How Collaboration Can be a Winning Strategy:

A Conversation with Artlandia’s Misty Tompoles

When Misty Tompoles took over what was to become Artslandia, she quickly had to learn a lesson familiar to all PR pros: think collaboratively to creatively find and engage with your key audiences.

For Tompoles that meant developing a new model for how performing arts playbills — the program you receive when attending an opera, ballet, theater or other arts event — were published. She worked with Portland’s arts community, convincing them to advertise in the playbills of each other’s events. So the audience attending an opera would see a promotion for an upcoming theater show, and vice versa.

In this week’s podcast, we chat with Misty, who is the publisher and founder of Artslandia. She is an amazing entrepreneur who started her company when she was 24. In our interview she talks about the events that led to her taking the entrepreneurial plunge and what has resulted over the last 20 years.

Artslandia is a diverse family of media, including a variety of Artslandia titles, performing arts playbills, custom publishing services, new media options, and sponsorships. Its print publications boast a circulation of more than 800,000 annually with a readership of 1.5 million.

They are a Portland institution, but are now expanding to other cities with the first being Vancouver, BC.

Misty also talks about the Artslandia App they created, as well as the Artslandia Box subscription, which delivers culture to you each month.

It’s a fascinating conversation with Misty because she’s an entrepreneur, publisher, and mom. I hope you enjoy it.

The Importance of Community Newspapers
A Conversation with Pamplin Media Group

We all have a sense of the power that The New York Times or even The Oregonian wield, but less appreciated is the influence of a Beaverton Valley Times or a Forest Grove News Times and the countless other community newspapers around Portland’s metro area and across the nation.

But PR professionals understand the power of local papers for their clients, where getting in front of local communities is critical to their success.

In this episode of PR Talk, I sat down with Mark Garber, publisher of the Pamplin Media Group.

We talked about the history of the Pamplin Media Group, the role of a publisher, as well as the current challenges community newspapers are facing and what that may mean for PR professionals.

The Pamplin Media Group owns and publishes 25 papers throughout Oregon, 21 of which are published weekly or twice weekly. Its flagship paper is the Portland Tribune, which was founded in 2001. Some of the other papers in the group have been publishing more than 100 years.

Mark has a long career in newspapers. He studied journalism at the University of South Carolina and started his career as a reporter at a newspaper near the university covering cops and city government.

Later, he moved to Oregon and worked at a number of community newspapers in the Portland metro area. About 10 years into his career, he transitioned to publishing community newspapers in Gresham and Springfield. He was the publisher of the East Oregonian in Pendleton before joining the Portland Tribune/Pamplin Media Group in 2001.

He said you can think of a publisher as the CEO of the business of a newspaper.

“All departments within a newspaper ultimately report to the publisher,” Mark said in our interview. “And the publisher is the one link traditionally between the news side and the advertising side and the circulation side. Newspapers traditionally have operated with a pretty good separation between news and advertising. But there are times when those two aspects of the business do work together. And publishers provide that link and can essentially work with both sides of the business to achieve overall goals. In the digital age, those lines are getting more and more blurred and there is more and more cooperation between the news and advertising side.”

What is the difference between what is published online and in print?

Mark said it is not always that different what is being published online and what is being published in the newspapers.

“We put all the breaking news online obviously and then a lot of that news by the time our print editions come out, because we’re either weekly or twice a week, might not be all that relevant anymore,” he said. “We’re daily or actually more than a daily online; and in our printed editions, we try to be a little more reflective of what’s happened over the past few days.”

In terms of community news – the on-the-ground coverage of all of the communities, whether it’s Prineville, Madras, Gresham, Lake Oswego or Beaverton – Pamplin’s newspapers are one of the only remaining sources with reporters covering those communities.

The print and digital audiences for newspapers

More than 350,000 people read one of the Pamplin publications in print each month.

But more than 1 million people are coming to their websites each week and consuming the news there in some form or another.

That is a huge digital audience.

“And you know the interesting thing about that is they want the same thing that the print readers want, they just want it in a different form,” Mark said. “And there’s not a lot of overlap between those two audiences.”

Mark said one of the things that surprised him is that those are two distinct audiences. “Some people only read us in print, and some people only read us digitally. And it’s not all generational, but certainly there’s an age factor there, too.”

His point is that within their group of publications, they are delivering that advertising or marketing message with content about the local community within a geographic area that people care about.

“And whether it’s in print or on digital, we can help deliver that marketing message and still be very targeted in how we do it,” Mark said.

Making money in newspapers and what that means for PR

As Mark points out, producing all that local news is a big investment with more than 100 news people around the state. And the evolution of newspapers and increased competition from other players – such as Craigslist – has meant changing the business model for newspapers with more native advertising or the addition of paywalls to digital sites.

Mark said they have added paywalls to some of the newspapers’ websites, which is something I said worried PR pros who are concerned their clients won’t see the benefit of getting in a publication if the public can’t freely access it.

Mark understood my concern, but also made a couple of interesting points.

“One is that if someone is willing to pay for the news, and this is pretty much true of our print subscribers, they’re households who have discretionary income, they’re a higher demographic typically,” Mark said. “And they are people who are interested in their communities and want to know what’s happening with their school district, with their city government, with their neighbors, and they’re actively involved citizens. It’s a very highly desirable demographic for any business to reach.”

He said they are aware of the challenges paywalls bring to promoting stories on social. One way they’ll address this is by adding more to the content being shared on social so readers have a better sense of the story.

And, he said, paywalls don’t require an annual subscription. He said readers can pay a low cost to be able to access one particular story.

Whether its social or other unforeseen challenges, Mark said, they are tracking visitor traffic to the sites with paywalls to make sure they don’t dramatically lose readers.

PR tips from a publisher

I asked Mark if he had any pro tips for how PR people can better get into their local newspapers and, specifically, the Portland Tribune. In addition to Mark’s tips, I recommend listening to PR Talk episode 13 for our interview with Gary Stein, editor for the Lake Oswego Review, one of the Pamplin papers, for more in-depth tips.

Mark had two excellent tips: make it local and establish connections.

It may be a bit harder to do, but Mark said by localizing your PR message to “each community or as many communities as you can, that’s going to greatly increase the chances that item’s going to get in the paper because a local person is involved.”

His second tip is it is much more helpful to establish some sort of personal connection or relationship with the reporter or the editor at the paper. He said his reporters and editors “get literally hundreds, if not thousands, of e-mails every day.”

A press release sent by a stranger may not even get read if it comes as an e-mail. But if you could establish a relationship with that person, take them out to coffee or even just have a couple phone conversations with them, or to drop by the office to say, “Hey, this is who I am and here’s the type of news that I’d like to send you. How can I do that in a way that is helpful to you?”

“Then when you send an email, the reporter will think, ‘I know Amy. I know she’s interested in giving me legitimate news.’ I think that is a good thing.”

Celebrating 20 Years of Street Roots with Executive Director Kaia Sand

Street Roots vendors are a Portland institution. You’ve probably passed by them at some point, maybe outside a New Seasons or Powell’s. These vendors tend to stand out because they are experiencing homelessness or extreme poverty, yet they partner with Street Roots to sell their papers. This partnership allows them to pocket much more than a profit, but also dignity in an honest day’s work and connection with their customers, who are people like you and me.

In this episode of the PR Talk Podcast, host Amy Rosenberg sets out to learn more about this important publication and how it can fit into a PR professional’s media plan during an interview with Street Roots executive director Kaia Sand.

A Social Justice Focus

Despite only being in her current position for a year, Kaia Sand has had a long relationship with Street Roots. Back when it was known as the Burnside Cadillac, Kaia worked as a staff reporter covering housing issues. She went on to write poetry (you can find her books at Powell’s), work as a community organizer, and teach in universities. She’s also worked in conjunction with the paper and its vendors on projects related to the ethnic history of Portland’s Old Town, now known as the Pearl. Today, she manages the organization’s day-to-day operations and its fundraising efforts.

Some community members have the mistaken impression that Street Roots is written by people experiencing homelessness. But that’s not the case. As Kaia explains it, the newspaper is staffed by a team of professional reporters. And while its coverage is certainly rooted in issues of housing and homelessness, Street Roots’ reporting has evolved to cover all types of social, economic, and environmental justice issues.

Providing Vendors a Hand Up

Every week, Street Roots publishes 10,000 print copies which are distributed throughout the city by its 180 vendors. In a relationship that’s common in the newspaper industry, vendors purchase papers from Street Roots and then sell them to their customers for a profit. What makes Street Roots unique is that its vendors are made up exclusively of people living on the margins.

The paper’s commitment to producing quality journalism on topics that are often ignored by other media outlets, along with a business model offering a lifeline to vulnerable citizens, has earned Street Roots a loyal readership around town. However, the paper’s readership is also growing throughout the state, due to its ongoing Housing Rural America series. Thanks to funding provided by a grant from the Meyer Memorial Trust’s Affordable Housing Initiative, Street Roots sends journalists outside the metro area to places like Ontario, Lincoln City, and Bend to explore housing issues from a rural perspective.

Reliant on Individual Donors

Street Roots operates as a nonprofit, and as such, relies heavily on the support of individual donors. Through the end of 2018, Street Roots will be featured in Willamette Week’s annual Give Guide, which highlights some of Portland’s most impactful nonprofits. You can also help support their mission by clicking the donate button on the Street Roots home page.

Plans are also in the works for a larger summer event recognizing the paper’s 20th anniversary. Kaia says she wants the event to celebrate Street Root’s longevity and its positive spirit of bringing housed and homeless people together.

Street Roots volunteers work stuffing newspapers with donation envelopes

Is There a Place for PR?

While Street Roots is doing important work in the community, Amy wondered if its focused coverage leaves much room for the PR professional. Kaia explained that if PR pros are working on issues related to social, economic, or environmental justice, they’re encouraged to contact executive editor Joanne Zuhl. The paper also features extensive coverage on local culture, celebrity news, art, music, and entertainment. So smart PR pros should consider Street Roots as part of their media mix.

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Kaia ended her interview with something of a rallying cry for the newspaper’s supporters, readers, and vendors.

“Just when you think that print might be dead, somehow we’re on the rise. There’s something really powerful about people meeting people in a public space and exchanging news. And we’re determined to keep that.”

To hear the entire interview, including a discussion of Portland’s ongoing housing and homeless crises, download this episode today. To hear future episodes, and to access the catalog of previous episodes, subscribe to PR Talk on Sticher, iTunes, or the Google Play store.