Did Your Company’s Online Newsroom Kill a Story?

We all know (or should know) that the web is where journalists go first to research companies. However, not all of us are making it easy for the media to find the information they need. Jakob Nielsen, “the guru of Web page usability” according to the NY Times, reviews corporate newsrooms, and the findings aren’t pretty.

For example, said one journalist to Nielsen after having a difficult time using a site:

“I would be reluctant to go back to the site. If I had a choice to write about something else, then I would write about something else.”

According to Nielsen’s research, the top-5 reasons journalists gave for visiting a company’s website are:

1) Locate a PR contact (name and telephone number)
2) Find basic facts about the company (spelling of an executive’s name, his/her age, headquarters location, and so on)
3) Discern the company’s spin on events
4) Check financial information
5) Download images to use as illustrations in stories

Read the complete report here. Hat tip Steve Rubel.

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