for a while…

Here’s what actually happened. Labour MP Samantha Niblett got in touch to say she was launching a campaign on lifelong, inclusive sex education. Knowing she was likely speaking to other journalists, I asked her for a coffee straight away that same afternoon.

Backbench MP campaigns often struggle to cut through, but it struck me that if she was calling for a more open conversation about sex, she might be willing to speak about it in a genuinely open way herself. That’s quite rare in political interviews, so I wanted to lean into it and do something more candid and unfiltered.

Before we started, I checked that everything could be on the record, including more personal questions, and she agreed. What followed was a very honest, wide-ranging interview where she was willing to put a lot on the table. She pushed back other interviews to give me the exclusive, built on a relationship of trust developed over time and an understanding of PoliticsHome’s fair, non-partisan approach.

The result was a story that cut through in a way most backbench campaigns fail to do, and it drove conversation in Westminster and beyond for days.

Were you surprised by the response, or did you expect it? I had a sense it would go big while I was carrying out the interview. There are rare moments as a journalist where you can almost see the headlines forming in real time, and this was one of them.

That said, the scale and longevity of the response went beyond what I expected. If the campaign had been covered in a more conventional, guarded way, it wouldn’t have had the same impact. The honesty was what made it land.

I expected strong engagement on social media, but the fact that it sustained coverage for over a week, generated major opinion pieces, and was even picked up internationally was more than I could have hoped for. If the aim was to spark a national conversation, it certainly did that.

What’s the story you’re most proud of? One story I’m particularly proud of looked at how MPs were using AI last year. It started with a throwaway comment from an MP about playing “ChatGPT bingo” in his office, which led me to dig into the data. I analysed Hansard to track how often the Americanised phrase “I rise to speak” was being used in UK Parliament, and found a noticeable spike that coincided with the rise of generative AI tools. It was a simple idea, but it offered a fresh, evidence-based angle on a topic everyone was starting to talk about.

The story was picked up widely across newspapers, broadcasters and magazines, and even became a bit of a running joke in Westminster. It showed how a small, creative data point can open up a much bigger conversation.

How can comms pros engage with you more? Personalised, thoughtful pitches always stand out, but it also helps when comms professionals engage with my work more broadly, particularly on social media.

Journalists do spend a lot of time online (for our sins), and if you’re interacting with my reporting where I share it, it gives you a better sense of the themes I’m interested in and how I approach stories. It also helps build familiarity and trust over time.

And as ever, if there’s something specific you want to discuss, just ask for a call or a coffee.

Where can people find you? You can email me at zoe.crowther@politicshome.com or reach out via social media. I’m on LinkedIn, X, Bluesky, Instagram and TikTok.

Remember folks, keep this just between us! We’re off the record.

Thank you for reading Off the Record! We want to make our newsletter as helpful as we can, so please get in contact if there’s anything specific you want to see.

We offer media masterclasses for brands/PRs/organisations looking to sharpen their storytelling, improve their relationships with journalists and boost their media coverage. If you’re interested, please email us at info@offtherecordmedia.co.uk

• You can follow Off the Record on Instagram and TikTok.

• You can follow Steph Spyro on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter/X and BlueSky.

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

I was lucky enough to see the England cricket team in Australia over the winter.

One of those little ambitions. Go to Brisbane, see the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne, mix with some antipodean friends Down Under. Oh, and see a match with the fanatics of the Barmy Army, England’s travelling band of loyal and noisy fans who are a staple of every England game abroad.

For those who don’t know, the Barmy Army is effectively a travel business. But one that largely caters for the diehard England fans willing to spend thousands watching England play abroad in places like Australia, South Africa and the Caribbean. It’s a bit eccentric. People dress up (my favourite is the old boy in Charlie Chaplin garb), they sing songs for every player, they gently barrack the opposition. And they stay cheerful when England loses.

It’s by no means the only way of seeing England play, but as an organised trip it’s easy, fun and I imagine profitable for the Barmy Army travel company.

Anyhow, the pretty innocuous Barmy Army is in the news this week and it’s a classic comms muck up – and there are lessons for every comms pro.

So, Vic Flowers, 74, a former joiner from Oldham dubbed the Army’s “greatest of all time” after 30 years on tour with his fellow fans it has emerged is standing in next week’s local elections as a Reform UK candidate. Because of his habit of turning to games in a top hat and a St George’s Cross flag he sometimes was called the supporters ‘unofficial leader’. Note unofficial.

Now when his background emerged, the Barmy Army bosses thought it wise to slap him down a little and put some distance between themselves.

A statement on social media said: “We wish to be clear that the individual referred to in recent media coverage, in connection with his candidacy for Reform UK at a local election, is not an active member of the Barmy Army, nor is he employed by, or affiliated with, the Barmy Army in any official capacity.

“Any views attributed to him do not reflect the views, values or position of the Barmy Army as an organisation or its wider support community. The Barmy Army does not endorse any political agenda, candidate or campaign, and remains entirely focused on supporting England cricket in a way that unites and celebrates our supporters.”

It’s little surprise that the small spat got coverage across the media. And a bit of a backlash from a bundle of cricket fans who would be prime candidates to travel with the Barmy Army.

Let me say now, this is not a political thing. It’s not about the rights and wrongs of Reform policies or their policies. It’s about business and the wisdom of getting involved when it’s unnecessary and the potential consequences.

So, the typical Barmy Army fan is generally a bit older, relatively wealthy (or willing to put a disproportionate amount of income into following England) and patriotic obviously. I imagine there’s a fair mix of political views.

And it’s fair to say there has been a bit of reaction from supporters – I imagine both from those who might support Reform themselves but also from some who wonder why a travel firm feels it needs to put its nose into a local election in Oldham.

It’s been enough to force the Barmy Army to issue a note as a way of explanation and retraction. I got it in my inbox yesterday afternoon.

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“Steph, how do I spot coverage opportunities?” was a question I got asked a few days ago. It stuck with me because if one person is asking it, plenty of others probably are too.

So this edition of OTR is all about that: how to spot the signals that can turn into stories, lead to fresh angles and create opportunities for meaningful coverage.

1. Think in hooks, not topics. Is there fresh data, clear conflict or a compelling case study? Is there something that gives the story a reason to exist now?

2. Spot and share trends with reporters before they become headlines. Have you noticed something bubbling away? Are campaigners, businesses or communities starting to voice concern or frustration?

3. Engage with adjacent beats. For example, pitch diet shifts to health reporters. Agriculture works brilliantly for political journos at the moment. You could also frame climate impacts as economic risk and pitch to business/finance desks. The obvious for all of these is to pitch to an environment reporter but there are opportunities in approaching others.

4. Use unexpected voices. This can help reframe a familiar story in a fresh and credible way. For example, get a former military strategist to discuss misinformation campaigns or tech engineers to analyse workplace burnout culture. Economists talking about the impact of diet shifts and even farmers advocating for plant-based transitions also do the trick. This can help unlock pitches to different editorial desks.

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

It’s been another week of hard news dominating the headlines at the moment. The rollercoaster of Iran and war in the Middle East, the psychodrama around the Prime Minister’s involvement in the appointment of Peter Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador in Washington and the report into the tragic killings in Southport are hard to escape.

As I have discussed, it can seem difficult to get coverage for your clients and causes when such momentous events are going on – although hopefully our tips help a little.

I’ve been pondering more about the issue over the last seven days and I thought it was worth expanding on – and asking if it is actually the case that hard news is dead (or at least dormant) for many publishers and operators.

I know, I know, that might seem counterintuitive – the press is full of coverage of serious, sometimes downright scary and depressing news, you will rightly say.

But the truth is that hard news is not where the media is making its money. These big issues do need coverage, but the number of people who are picking up papers, watching news bulletins, listening to the Today programme etc is undoubtedly on a steep slide.

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And it’s not just about readers and viewers deserting mainstream media.

The trend for businesses who advertise in the media to be brand safe is going nowhere – and in fact the demands are more influential than ever (so much so that it is not unheard of for major advertisers to pull front page promotions if a splash is not agreeable to them).

On a list of stories both online and in print that advertisers do not want to be associated with are war and humanitarian disaster (particularly, I am afraid, when it is a long way from home), horrendous murders, anything connected to paedophiles, culture wars such as we have seen over trans rights, grim court cases and migration. There may well be more but you get the gist.

All of which begs the question, what are the stories and features that are getting attention from readers and advertisers? And where are the public going to consume their media?

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I’m delighted to introduce my boss’s boss’s boss’s boss… you get the idea! David Higgerson is chief content officer at Reach plc (publisher of the Daily Express, Daily Mirror, Daily Star and a vast portfolio of local titles). He’s also been a long-time fan of Off the Record (which I’m incredibly grateful for)!

Today, David is taking over the reins of the newsletter, sharing his do’s and don’ts for comms pros. He dives into the impact of AI on newsrooms, what the news creator economy means for the industry and how both are reshaping the relationship between journalists and comms pros.

David, if you were starting Reach from scratch, what would be the digital model? Subscriptions, hits online, keeping papers going as long as possible etc? This is the question I asked our editors when we set out to restructure editorial last year.

We’re a company which exists to connect with people where they live and what interests them, building a sustainable future for journalism in the process, and I believe we have to look to audiences and understand what they want to determine what that model is.

For journalism to be effective, it needs to be seen by lots of people - the people who it can stand up for, the people it can help, and also the people it needs to stand up to.

90% of people in the UK say they wouldn’t pay for news - there are many reasons for that – from the BBC being all dominant through to the cost of living crisis. So if I was building Reach from scratch today, I’d want a model which set out to reach as many people as possible by understanding how our journalism can make a difference to their lives.

Subscriptions would be an important part of the model, but not in a “walled garden” way - but in the way we are pursuing it, offering a premium tier to readers who really value deeply what we do.

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Placing a greater emphasis on the relationship between individual journalists and readers - as we’re seeing with the growing news creator economy - is essential too.

While newspaper circulation is in decline, we are very lucky to have so many brands which have such history in the UK and Ireland. It would be very hard to recreate that starting from scratch today. It’s not just about keeping them going for as long as possible - for me, it’s about understanding the particular needs of print readers and making us part of their daily routine for as long as possible.

Like all publishers, we need to learn and adapt to forms of storytelling which we weren’t traditionally known for - in our case, audio and video, and that is something we are putting at the heart of the business.

What role do you see AI playing in newsrooms over the next five years? AI is an opportunity and a threat to journalism. We’ve seen the impact of AI Overviews on audiences from Google, and also how AI is used to perpetuate dis and misinformation rapidly around the globe. The ability to dupe the public with AI is a constant threat both in civil society and for journalists going about their work, making life harder.

AI however has a massive role to play in helping us do the job we want to do, cutting out the more tedious parts of the job - especially in digital storytelling - so we can focus on the parts of the job we enjoy the most and which the reader values the most.

AI will help us reach more people, in more formats, more quickly, and we already have lots of examples of that at Reach. It has to be built on the basis of helping journalism, which is our starting point.

Are there any newsroom tasks you think AI should definitely not touch? AI should not be used to do anything which interferes with the most important commodity in journalism: Trust. We need people to trust us with their stories, and to trust us to represent them and their communities fairly. There are loads of ways AI can help with storytelling, but it must do so within these parameters.

The most important relationship in journalism is between the journalist/publication and the reader. The reader is choosing us over multiple other sources, including on social media, where AI-generated content can often be alluring.

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So to answer your question, AI cannot replace key editorial decision making - be that from the reporter when they are deciding which angle to pursue, and which questions to ask, through to the news editor deciding what to place and where, to the editor ultimately setting the agenda for his or her title.

Within that, we should of course always experiment with how AI can help us, but not replace the critical decision making at every step of the process.

Reach has a “whitelist” of trusted PR firms to curb fake AI experts. Do you see the whitelist as a temporary fix or part of your long‑term editorial process? I’d love it to be temporary, but we have to be realistic that there are bad actors who want to try and dupe their way into legitimate media coverage.

The white list has received a lot of press. What we’ve created is an AI “detective” tool which can help journalists when dealing with press releases to understand how credible the source is. This tool gives an instant report on a release, grading it on everything from the credibility of the expert sources, to the PR company itself, to the claims within the release. It’s always still up to the journalist to decide whether they want to pursue the story or not.

Whether the PR is known to us is just one of the factors that the tool reports on and PR firms go on to the white list if they are endorsed or recommended by one of Reach’s journalists. It means that when the Detective tool reports back on the press release being reviewed, it can reference whether or not another Reach journalist has endorsed the PR firm sending it. It’s a version of asking around in the newsroom if your colleagues have ever worked with someone before and would vouch for them - only using the Detective, journalists can draw on the advice of hundreds of colleagues.

In an ideal world, journalists should be able to spend time focusing on what is being said in a press release, and validating it, rather than having to prove whether the quoted person is real. But we are where we are, and we’re trying to make it as quick as possible for our journalists to be able to do that verification.

The whole industry is losing paper sales and has done so for decades. Do you think there will always be a role for them even when they are loss making? Yes, and I don’t necessarily think we should assume they will be loss making. I don’t see a world where there will be a state subsidy to support loss-making newspapers, so the question then becomes what newspapers become to ensure we can sustain them.

A little bit like the vinyl revival, I believe the slow news movement will sustain printed papers in some form or another.

But journalism’s future is an online one in the main, and it’s essential we keep responding to changes in audience habits, and find ways to sustain our journalism as we go. There’s a lot which could be done to help us in this regard, both locally and nationally, which we are pushing Government on.

Quick fire round...

Coffee first thing or emails first thing? Tea first thing and daylight before screen light!

One word to describe your inbox Rewarding.

One thing comms pros should do more of? Connect with journalists directly, and personally. I keep being told journalists are harder to connect with due to their being fewer physical newspaper offices. We’re easier to contact than ever.

One thing comms pros should do less of? Seeking coverage when links are incredibly tenuous to a title or area. Pet peeves are the [name of place] ones where the location relevance is no deeper than naming a place, or the statistical ones which are incredibly dubious and don’t stand up to scrutiny.

Remember folks, keep this just between us! We’re off the record.

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Thank you for reading Off the Record! We want to make our newsletter as helpful as we can, so please get in contact if there’s anything specific you want to see.

We offer media masterclasses for brands/PRs/organisations looking to sharpen their storytelling, improve their relationships with journalists and boost their media coverage. If you’re interested, please email us at info@offtherecordmedia.co.uk

• You can follow Steph Spyro on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter/X.

• You can follow Off the Record on Instagram and TikTok.

The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

It’s impossible to escape from what is happening in Iran and across the Middle East.

Scary and depressing, it’s getting blanket coverage across the airwaves, the press and (to a lesser extent) social media.

The war itself and the potential consequences and long-term effects are rightly at the top of the news agenda and are likely to be there for some time.

But without being flippant, if you’re a PR trying to get coverage for your client, charity or business, the war is bad news in other ways. It feels it has got ten times harder to get a look in against the very serious news that’s dominating.

So as the war in Iran drags into its second month, here’s a media insider’s view on what you can do to make sure you have a fighting chance of getting what you want into the media.

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Right everyone, the lab coat is on. Gloves at the ready. Safety glasses perched on my nose. It’s time to dissect the organism that is my inbox.

I’ve had the great pleasure of being on the other end of steph(dot)spyro(at)reachplc(dot)com for over six years. I’d LOVE to know how many emails I’ve sent (but more importantly, received) since my first shift at the Express back in November 2019.

The answer for both is: A LOT.

Today, I want to explore the things I notice the second an email lands in my inbox. For this little exercise I’m going to open a bunch of emails randomly and see what jumps out at me first. Here goes!

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1. The sender: Every journalist will be different but it seems I’ve trained myself to first spot the sender. Who is the delightful human/bot at the other end of the message I’ve been sent? If I recognise your name, you’ve already bought yourself more time in my inbox. This is why I say building relationships with journalists is vital. It helps to comment on reporters’ LinkedIn profiles, liking their posts on their professional Instagram account or meeting journalists for coffee. When that name appears in my inbox, I know there's an understanding of the stories I cover. In the age of fake experts, the trust between reporter and comms pro matters more than ever.

2. The subject line: Once I’ve spotted the emailer, my eye next moves onto the subject line. I won’t dwell too much on the art of writing these as I’ve explored this here previously (and highly recommend you read). These matter. How you craft them can help sell a pitch… or dare I say even lead to an instant “delete”.

3. The scan test: Before I properly read anything, I do a quick visual sweep. Is this easy to digest or a wall of text? Bullet points, short paragraphs and clear structure buy you more time. I hate to say it but the formatting of a press release can be a MAJOR barrier to reading it. You’d be surprised by the number that are visually problematic. Lots don’t make for easy reading is all I’ll say…

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

“You idiot. You naive, foolish, irresponsible nincompoop.”

That’s how then Prime minister Tony Blair admonished himself for introducing laws 20 years ago allowing members of the public to make freedom of information requests of the government and public bodies.

The legislation was designed to allow transparency in public decision making but Blair quickly felt it made frank, private discussions in government more difficult – and had become a weapon for critics and journalists.

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He is of course right on that last point. It is part of the (entirely legitimate) armoury for journalists to get inside government, councils, the myriad of quangos and public bodies that spend taxpayers money for good or bad.

And as my colleague Steph explains in her essential guide to making FOI requests, it can generate a huge amount of great data that is of genuine public interest.

But what Blair introduced and then regretted, the current Labour government are looking to effectively curtail, according to a report by the Financial Times.

Rules currently allow authorities to refuse requests on cost grounds if they believe researching the answer will go over £600 for government or £450 for public bodies (those limits, by the way, have never been increased for inflation one estimate suggests if they had been inflation-linked, the £600 government limit would now be roughly £1,097, and the £450 limit would be over £820).

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Jacob Granger, community editor at Journalism UK, is taking the reins of Off the Record this week. The media insider unpacks how newsrooms are evolving and helps unpack the shift from volume-driven journalism to a model built on audience value, engagement and trust.

Jacob, you’ve told me that journalism is moving from a “volume-based” era to a “value-based” era. What does that shift actually look like in practice inside modern newsrooms? How should comms pros adapt? It means that we are in the midst of changing metrics of success. Newsrooms are fighting hard for each and every user action beyond just simply clicking in and out of an article. It’s not only the page view column that matters and where newsrooms might have longer-term goals.

They are watching their dashboards closely for all sorts of other indicative behaviour metrics to influence commissioning decisions – from user journeys to registration conversions, to more sophisticated combined user metric scores. The FT for example uses a RFV (recency, frequency, volume) score to judge the success of articles. A story isn’t just a story because it’s going to get eyeballs across social and digital. A story might be a story because it will resonate deeply with their most loyal user base or convince elusive users to take an important step in the funnel.

Good editors will be aware of these subtle shifts and attitudes in their readership. Comms folk should not just think about how far stories might travel, but about how they nurture the relationships newsrooms are fostering with their readers.

How much of this shift is driven by audience expectations and how much is driven by business models like subscriptions? A little bit of both, and they’re actually connected if you think about it. We are living in times of information overload and articles that fail to meet audiences needs are simply not going to be given the time of day. And worse, it will discourage readers from coming back in the future.

At the same time, digital advertising is in severe decline in the news business, and so a lot of advertising-driven outlets have to stuff their pages with more ads to keep the business operational – much to readers’ dismay. It’s very hard to focus on these types of sites and the user experience is sub-optimal. The tide is somewhat turning and those outlets – typically local news organisations – are veering into subscription and ad-lite/ad-free models.

However, if you’re going to charge users per month in a cost of living crisis (and when people are used to getting content for free) you need to make sure you’re delivering enough return on value and expectations. Volume still matters because you need to be in a constant state of marketing and growth in terms of subscription numbers, but hanging onto them (especially beyond cheap introductory offers) is the big challenge. And user value is our best shot.

You talked to me about journalism becoming more audience-centric. What does “serving audiences well” mean today? The answer to that question depends on your organisation. Any good audience-centric newsroom will have done the legwork to understand what audiences expect from them and what they come to them for. That won’t be the same for every news organisation – readers of The Mirror have different needs to readers of The Guardian. They could be similar as they’re both national publishers. But they’ll be very different from a local news organisation or a specialist title. If you’re pitching to a media company, do the research. Look at their mission statement, look at sites like ours and others (JournalismUK) if they’ve openly spoken about what sort of content they’re focused on, look at their website or press corner for any curious new launches around new verticals, campaigns, series podcasts and so on. These are quite telling about the direction they’re moving in.

What will successful newsrooms look like in five years? It’s difficult to predict one year in advance let alone five! God knows. I’d like to think that mission-driven journalism will always find a way to survive. It may not resemble what it is today, it may well look a lot more content creator-esque, for example. It will have to be a lot more automated and AI-savvy in my view – there’s no sense being left in the dust by competitors. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing, as long as we are getting relevant, robust and responsible reporting in front of people.

You’ve said editors can’t just publish whatever PR sends through. What should comms teams understand about how editorial decision-making may have changed? There’s two things I would say: The user needs model is the number one framework for making commissioning decisions today. A genius called Dmitry Shishkin pioneered it at the BBC, and it has had an enormous ripple effect in the industry. It has since evolved into the 2.0 model and a sports-specific variant, and it basically tells broadly what needs news consumers want met when consuming content.

If you track this over time, it reveals exactly the demand in your readership, and if you can have a savvier and more efficient commissioning model if you produce more of what people want, and less of what they don’t want. The model came with the uncomfortable realisation that most news outlets do too much ‘update me’ content, and leave large parts of their audiences as untapped potential because they’re hungry for content that isn’t served up enough. The bottom line: if an editor is telling you your pitch needs a new approach, new angle or just isn’t a story, trust their instincts and go with their judgement.

Point number two is AI - there’s a lot to say about this but to keep it brief… Newsrooms are increasingly being duped by sources posing as legitimate but are in fact products of generative AI. De Telegraaf in The Netherlands is the latest to fall victim of this, but there’s been lots of examples. Press Gazette have done first-class work exposing this problem. Editors have every right to be very cautious and guarded over what they’re commissioning. Trust towards the media is not a given nowadays. In fact, it’s a luxury that many cannot afford to jeopardise. Be prepared to show your legitimacy and your access to sources.

Quick fire round:

One sentence to describe the future of journalism? In the air… disruptors are everywhere, from AI companies to content creators.

The fastest way for a pitch to get deleted? Being difficult to work with, like meddling with the story or insisting on it being told a certain way.

One thing PR people think editors want that they actually don’t? Earned media… covertly placing a product into a story is serving your interests, not the audience.

Best way to contact you? Connect me with me on LinkedIn. Please feel free to join our JUK community while you are there and our mailing list for updates on our work.

Remember folks, keep this just between us! We’re off the record.

Thank you for reading Off the Record! We want to make our newsletter as helpful as we can, so please get in contact if there’s anything specific you want to see.

We offer media masterclasses for brands/PRs/organisations looking to sharpen their storytelling, improve their relationships with journalists and boost their media coverage. If you’re interested, please email us at info@offtherecordmedia.co.uk

• You can follow Steph Spyro on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter/X.

• You can follow Off the Record on Instagram and TikTok.

The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week we will take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

Want to be hitting the media that the leading decision makers are watching and listening to? Then it’s got to be on social media.

That’s very much the message from a new survey of MPs about where they get their news from.

And the move to social media is if anything speeding up. Some 83% of MPs asked by YouGov cited social media as their primary source of news, up from 61% at the start of 2025.

That’s not to say mainstream news outlets are dead - 96% of MPs still visit newspaper websites at least once a week, with 89% visiting daily. And I’ve spoken about my experience as a special adviser in government not that long ago, where coverage in print still had an authority and standing that was appreciated by ministers.

But the direction of travel is clear, according to the survey of 105 MPs.

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Daily newsletters are also popular among the UK’s lawmakers - Politico’s daily London Playbook newsletter was read by 48% of MPs, LabourList got 28% and The Times 23%.

Overall, 70% of MPs subscribe to at least one political newsletter – up from 61% last year.

Podcasts are also on the up. Nearly two-thirds of MPs listen to a podcast every week and nearly a third listen to one every day. The Rest Is Politics led the way, followed by The News Agents, Sky News’s Electoral Dysfunction, the Sky/Politico joint effort Politics at Sam and Anne’s and The New Statesman Podcast.

A few thoughts on the survey. Interestingly, this current parliament elected in 2024 is the youngest ever, with the average age of MPs of 46 when elected (in 2019 it was 51). That might not seem that much, but it may well cross something of a dividing line between younger, native social media followers and an older generation (see below my thoughts on The Times’s subs).

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“Hi Steph, just checking you saw this.”

“Hi Steph, just following up on this press release. Any updates?”

“Hi Steph, think this is one for you?”

I’m on 1,001 mailing lists and receive hundreds of emails every day. Unfortunately, I’m not able to acknowledge them all. I really do try to politely decline a pitch when I know the person on the other end of the email chain but that’s not always possible.

I’d never get any reporting done if I spent the day responding to each and every pitch I receive. The same is true for hundreds of other journalists.

So, this brings me to the art of the follow-up. I don’t mind a chaser email. I try my best to stay on top of my inbox but I definitely miss things. A follow-up can be a helpful nudge to bring something back to the top of my inbox.

Here are some of my thoughts on what to/not to do:

1. Keep follow-ups shorter than the original pitch. One to three sentences maximum is ideal.

2. Change the subject line on a follow-up. If the first subject didn’t land, don’t reuse it. Try a sharper angle or a data point.

3. Time your follow-ups to a journalist’s workflow. Certain times of the day and news cycle should be avoided... like late on Fridays, weekends (unless news-driven) and the height of major breaking news cycles. Instead, try early mornings or early afternoons.

4. Don’t fake urgency. Don’t say something is “time-sensitive” when it isn’t. That’s just a credibility killer.

5. Don’t “just bump” the email. “Just bumping this to the top of your inbox” adds zero value.

So what should you do instead?

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The media landscape is changing at pace – and keeping up with the latest developments and moves will give every comms expert an advantage over their rivals. Every week we will take a look at the media business from mainstream and ‘legacy’ media to cutting edge tech and the latest trends and developments – and how you can use that know-how.

There was an interesting difference of opinion at the Society of Editors Future of News Conference last week between the bosses of two of the most influential and oldest names in journalism.

PA Media editor-in-chief Jack Lefley and his counterpart at Reuters Alessandra Galloni had very different takes on the role AI should play in creating the news. (My very simplistic interpretation is that Lefley is a purist and thinks that humans should do the reporting for everything that his organisation puts out, while Galloni is more liberal on using AI even in frontline reporting so that journalists can be freed up to meet people and get scoops).

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The use of AI with both its fantastic possibilities and difficult drawbacks is an issue we have discussed on Off the Record in the past and undoubtedly will again.

But with two agency giants holding court at the Society of Editors, I wanted today to discuss the state of freelance and agency journalism – and most importantly how comms pros and PRs can use them to their own advantage.

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It gives me great pleasure to hand over this edition of Off the Record to Press Gazette’s UK editor Charlotte Tobitt.

She dives into the forces reshaping journalism right now... from the sharp decline in Google-driven traffic to the growing influence of AI across newsrooms.

As publishers rethink their strategies and double down on original reporting, Charlotte explores what these shifts mean for journalists, comms pros and the future of trusted news.

1. Charlotte, what has been the biggest shift you’ve noticed in terms of how journalism has changed in the last 18 months? The biggest change has been the fact that Google is no longer sending so much search traffic to publishers as a) it changes its algorithm to favour other types of content (eg sharing Youtube and X links in its Discover mobile feed) and b) AI Overviews now provide summaries in response to searches, meaning fewer people feel the need to click through to the original sources.

As a result many publishers have changed the type of content they are creating. For years many were creating SEO-driven and/or evergreen queries to get clicks and help support their core news journalism. But these are exactly the type of queries that are no longer getting as much traction in Google.

Instead, original reporting and analysis that can’t be found elsewhere is key - as is breaking news. These are the things that are harder for Google and LLMs to aggregate. I think this shift is only going to become more noticeable as 2026 continues.

2. Where do you think AI will have the biggest impact on the industry? My biggest concern is around the use of AI in content where it’s not known or disclosed.

To be clear, I don’t think this is a widespread problem right now. But there have certainly been examples that we need to learn from before it’s too late.

Last year a freelance journalist who appears not to be a real person managed to get several articles, which also included fabricated quotes, published in major newsbrands. It’s worrying that these got through to the publication stage before any red flags were used.

Just this week a senior media executive has been suspended after articles he wrote about the industry were found to have contained quotes from named individuals that were, in fact, AI hallucinations. He had used AI to summarise materials and not sufficiently checked the finished product. More widely, it is getting harder and harder to tell at first glance whether AI-created imagery is real or not. Supposed photos from Zendaya and Tom Holland’s wedding were the latest example.

The impact of all of this is that truth is getting more and more important. Journalists are uniquely placed to help people understand what is real and what’s not. So I think the news publishers that flourish will be the ones that take that seriously and don’t do anything to destroy that trust they have built up. To add a second part to this answer, the time savings from AI could make a huge difference to the amount of original journalism we are all able to put out into the world.

Aside from small changes like making it easier to file a story in the CMS with all the required bells and whistles, some publishers are now experimenting with AI agents helping them to write quotidian stories from press releases and other trusted sources. This means the trained journalists they employ can spend more time sniffing out stories that will ultimately add more to society.

With sufficient human checks this could be a net positive. But I do think we need to be cautious about any consumer-facing use of AI - and at least disclose it very clearly.

3. What advice would you give to comms pros looking to adapt to the changing media landscape? Don’t be tempted by shortcuts! Similar to the above, Press Gazette has done a lot of reporting over the past year on fake, AI-generated subject matter ‘experts’ making their way into major news publications. A lot of these have been pushed by bad PR actors.

So I think comms professionals need to be aware that humans are more important than ever at this point in time and they can help journalists decipher what’s real and what’s not if they do their job right. Make it easy for journalists to speak to case studies on the phone, for example. Don’t be offended if they want to do extra verification that they wouldn’t have done a year ago. In fact, why not offer all of these extra steps from the start?

4. What trend in the industry are you really excited about (which might potentially feel long overdue)? I’m thrilled by the fact that it’s now largely agreed that journalism has a value that is worth paying for. When I started at Press Gazette eight years ago the subscription-based publishers were the exception. Now, it’s basically the rule.

Even Reach, Daily Mail and The Sun all have premium paywalls on their websites now. Readers can still access the main news stories for free but they all have their own specialisms that mean they are producing content that no-one else is. If they build a relationship with their core audience, it’s a no-brainer that those people should pay for that.

The other key part of this trend is that the general public are now much more willing to pay. Platforms like Substack and Patreon have helped with this and that’s felt like a trend picking up tremendous momentum over the past couple of years. There’s still some distance to go bringing everyone along on this journey, but I find it really encouraging.

5. Is there anything about old-school journalism you wish could be brought back? There are some amazing court reporters working in the UK. But it’s much harder today for news organisations to gamble on a journalist spending hours at court for potentially no reward. Everything has to have a much surer return on investment. There’s no easy solution but I think more reporting from courts would be really valuable to our understanding of society right now.

Quick fire round:

Your favourite aspect of the media to write about? I love getting stuck into how decisions made by tech platforms in Silicon Valley affect large and small news publishers on this side of the Atlantic.

Something you wish comms pros better understood about your job? As much as we’d love to cover every small news update, we simply can’t. We need to concentrate on the areas that will provide most value to our readers. It’s similar at many news organisations now. But at Press Gazette that generally means what is and isn’t helping journalism pay in this digital age.

What has surprised you about being a journalist? Most people are willing to talk to you.

How can people get in touch with you? Feel free to drop me an email on charlotte.tobitt@pressgazette.co.uk or Linkedin is the best social network to find me on now (RIP Twitter).

Thank you for reading Off the Record! We want to make our newsletter as helpful as we can so please get in touch if there’s anything specific you want to see.

We offer media masterclasses for brands/PRs/organisations looking to sharpen their storytelling, improve their relationships with journalists and boost their media coverage. If you’re interested in finding out more, please email info@offtherecordmedia.co.uk