Media outlets around the world — and in particular in the U.S. — are strategizing how to cover the incoming Trump Administration. Some are even planning to shift their focus to more soft news in order to retain readers and avoid drawing the president’s ire. We look at the implications for the media relations industry in this short midweek episode.

Links from this episode:

• How publishers are strategizing for a second Trump administration: softer news and more social media


• The Trump to-do list: How communicators are getting ready for the MAGA takeover


• Communicating Successfully Amid Political and Social Dissent

The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR will drop on Monday, January 27.

We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email fircomments@gmail.com.

Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music.

You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. Shel has started a metaverse-focused Flipboard magazine. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients.

Raw transcript:

Hi everybody, and welcome to episode number 444 4 4 4 of four immediate release. I’m Shell Holtz. And I’m Neville Hobson As we record this episode on the 8th of January. It’s just under two weeks until Donald Trump prepare assumes the US presidency. That’s 20th of January is the inauguration day.

That’ll be a second term for him. We’ve got a story about news publishers that face the challenges of unpredictability and polarization. These realities necessitate strategic shifts to adapt to a fast-paced, erratic political environment for US-based news publishers. The challenges of covering Trump’s second term are particularly acute.

The fast-paced, unpredictable nature of his administration will require editorial agility as well as innovative strategies to sustain engagement in a politically charged environment. However, the implications of a second Trump [00:01:00 ] administration extend far beyond US borders capturing the attention of publishers and communicators worldwide.

We’ll explore this topic right after this message.

From Europe to Asia, global audiences are deeply invested in the ripple effects of American policies and political rhetoric on international markets, diplomacy and cultural trends. International publishers such as the BBC and the Independent, are recalibrating their strategies to engage North American audiences.

While communicators and multinational corporations are preparing for how Trump’s leadership might shape global narratives. Requiring alignment across diverse regions and stakeholders for publishers. According to a report by Digiday this week, the focus is twofold, balancing hard news coverage with softer lifestyle oriented content and engaging audiences more deeply through social media and interactive platforms.

Publishers like Newsweek and the Independent are prioritizing lifestyle content, not [00:02:00 ] only to attract diverse audiences, but also to create safer advertising spaces amidst a politically charged landscape. Enhanced social media monitoring and staffing changes reflect the need to keep pace with Trump’s activity patterns, particularly on platforms like Truth, social, and X tools like polls.

Ask me anything. Sessions and comment management are being deployed to foster community interaction while gathering valuable first party data. At the same time, publishers are grappling with the toll of covering a Trump led news cycle. The relentless nature of his previous term was described as a gushing river of news prompting concerns about staff burnout and long-term sustainability.

Despite these challenges, the potential for increased readership and revenue from a busy news cycle remains a motivating factor with publishers seeing opportunities in the heightened public attention that Trump presidency typically generates. On the other side of the communications fence, the emphasis for corporate communicators lies in preparing for Trump’s hallmark [00:03:00 ] unpredictability now amplified by the controversial team he’s assembling.

Notably, Elon Musk’s significant influence within this new administration has already introduced an unprecedented dynamic. Musk is known for his polarizing public persona and unfiltered approach to communication and his involvement as a layer of complexity that communicators have never faced in a government context.

This combination of leadership styles demands rapid response capabilities, and scenario planning At an unparalleled level, teams must ensure messaging, clarity, and internet. Sorry. An internal alignment to navigate sudden shifts in public discourse with misinformation, polarizing policies and unconventional decision making, likely to dominate the agenda, proactive communication strategies and robust risk mitigation plans.

Are essential to maintain credibility and public trust in this uncharted environment. The shared challenges of unpredictability and audience polarization highlight the importance of adaptability [00:04:00 ] across both sectors. For publishers, this means finding a balance between hard news and softer content to attract readers and advertisers alike.

For communicators, it involves crafting agile strategies that enable swift. Pivots while maintaining coherence and transparency. Both sectors must also address the human cost of this rapid pace, safeguarding the wellbeing of staff as they navigate the demands of a divisive and volatile political landscape.

To restate what I said earlier, this is the global picture. In essence, the coming months will test the resilience and creativity of publishers and communicators alike. Success will depend on their ability to stay nimble, engage their audiences meaningfully, and weather the unique pressures of covering and responding to a Trump presidency.

And let’s also mention the news this week about meta and its fact-checking overhaul on its social networks to replace content moderators with community notes similar to X. None of this is a stroll in the park shell for anybody. Absolutely not. And I think the move by [00:05:00 ] and Mark Zuckerberg is emblematic of what we’re seeing.

From a number of different types of media that are, let’s face it, running scared. On the newspaper side, you have the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post refusing to make presidential endorsements. Their editorial teams wanted to, the publishers, the owners, and that includes Jeff Bezos Amazon’s founder.

Chairman of the board, who’s the owner of the Washington Post said, we’re not going to make a presidential endorsement because clearly they were gonna invoice endorse Kamala Harris. And you also had the Washington Post recently experienced the departure of a very popular political cartoonist. When the editor in chief declined to run one of her cartoons, for the first time ever, the cartoon showed Jeff Bezos kneeling at the feet of.

Donald Trump and she said that kind of, I don’t remember her exact words, but the [00:06:00 ] spirit of it was that the cowardice displayed here is something she didn’t wanna be part of. Now the editor said, no, it wasn’t about that. It was the fact that we’ve done two reports on this and another one coming up and we just didn’t wanna overdo it.

But that’s suspicious. To me. So I think you have a lot of media that are proactively capitulating and abdicating their responsibility to report accurately or as they would with any other president in office. The other side of this is that you have Trump suing media. And this is a way to get around the First Amendment if somebody says something you don’t like.

The first real experience we had with that wasn’t Trump, it was Peter Thiel suing Gawker out of existence over, I remember that, their publication. But now you have Trump just got a $15 million settlement from A, B, CA, B. C can afford it. But now he has filed a lawsuit against the Des Moines Register [00:07:00 ] over the.

Poll that they ran. This is a highly lauded poll. In fact, when they talk about this particular presidential poll, they say it is one of the most highly regarded in the entire country. It was wrong. Most of the polls were wrong. Most of the polls were wrong four years ago. There are reasons that the polls are not as accurate as they used to be, that we could get into another time if we ever do an episode about polling and research.

But he’s suing over the fact that it. Reported that Harris was going to win in Iowa. She did not. So you have this ability to sue media out of existence a