At The Dallas News, a New "Bold Strategy": Section Editors Reporting to Sales Managers

Wow is an understatement. As someone who once worked in TV, handing ANYTHING over to the sale staff is a path to destruction. And we didn't even HAVE a news department!

This has to get national play, because I thought every "news" outlet is always continually stating that their reporting was not influenced by their advertising, as it shouldn't be.

So now the entire paper will be one big advertorial? Will every article now have to be run past the local Macy's store manager, or other major advertiser? Will we soon see a series of articles focusing on the "news" going on at our local Sigels store?

It doesn't matter if you change their titles, the sales guys are still sales guys; their paycheck is still determined by what they sell; and they have absolutely no qualms about about throwing principles out the door if there is $$$ on the table.

This is truly a shameful day for Dallas journalism. Everyone at the DMN should be embarrassed about this. It's sad (but so often, so true) when the clueless are in charge.

The Dallas Managed News!

Uhh news should dictate the news not advertisers. This is appalling at best. So does this mean when they do a story and content share with the Star telegram that story will be dictated by the advetisers for DMN too. I hope the telegram decides to nix this content sharing.

Today we are launching a new business segment structure as the next step toward becoming the most comprehensive and trusted partner for local businesses in attracting and retaining customers and continuing to generate important, relevant content for our consumers.

HO-LEE SHIT did they have their priorities completely backwards.

So what happens to investigative journalism? None of the business segments WANT to be investigated?

With the ties of real estate developers to DISD, no more investigation of the district since it hurts real estate values?

So essentially, the DMN is out of the journalism business and into marcom for businesses in Dallas?

My God. Is Grandpa Dealey spinning in his grave yet?

This makes me actually nauseous. They're turning the city's paper of record into a shopper.

Maybe NOW a restaurant will get over 3 stars in a review. Pay to play, baby.

More sacred cows. Moo.

What are people so up in arms about? I can't remember a time when the DMN wasn't one big advertorial for the Citizen's Councils whims.

This memo must be a few years old.
Advertisers have been guiding "news" in this fish wrapper for a long time.

Oh, c'mon, we know that the Jaguar's Gold Club has secretly been writing all of Schutze's columns for years.

This news in conjunction with the loss of
Rod "the beard" Dreher makes me wonder if life is even worth living.

I with Bethany in that I think we are soon to see the Dallas Morning Greensheet.

Surprising? No. Saddening? Yes.

Despite the DMN's ingrained tendency toward this kind of behavior, you hate to see it formalized.

Jack, we've been agreeing more than disagreeing as of late. If it weren't for this giant misstep by the DMN, I'd think the universe was out of kilter. ;)

But yes, ZBeggs. This is sad. I remember when I got the news I had been hired at the DMN. I was excited. It seemed like such a big deal.

Today, eh. It's like finding out Santa's just a pedophile bent toward home invasion.

Dear Phelps:
Jaguar Gold Whatever has nothing ... I repeat, nothing ... to do with writing my columns. All of my columns are written by the p.r. people at Home Depot as part of a certain "emergency work-out" agreement we came to in relation to certain debts I have incurred building elaborate chicken coops for my wife. What pisses me off is that my rate is two and a half favorable columns about Home Depot for only one 25-foot roll of 48-inch hardware cloth. My sources tell me that Home Depot is giving Keven Willey two 25-foot rolls for only one favorable editorial about Home Depot. You know, you find out stuff like this, and you say to yourself, where has the honor and integrity of the press gone, anyway?

But the important thing is that the Comics pages are apparently maintaining their editorial independence!

Why don't you develop clean up your web site. Convert it to a portal like yahoo or MSN, and make it customizable. Add a strong search engine and great resources/links, then market it to everyone (who has a computer) in the greater DFW Metro, free of charge of course. I (and many others) would love to log on to my PC and have a local home page to surf out and back to.

While you're at it add some software that will search and retrieve the types of advertising, specials, coupons, etc. that I want. I suspect you'd have every business in the Metro clamoring for ad space and inclusion to your database and the demographics data you could retrieve.

Shameful.

So the rest of the paper will be more like the Neighbors section on Fridays. You know, the ones that have all the content submitted by private school marketing directors who also buy ads.

Is First Baptist going to control the content of the Religion section?

It actually all started today, with one of those infernal stickers they plant on the front page, this one declaring "Headline" of some sort.

"The segment restructure is one of several key strategies we have implemented this year to better serve our advertising clients,..." says it all. Nothing more need be said. They are sooooo hurting for ad dollars that now the inmates, who could not adjust to the new reality, are running the asylum.

Next we will read that Hashimoto has been named Mong's boss and that Willey will report to Mark Davis.

Well, this marks the end of the Dallas Morning News as a reputable publication. Should probably not even refer to is a newspaper anymore. A "circular" or "advertiser" may be more appropriate.

So are they changing the name of the paper to the Dallas Morning Penny Saver now?

What they're describing in that memo isn't a newspaper, but a "Shopper," which is a strictly an advertising/marketing publication.

Interesting that the people getting all huffy about the state of the media are people who no longer work for the media. I'm not saying this is a good development for AH Belo, but as a working journalist, my choices are limited. Keep an open mind or wait to get laid off.

This is the end of "Dallas's Only Daily", as it appears the 15th largest daily in America is become nothing better than a high-gloss version of the Recycler. We all know the dead-tree paper business has had issues for awhile, but taking a paper that has had a proud history and reducing it to being nothing better than a bridcage liner without journalistic teeth during the Bob Mong(sounds like a cancerous growth??) era. I quit subscribing to them years ago when they decided to start lying about their distro numbers and got caught accordingly.

Just from a functional point of view this reorg doesn't make a lot of sense. Okay, so they want to give advertising some influence in the product. I don't agree with it, but there have been varying amounts of ad influence over many products in the past decade and the world hasn't burst into flames.

But to outright create a direct line of report to advertising?

Are ad managers prepared to manage the newsroom in addition to advertising? By the way, if they were doing such a good job in advertising maybe the newspaper would be a little healthier? Are they just trading one group of mediocre managers for another?

It just smacks of desperation, and nothing sinks a product faster than a lack of confidence.

Pretty sure Lisa Kresl gave up the right to call herself a "journalist" a looooong time ago...

This is the very reason I wrote "Soft News," (which got great Kirkus reviews by the way) and started the blogspot, Americans for Truth in News. National news has lost its way. I have been in newspapers and magazines for 35 years and know what commentary and advertorials have already done to fact. This isn't the beginning of the end, I am afraid we have reached the edge of the cliff and are headed for dollar control. While the masses fear government control- I say look out for BIG business. After all, isn't Comcast about to buy NBC and Universal from GE? Another clear voice lost in the wilderness.

Let's say you have this weekly food and entertainment section called the "Guide" and let's say while the industry is in turmoil and advertising revenue is down, you give your long-standing full-page advertiser a one-star rating. Then further, on the blogs you kick that same advertiser in the gonads for using the name "Restaurant Week" (an non-copywrited term) to raise money for a charity that is NOT related to a certain radio station in the area.

Then you find out that the advertising dollars for that certain week (paid for by the restaurant who participate), many thousands and thousand of dollars total is being earned entirely by the competition but your editorial staff is devoting hours and hours in the run-up and blow-by-blow to cover it.

Now take a three star restaurant review median rating, bring the bottom up and the top down, and voila, you have a advertising/marketing cluster-fuck.

How *dare* they put a person with business responsibilities atop the chain of command. Oh, wait. That what the publisher is. And you *know* how much *he* dictates the coverage at the DMN.

Look: If this really turns out to be "those who sell ads for A.H. Belo's products will now dictate content," then out with the torches and pitchforks. But if, instead, it's a better way to monetize the content the DMN produces because the ad sellers have skins directly in the game, then I'm all for it. (Not that I understand exactly how this reorg will accomplish that, but that's another issue...)

It's not as if business decisions haven't pushed content decisions in the recent past.

For instance: Pace Steve @11:27 a.m., the DMN *has* no Religion section and hasn't for a while now. Why? The ad folks basically sold no ads for it. Had a structure like the new one existed a couple of years ago and created impetus and accountability for the ad sellers to sell ads for the Religion section, it might still exist.

There's a difference between coordinating coverage and sales and dictating coverage because of sales. We'll all see which this new plan creates.

And guess what, bunkies? The old plan ain't working. Not for nobody. So if news businesses don't try some different things, most bloggers will have a lot less original content to comment about...

On the bright side, the editorial integrity of the Comics Pages has been maintained.

Jeffrey, it seems unfair to place all the blame for the Religion section's demise on ad sellers. Partly because of your efforts, the Religion section had become one of the best, most well-respected Religion sections in the nation. Churches should have been clamoring to advertise in the section because it was good enough to sell itself. Maybe, just maybe, it was an issue of pricing.

The folks at Belo have clearly been watching Network and thought it had some great management ideas...

It's always sad when a newspaper dies, but at least the Seattle PI and Rocky Mountain News were allowed to die on their feet instead of groveling on their knees.

The sad truth is I haven't read the DMN in over a decade. I don't even pick them up for free when they're lying around at Starbucks.

In Tomorrow's Edition of The Dallas Morning News:

The Romantic Cement Plants of Midlothian (by The Ellis County Chamber of Commerce)

The Real Meaning of Hanukkah (by Dr. Robert Jeffress, First Baptist Church of Dallas)

Buy a Hummer, Save The Planet (by J. Carl Sewell, Jr)

On the brighter (if only temporary) side, this will put an end to any more ink wasted on the Tiger "Mr Endorsement" Woods story...

Could Billusa99 or someone else provide a link for where this was posted on the DN site?

"The segment restructure is one of several key strategies we have implemented this year to better serve our advertising clients,..."

I'm going blind trying, but I just can't seem to locate it.

Thanks in advance.

The DMN should concentrate more on serving their readers than kissing advertiser's behinds.

Sorry. Cancel that. I read backwards and attributed info incorrectly. Strike that above request.

I know he isn't Asian, but with a name like Bob Mong, you'd think the editor of the Dallas Morning News would know about Chinese walls. But I guess not.

One other thing: Did you notice the repeated use of the word "solutions" in the memo? While editor Mong may have signed the memo, let's hope he didn't write it. What, for example, is "solution-based selling"? With apologies to the Holocaust, let's hope this is not the final solution for the DMN.

Are These people RETARTED! Texas... that says a lot.

This is why I rarely read newspapers now, despite the fact that I had 30 years of editorial experience at newspapers. The news business continues to prostitute itself to business interests, political correctness ... you name it!

This makes me unspeakably depressed.

You may stop dropping those 'Briefly" things in driveway now, DMN (which I actually thumbed through from time to time). Compromised news is compromised news, whether it's 200 words or 2,000.

Thanks for the update, now I know to never again trust a word of "news" coming from the Dallas News.

I was raised with the Morning News as our regional Big City paper, and the zeitgeist was forever editorial in line with business. It wasn't the place you'd go to read a balanced report on the Oil Depletion Allowance, and all sections were apparently charged with carriying forth the rightwing agenda - a sportswriter railed against the guys who raised their black fists in Mexico City long after the occasion. And I remember one fine day when Ross Perot's EDS was under question for a cool million in federal funds unaccounted for in services, and the huge Op-Ed that day involved a Black lady caught accepting fifty dollars in welfare to which she was apparently not entitled. Always it was like that, so this current herding of supposedly independent "journalists" under the Big Tent is only formalizing an old habit, like cows driven to the barn.

To Jon Garinn: Thank you for the kind words. I was told back then that the church ads were already *heavily* discounted compared with other ROP ads.

What we needed were not more cheap ads, but even a *few* regular advertisers who saw the value in the many thousands of eyeballs that routinely read the Religion section -- and whose owners also shopped for chairs and pants and cars and fresh produce.

There was a time when even a quarter page of ads every week might have made the difference. Which we did not get. That was a recession and several layoffs ago, so who knows how long the reprieve might have lasted. But still...

My point being that people complaining today about ad sales broadly influencing content are weeping for long-spilt milk.

So, they're a magazine now?

This only reinforces the truth that readers are not the customers, but rather the product. We're the eyeballs sold to advertisers, who are a newspaper's only true client and customer.

If you want to read the source material Moroney used to hatch this latest attempt to save the franchise, check out:
http://www.journalism20.com/blog/
also, read: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/140/match-game.html
BTW, the magazine industry--notably D Mag and Texas Monthly--have been following this "new" and "bold" approach for years.

To Moe Hong: About the "real" customers. Welcome to reality. Although that is less real today for the DMN than it was a few years ago, because subscribers now represent a much higher percentage of revenue than they used to.

But look: Even under the old financial setup, if we don't produce content good enough to deliver the eyeballs, the ads don't matter. If we lose credibility, we lose eyeballs. So it is really in the best interest of the ad execs to *not* tread on the journalism.

This is completely appalling. You don't have to be a purist to feel that this represents some kind of wholesale abdication. Very sad indeed. And shame on the editors for going along.

Today's top story:
"David McDavid Autos is great"
By David McDavid

I agree with you, Jeffrey, that we didn't need churches advertising in the Religion section but retailers, service providers, etc. It always seemed like such a no-brainer to me, especially in this market. Believers' dollars spend just as well as atheists'.

News, Mr Mong, is "anything someone doesn't want you to know. Everything else is advertising."
By that classic standard your "bold strategy" is simply to remove every last scrap of actual news from your advertising.
Genius really.
Just NOT NEWS.

"To better meet our clients' needs?" What about meeting readers' needs?

Well, there's another paper I'll never trust.

This is a memo from the editor of a major NEWSpaper, yet he doesn't use the word 'news' until the fourth paragraph...this can't be good

Yawn. This isn't a change so much as an admission. Remember last year when Schultz reported that the DMN sat on a story proving that Leppart lied about assurance from the corp of engineers concerning prior approval of the toll road inside the levy? What ethical news reporting organization would sit on a story like that until after an election on that very subject?

If the DMN survives five years from today, I'll be very surprised.

Things brings up two questions.

1. When will Dallas be ready for a not-for-profit media organization like other cities?

2. When is KERA TV and especially radio going to step up and fill the news void? They could be a real powerhouse if they wanted.

I submitted this article to techdirt.com and they posted a quick review of their opinion of this.

If you find this type of media behavior alarming then you should be reading techdirt.com frequently.

This is hilarious! As a longtime former DMN salesperson, I once had to ask Bob Yates a question. Yates, one of the surliest people I have ever met, simply turned away when I identified myself as a salesperson. I mean, he shut down like Klaatu and you could smell the bile rising in his throat. Glad you've had a spiritual reawakening Bob! So happy you're completely on board with this.

If only I could have lasted a couple of more years. Why, I could be calling roundtable meetings with editors to tell them why I think the Tiger Woods story belongs in GuideLive. Or even better, FD Luxe. Maybe then someone would read the damn thing.

DMN is starting to look like the Santa Barbara paper, where socialite Wendy McCaw calls the shots and nothing that might remotely offend her friends or advertisers sees the light of day. The News (!) might seriously want to consider retooling that "Truth is Built Upon the Rock" blather chiseled out on the front of their building.

Editors reporting to sales people? Hmmm... How long will it take for the trust factor to take a dive? Kind of sheds new light on "fair and balanced." But hey, I guess they will now have the best news money can buy.

To Huffy @ 11:54 a.m.: I certainly understand that job opportunities for journalists are steadily shrinking and that, if you want to keep your job, you probably do not have a choice but to do what you are told. But, really, you're OK with an editor taking things out of a story you've written that may offend an advertiser? It's fine if someone in your advertising department has a major say-so in how you write a story? To that you say, "no problem"? You know, we have depended on news reporters to bring us the truth - and now you guys are cool with helping contribute to the distortion of it? Instead of lashing out at us - who really and truly have a right to be pissed - why not take a good look in the mirror. Oh, that's right - at this point, you probably can't.

Have you seen the movie Food Inc.? Maybe we'll get a sequel to that: News Inc.

Hey Tracy, your first story: Funerals Texas way.

oh..oh...by the way, I am sure the founding fathers of The News are turning over in their graves for this.

For as long as I know, the separation of "church and state" has been the biggest value for The News: The intergrity for sales NOT being able to influence the newsroom. What happened to that?

Newspapers are read for their news content. Newspaper sites attract traffic based on the content, too.

I'd say PegasusNews..Go for it. In 18 months, you can own the market.

Merry X-mas everyone!

News for sale, step right up. Welcome to the all infomercial newspaper.

Belo is just giving up now. The white flag is waving over the DMN building, making a mockery of the lofty words carved in its edifice.

All pretense of objectivity for this once proud company is gone. This is shocking, disappointing, and shows what happens when good companies get desperate.

This is one step closer to "pay-for-play" in my opinion. It's going to turn in to an incestuous market where the advertisers influence sales, sales influence editorial, editorial only makes the advertisers happy. Where does that leave us readers? We all know the media landscape is changing and I guess this is just one example of how newspapers are doing what they can to survive.

Meh. This is no different than the slavery to Democratic arty talking points that has always dominated the media.

Journalists were never independent. Journalists never told the truth.

Deal with it, whores.

I think that everyone needs to hold on and take it easy for a minute. Mong never said that advertisers were going to dictate content. I do not believe that at all. What is happening here is a logical move to delivering audience and content in a way that makes sense to both readers AND advertisers. Sales Executives understand what kind of content drives readership - and those are valuable eyes for the advertisers. Journalists have never really understood this.

For instance: Ad guy goes to management with an idea for a vehicle to carry content - content that IS interesting - not advertorial mind you. No one says that writing slants one way or the other...it is the VEHICLE - the mag, section etc - not the content. Content is then written to that audience - makes sense. Advertisers are attracted to the audience - not the content that is delivered.

Next step - ad guy goes to client and says - here is a product that will deliver the eyes you are looking for - NOT - here is a product - do you want to run an ad and get a great story written about your company? That's BS and you should all know better (put down the pitchforks!)

I believe that the writers and advertisers will work together (as they should) to deliver products that deliver eyes. Sometimes you journalists think things are always about you...It really is ALL the about dollars that advertisers spend that enable you to stay employed - always has - always will.

Great! Now the armchair executives are coming out with their two cents. You are reading too much into this. These GM's will not be overseeing 'news', they will be overseeing 'interest' content. Fluff content. Journalists are NOT business people and should not have the future of this struggling industry in their hands. That is why, historically, the executives and media companies come from the advertising side.

The problem with newspapers today is not the format, it's the content. Putting business people at the helm as the DMN has, is a very wise decision. Maybe they will now produce content that the market/readers want, not the Cat Stuck in Tree crap many journalist think is interesting.

Hi, I'm a Sales Manager for a weekly newspaper and I would bet that this is a recipe for distruction. Readers aren't stupid and if a newspaper is not serving readers first than there isn't going to be an audience to advertise to. What a horrible idea. And who are the editors that go along with this?

I thought the content couldn't get worse at the DMN. Well, I was wrong. Fools.

Idiots.

Media Salesguy says:

"I believe that the writers and advertisers will work together (as they should) to deliver products that deliver eyes. Sometimes you journalists think things are always about you...It really is ALL the about dollars that advertisers spend that enable you to stay employed - always has - always will."

So, what happens when there is an important story that needs to be covered, but it doesn't correlate with any of the sponsors' goals, so it's cut from the final edit?

Readers don't want to be short-changed on relevant news because it just so happens not to sell a product or service.

Will that important story be cut, so that an 'advertiser-friendly' story can be put in its place?

News isn't "all about journalists", nor is it "all about dollars". It's all about NEWS.

It's meant to serve the PUBLIC before anyone else (including sponsors).

as a former DMN reporter, this simply breaks my heart. if i hadn't retired already, this would have sent me over the edge for sure. if quasi-articulate readers thought we were whores before, what must they think now?!

Can they even legally call it a newsaperif it is "generating" news articles? I always thought those were magazines; advertizements with some editorials Apparently the consumer is no longer their customers and only the advertisors count. I hope subscribers recognize their right to veto this absurd restructuring and cancell all subscriptions asking for their money back on grounds of breach of contract. they subscribed to a newspaper, assumingly unbiased. and now they are getting a openly biased magazine.
Next we can expect government run newspapers - It couldn't be any more tainted!

Wow, Dallas, first y'all kill Kennedy and now you whack journalism, too. All in a day's work right?
Disgusting.

Now that I know that every word printed in the Dallas Morning News is controlled by corporate sponsors and therefore cannot be trusted, I won't be buying the paper anymore.

never did

The news media already turned their reporting over to the liberal agenda any way. Now it will be a liberal bias AND a sales bias. Who cares - all major media organizations who claim to be "unbiased" are anything hut.

Quasi-articulate being the key word there for sure!

This is Texas, after all, where there is something congenitally wrong with the intelligence of the people.

Glad I left the metro area, life sucked there to begin with. This development shows how to go forward in the opposite direction of the truth. People read the paper for issues that relate to them, their lives and the relevant issues of the place in which they live.
It's a capitalistic wet dream to align the news and advertising "content" to placate advertiser's concerns. Glad to see the area will be the intellectual armpit of Texas! I think Crawford will gladly pass that honor on to the DFW metro area. Thanking the world for great forward-thinking places like Portland Oregon.
Which is a place I'm soooooooooooooo happy to live in!

What Dallas will end up with is a really huge version of a Chamber of Commerce paper. The ones with nothing but ads and fluff articles about how great business is in the area. Lots of color, completely useless to the community.

Having worked at both major daily newspapers and television stations, this move is a sound business decision. The advertising department at both media suffers when a reporter does a scathing report on an advertiser only to have the retailer pull his ad dollars from the company. GSM then goes to the news department to complain, only to hear the standard line about journalistic integrity. Who pays your salary pal? News doesn't care. They don't have to answer to corporate about revenue being down. About time that business decisions govern how the company is being run. For newspapers, it's going to be too little, too late.

If the allegiances of journalists covering the news in Dallas are going to be solely profit-oriented -- advertising dollars -- rather than any remote sense of objectivity, then we shouldn't really call it "news." "Advertising information" might be better.

It's embarrassing that Dallas is leading the way in this transformation of the "news."

As a former staffer, I'd comment that it's waiting and finding out what it looks like. Perception is important, no question about it.

But I've now read every single comment here - and it seems to me that the vast majority of people who are bitching about this also have a chip on their shoulder about newspapers in general and the DMN in particular - and have for a long time.

Like the guy who hasn't read the DMN in 10 years. Or the guy who claims to care about DMN content - yet didn't know there hadn't been a Religion section in two years. What makes you guys think your opinions strap credible themselves? Everyone can see right through to your bias. It's like you're bitching about the results of an election when you didn't even bother to vote in it.

I'd also add that the journalists at DMN are extraordinary newsmen and women - they're not brainless drones typing in whatever's dictated. Of the line gets crossed, they'll bounce.

They'll keep an open mind, like the earlier commenter (a reporter I assume) said. But I know them personally, and they'll take unemployment over lack of integrity any day of the week. Trust them, please, as you always have.

You can dress a whore any way you want. She's still for sale.

After reading how the DMN behaved like a good little lapdog last summer when they attacked Cintra Wilson on behalf of JCPenney, I was under the impression that this "bold strategy" had already occurred.

If the Morning News reader base had any common sense, they would be canceling their print subscriptions tomorrow, if not right now.

Journalism integrity? The only time those two words should be used in the same sentence is when it's a punchline. Journalist take themselves way too seriously. The majority of the public already does not believe there is integrity in journalism.

Reminds me of survey after survey where consumers say the newspaper is all bad news and drama. They want "feel good" news. Print that stuff and readers flee. Brittney Spears and Tiger Woods type drama rule the day. Consumers say they are not interested in that garbage but it always the most consumed news.

Translation: He who buys the biggest ads, gets the best stories. Or what we formerly called "special interest" sections basically what is sold governs the editorial content. bye, bye newsroom

Alright, it was a motivation to me. I'm planning for my personal blog

This is an interesting post...I enjoyed reading the article especially the information that was presented from another angle adding too much to the topic.Look forward to more such posts where such exchange of ideas take place.Thank you very much.