Professor Side’s PR Course (Newspapers ①)

In this corner, where Professor Side and various others discuss PR,
today we will explain “newspapers,” which anyone involved in PR absolutely knows (or should know)! (Foundational Edition)

Hello.

This is Professor Side.
Today’s topic is the very fundamental subject of “newspapers” in PR companies.

On Monday mornings, weekend newspapers and Monday’s morning edition are lined up together.

Japanese newspapers are broadly categorized into “general newspapers,” “block/regional newspapers,” “business newspapers,” “sports newspapers,” “evening newspapers,” “specialized newspapers,” and “industry newspapers.”

General newspapers include the Asahi Shimbun, Yomiuri Shimbun, Sankei Shimbun, and Mainichi Shimbun—four newspapers published nationwide. Japan has an excellent home delivery system, so the number of newspaper subscriptions per capita is among the highest in the world compared to other countries. However, overall circulation has been declining in recent years, and the number of people reading “paper newspapers” on commuter trains has decreased dramatically.
That said, paid and free digital subscriptions have not surged proportionally; most people now encounter newspaper articles through portal sites like Yahoo. In terms of sales revenue, Japanese newspapers, including general newspapers, are at a major turning point.
Newspaper companies in the United States and other developed countries face similar challenges. In the U.S., over 100 newspaper companies have abandoned “paper newspaper” publication in recent years.

From PR

I see a lot of news about U.S. newspaper companies. When major newspapers make moves, I think, “So even they are…” and feel the changing times.

As a PR company employee, one of the first steps is reading all the newspapers every day. Our company receives over 20 newspapers daily (including sports newspapers). When you compare them, even the same news is covered differently in terms of approach and prominence, which is very interesting.
When you read many newspapers every day, if you want to get a particular news story into a newspaper, you can start to imagine:
“This section of that newspaper would probably cover it like this… They’d be interested…”

There are many newspapers alone, but being able to learn about the various other media that exist is one of the attractions of working in PR!

※I went through a phase of being obsessed with deep-sea fish, and I checked newspapers that covered deep-sea fish news. There was always one newspaper that featured them more prominently than others, and I became a fan of that newspaper. LOL There’s that kind of enjoyment too (?), and even though readers are said to have shifted to the web, newspapers are still interesting! (I also like the web)