Fortune sure does churn through the journalists. In the ten months since we last studied its masthead, 19 editors have departed, while 16 arrived. That’s roughly a 25 percent turnover rate.
Lots of people cover cloud these days but who’s at the core of it? This SWMS cheat sheet offers 17 targets across Tier 1, trades and verticals. The challenge was not to omit obvious go-to’s, but still come up with targets you may not have considered.
You may be familiar with Timothy B. Lee’s work from The Washington Post, Vox or Ars Technica — he worked at all three. Today Tim is a Substack author well into his second year of “Understanding AI,” a fast-rising analytical newsletter on the hottest topic around.
Axios and Fortune continue to be star performers in the world of Tier 1 edit, according to the latest data from Similarweb.
From June 2023 through June 2024, Axios increased its readership by 47.5 percent, from 22.5M monthly visitors to 31.1M on a trailing 12-month basis. How does Axios do it? Smart management, smart verticals, smart brevity.
Until now at least, PR pros never had to pay much attention to tech analytics platforms such as CrunchBase, PitchBook and CB Insights. Sure, they might have had a blog. But PR was built to pitch publications. The worlds of tech data and tech edit really didn’t intersect.
This cheat sheet was born from a valet request for reporters who are covering corporate sponsorships of the Olympics — which will come and go. Fact is, most if not all of these 11 journalists stand to cover sponsorships in general — if the deal was interesting enough.
f you represent a tech product that fits in a “back to school” category, you had better get those pitches together — the coverage is already appearing. This cheat sheet contains 11 targets, many freelance and connected to a publication’s “list and best of” operations.
Two of the world’s most powerful business publishers are out to refine themselves as the impact of generative AI approaches.
It’s been true for years: Tier 1 loves to craft “can they do it?” stories. Some PR pros avoid pitching “can they do it” stories because “what if they can’t?” Why encourage a reporter to think that the company might come up short?
Here’s a cheat sheet with 13 reporters who cover how Washington tries to rein in the forces of technology. Keep an eye on this group… and expect it to grow in coming months.
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FRIDGE NOTES
Well, for now it’s Jim Jordan… but such news illustrates the kind of world we seem to be headed for. Adweek has the details, subscription required.
No “predictions” post will appear on this site. That said, quite a number of subscribers have asked for a Zoom/MS Teams presentation on what 2025 will bring. A conversation is precisely the right tool for the job. After the election — and with AI transforming publishing and life — “2025” is best discussed among peers, not predicted. So if you’d like to have a confidential group exchange on what stands to unfold, and why, and how comms pros can come out on top in spite of it all, drop a line and we shall schedule something.
According to Adweek, Omnicom CEO John Wren and IPG CEO Philippe Krakowsky were in merger talks for eleven and a half months before the transaction was announced this week. Amazing that it didn’t leak.
Should PR pros stop visiting X, with all its lies and hate? It’s only going to get worse. Or are tidbits from targets too important to walk away from? Click here to watch tech edit vet David Strom and I disagree (at high speed) about this, as one compelling visual after another pops up on your screen. In 2025, SWMS will officially launch “SWMS Sound Thinking,” designed to be “argumentative insight in six minutes or less.” Each segment will explore a timely and controversial topic of interest to tech comms pros. This prototype runs 5:25. Hope you enjoy it — feedback vital and welcome! –Sam
New EIC Jamie Heller has asked her reporters to start going on camera — for the BI TikTok channel — to explain the big, deep-divey story they just published. Other publications do this — especially archival Fortune. BI is now on that too. Game on.
At this time last year, Eric Newcomer and his two podcast co-hosts — Max Child and James Wilsterman — each formed an “AI startup fantasy team” and picked five AI startups to seed their rosters. We’re now in year 2 and it’s time to draft again. The podcasters wonder… which startups do they dump? Which do they add? The player whose startups accumulate the most total value by Nov. 1, 2028 is the winner, so there’s plenty of time to make adjustments. Here’s a link to the AI fantasy team podcast — you may need a password. Not sure.
