Trade publications are becoming more and more dependent on contributed articles from industry experts.

I have found that pitching an interview with an expert to discuss a particular trend or concept is not as attractive to the Media as it used to be. Indeed, trade publications are still interested in these topics but prefer to receive them via a contributed article rather than an interview.

While contributing an article is a great way to get a large media placement and stay in control of the representation of your company, most executives do not have the time to be churning our 2,500-word articles every few weeks. Even more so, when publications request exclusives and articles cannot be submitted to more than one publication.

The constraint on the client’s valuable time is a dilemma for PR professionals. While wanting to achieve as much media coverage as possible for the client, it is important to keep the client load as light as possible.

PR agencies that deal with trade publications on a regular basis are finding that they must add an in-house writer to their team to be able to ghost write contributed articles on behalf of their clients. In many cases, the PR practitioner is playing the role of the journalist by interviewing the client and producing the end article.

Christmas is being attacked yet again and this time it is via the traditional Christmas Tree.

Spurring this attack is a banner at a Lowe’s store in Austin, Texas. The banner was written in both English and Spanish. While the English version read “Now here, fresh cut holiday trees,” the Spanish translation read “Now here, fresh cut Christmas trees.”

The average person would not think twice about this translation, but somehow this trivial point has made the news. Please note, it is not the use of “Holiday Tree” that forms the attack on Christmas. It is the way that people are outraged by the use of Christmas in the Spanish translation. Honestly, does it really matter?

Are people really more likely to buy a tree if it is labelled “Holiday Tree” instead of “Christmas Tree”? While “Holiday Tree” is certainly more inclusive, “Christmas Tree” follows centuries of tradition. Furthermore, does a Christmas Tree cease to be a Christmas Tree just because it has a different name?

As for those that buy Holiday Trees, will they be able to find Holiday Tree Stands? I suspect the stores are still selling them under the label of Christmas Tree Stands…..

Leading supermarket chains Target, Walmart & Costco, all announced today that they will not be using the phrase “Merry Christmas” in their advertising.

What is wrong with including “season’s greetings” alternatives, such as “Happy Holidays” and “Happy Hanukkah”, in order to avoid offending non-Christians? The drive towards omitting “Merry Christmas” altogether, I think, is a clear demonstration of the anti-Christian mood that is currently moving through the US.

What these people seem to forget is that while the Christmas Holidays are based on Christian origins, there are many non-Christians that celebrate the festivities of Christmas and exchange gifts, and do not think twice about calling it Christmas. The term “Christmas” is a part of our culture and our heritage; it need not be, and for many is not, a religious holiday.

This latest attack on using “Christmas” terminology is just another excuse to protest against Christiannity.

Isn’t it ironic that today’s society, that is so adament about equal rights, is completely bent on diminishing Christiannity? So much so, that Christiannity is demoted to a level far below the “politically correct” equality that is being so strongly advocated.

I heard on the local news the other night that newspaper circulation is on the decline. No surprise there.

The public announcement of the decline of interest in print media only serves to confirm what I have been reiterating for a while – the media landscape is evolving.

There are still plently of people who enjoy a lazy Sunday morning drinking coffee and reading the newspaper. However, more and more computer literate and Internet savvy individuals – myself included – are choosing to read the news online.

Indeed, the invention of the lap top means that it is possible to enjoy a lazy Sunday morning drinking coffee and clicking away on your mouse while lounging on the sofa. Not only that, there’s no chance of ending up with black fingers from leafing through the print version of the newspaper.

I’m not really an advocate for online media over print, really I am not. I am simply aware that the demise of print media was to be expected and probably will never be reinstated to its previous grandeur.

Blockbuster is scrambling. So much for its “no late fees” marketing campaign. Not only is Blockbuster being sued for false advertising (because “no late fees” really means an “8-day grace period”), but there is now talk of retracting the “no late fees” policy altogether.

Couple this with the presence of “on demand” movie services offered through Direct TV and satellite/cable providers, plus competitor, Netflicks, growing more and more dominant as a more convenient Blockbuster alternative, how long can Blockbuster possibly survive?

To have any hopes of survival, Blockbuster is going to have to understand the critical impact that technological change is having on its business (and much more than VHS to DVD). As technology continues to influence consumer behavior, Blockbuster will need to follow its customers and adapt as consumer convenience and availability needs evolve.

If I wasn’t completely clear in my last post about the importance of knowing your audience, let me take this opportunity to clarify.

In addition to the marketer needing to understand the goal behind each piece of PR, he or she must also understand how they can make each piece of news attractive to the target media outlet in order to achieve that ultimate goal.

PR professionals should recognize that ignorance about the publication is most journalists’ number 1 pet peeve when it comes to being pitched. Of course, a food journalist does not want to be emailed press releases about structured finance!

PR professionals have been analyzing their target media for a long time; there’s nothing new there. What I am suggesting now, and in my previous posts, is that we can no longer anticipate that if we have the client featured in the New York Times for example, the message is going to automatically reach our prospects. Indeed, we need to anlayze prospect behavior, particularly in terms of the kind of media channels that are reaching them, before we even analyze those media channels themselves and work out how we can get our message to resonate.