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Fortune 500 Company Web Sites



Running head: FORTUNE 500 COMPANY WEB SITES




Fortune 500 Company Web Sites and Media Relations:
Corporate PR Practitioners' Use of the Internet to Assist Journalists in News Gathering




by
Coy Callison
Assistant Professor
Texas Tech University
School of Mass Communications
Box 43082
Lubbock, TX 79409-3082
(806) 742-3385
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Paper submitted to the PR Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication for consideration for the August 2002 conference to be held in Miami, Fla.

Author will require an overhead projector to present this paper if accepted.

Fortune 500 Company Web Sites and Media Relations:
Corporate PR Practitioners' Use of the Internet to Assist Journalists in News Gathering



Abstract

A content analysis of all 2001 Fortune 500 company Websites was conducted to determine how corporations are using the Web to meet the informational needs of journalists. Analyses revealed that the majority of Websites do not have dedicated pressrooms where media content is centralized. In pressrooms, news releases, executive biographies and executive photographs are the most commonly included materials. Statistics suggest that higher-ranking companies more often provide pressrooms and materials in pressrooms than lower-ranking companies.


























Fortune 500 Company Web Sites and Media Relations:
Corporate PR Practitioners' Use of the Internet to Assist Journalists in News Gathering

        In Winning PR in the Wired World: Powerful Communications Strategies for Noisy Digital Space (2001), Middleberg begins the preface by stating, "the Internet is the most powerful, most global, and most revolutionary communications medium in the history of the world. Its impact changes everything, including public relations, forever and for the better" (p. ix). The statement reflects strong support for the Web and public relations on the Web. But while Middleberg's review of may seem bordering on hyperbole, the statistics outlining Web use do in fact lend support to his opinion. Nielsen/NetRatings data collected in January 2002 revealed 105 million people had home access to the Internet in the United States; globally that number was over 450 million ("Hot Off the Net," 2002). After comparing these numbers with the estimated total 30 million Internet users in 1995 (Marken, 1995), there is little doubt why one researcher interpreted the results of a corporate Web site analysis by con
cluding "the World Wide Web could serve as the greatest tool the PR profession has ever known" (Cooley, 1999, p. 42).
        But while showing how the use of the Web has increased in general does lend support to theories that a powerful new PR tool has been unleashed, the fact that public relations practitioners most often attempt to communicate with specific audiences remains. One of these audiences, the media, serves as the primary focus of this paper. By outlining the results of a content analysis of Fortune 500 company Websites, this paper attempts to uncover how corporations are using the Web to facilitate better media relations.
Literature Review
        Now more than ever, members of the media are surfing the Internet looking for information to bolster stories and for story ideas in general ("No One's Yelling 'Copy' Anymore," 2001; O'Keefe, 1997). The Seventh Annual Middleburg/Ross Survey of Media in the Wired World (n.d) found that the percentage of journalists using the Internet for article research had increased from 66% in 1995 to 92% in 2001. In fact, the survey revealed that 81% of print journalists go online at least once a day for research, and magazine journalists reported that corporate Web sites are their first choice for information when a story breaks and no live source is available. Not surprisingly, the journalist respondents in the survey agreed that the Internet has made their jobs easier and that the new medium had improved the quality of their work.
        This adoption of the Web as a research tool for journalists has not gone unnoticed by public relations practitioners (Newland & White, 2000; White & Raman, 1999). Soon after use of the Internet exploded in the early to mid 1990s, practitioners realized the power it afforded them in enhancing media relations (Bovet, 1995; Ross, 1995). The PR opportunities are clear with journalists reporting that they have less manpower in putting together the news and the vast majority stating that they have more work to do than ever ("What a Journalists Wants," 2000). Practitioners are more than willing to help media representatives expedite the information-gathering process. Laura Bennett, president of Bennett & Company, an Orlando-based public relations and marketing agency, may have articulated best the feelings of the industry toward reaching the media via the Web when she stated, "The message from the journalists is clear-they have less help to do their jobs and have more to cover. So it's our responsibility as publ
ic relations professionals to provide information not only in a timely and concise manner, but as effectively as possible" ("What a Journalists Wants," 2000, p. 4).
        But before practitioners from companies with a Web presence can bask in the knowledge that they are indeed meeting the needs of the media via the Web, an investigation of the media's opinion of corporate Web pages seems merited. The same practitioners that may be inclined to believe they are providing the media with quality Web materials may be surprised to learn that journalists overall feel that corporate Web pages are lacking. In 2001, PR automation software provider Vocus surveyed 72 journalists from newspapers, magazines, and online publications to find out what they were looking for in corporate Web sites (Bransford, 2001). While 90% of reporters confirmed that they use the Web to gather information about a company, they also stated that they were not finding what they were looking for the majority of the time.
The journalist in the Vocus survey indicated that they liked the immediate delivery capabilities of the Web and that they were likely to visit a corporation's Web site before they actually telephone a corporate media relations expert, but a visit to a company Web page was not guarantee that press releases, corporate information or contact information would be found. In fact, another study asked 20 journalists to find on 10 corporate Web sites basic information for a hypothetical story assignment ("Corporate Web Sites Get a 'D'," 2001; Flynn, 2001). The journalist participants looked for a PR person's telephone number, management information, and commitment to social responsibility. On average, the journalists found the answers to each of the questions only 60% of the time. It was also reported that in every single session, journalists said they would have to leave the sites because they failed to deliver the needed information.
Following the journalists' negative opinions of corporate Web sites to their logical consequences, journalists surveyed reported that poor Web site usability could reduce or completely eliminate press coverage of that company ("Corporate Web Sites Get a 'D'," 2001). One journalist lamented about not being able to find what he is looking for by stating, "My momentary frustration-I like to think that it will not spill over into my story. But it makes me wonder about the competence of the people in the company. You [corporations] know journalists use the site. Makes me think someone is being evasive, or that they may be incompetent" (p. 7).
Undoubtedly, press members leaving a corporate Web site disgruntled that their search efforts did not bear fruit is not good in any PR sense. This leads to the question, what is it that company Web pages are not yielding and what is it that journalists want in their Internet searches? In particular, journalists search corporate Web pages looking for press releases, public relations personnel contact information, and general corporate facts (Bransford, 2001). They want materials in viewable, downloadable files because attachments emailed directly to journalists could carry computer viruses (Cantelmo, 2001). Journalists also weary from receiving mountains of unsolicited corporate material they neither request nor want (Watson, 1995), appreciate downloadable material that allows them control over what content they choose to view in addition to the fact that downloaded documents can be quickly edited and type-set while skipping the step of re-keying text into appropriate software (Bobbitt, 1995,Witmer, 2000).
In addition, journalists not only want the Web to provide information when they need it (Garrison, 2001; Johnson, 1997), journalists want corporate Web pages to be structured in a way that facilitates quick location and retrieval of electronic resources (Gleason, 1997; Settles, 1996). Ultimately, journalists demand unique, multimedia content-rich news and information that they can access both in a timely manner and in a usable format (Lissauer, 2000). In fact, Los Angeles Times Syndicate columnist Larry Magid said, "I want one-stop shopping for news releases, photos, and any important content allowing me to tell a better story" (Lissauer, 2000, p. 26).
Knowing that journalists are attracted to resourcing the Web but that they are not satisfied with the content provided begs the question as to what exactly are corporate Web sites providing media visitors. Several researchers have asked this question and have attempted to uncover the answer through corporate Web page content analysis. Esrock and Leichty (1999) sampled 100 sites posted by companies listed in the 1997 Fortune 500. Sites were analyzed for the presence of content that related to customers of the organization and the news media. In investigating how the sampled companies were meeting the needs of the media, the researchers examined sites for news releases, release archival releases, and media contact information. If any of the three features appeared anywhere in the site, they were coded as present and available to the media.
The researchers found press releases on 88% of the sites but were reluctant to claim that the releases were provided for the benefit of the media because only 60% of the sites listed media contact information, and a mere 36% of the sites organized the releases by topic area, a feature the researchers saw as indicative of a company's focus on using the site for media relations. Ultimately, the researchers labeled corporate Web sites as not media friendly. Esrock and Leichty were particularly critical of the fact that information that may have been interesting to the media was not centralized but located on different pages within the sites. The researchers concluded that the inclusion of news releases on corporate Web sites may not be the best indicator of a media consideration because the information in news releases may be of interest to multiple audiences and companies truly interested in media relations would have provided, among other items, central locations for content that c
ould be of use to media professionals.
In an article published the next year, Esrock and Leichty (2000) revisited their previous Web content analysis. Believing that any public a corporation was truly serving through its Web site should be addressed on the site's homepage or front page, the researchers again coded the 100 sites pulled in the 1997 sample. In this study, the researchers categorized links on the homepage and material deposited in pages linked from that initial portal. Again, Esrock and Leichty interpreted the presence of news releases, release archival systems, and media contact information as indication that the corporation in question considered the media important. What the two found confirmed their conclusions from the 1999 study. Primary audiences, as indicated by front-page hyperlinks, were shareholders/stakeholders (68%), prospective employees (68%) and customers (51%). Much lower priority was given to the media (22%). The researchers again concluded that the press and journalists seem to be less i
mportant than previously thought as indicated by the lack of navigational tools aimed at the media located on the homepage.
In summary, literature and research suggest that the Web has the potential to be a key public relations tool but is not currently being used to its full potential in media relations. In fact journalists report turning to corporate Web sites when researching stories. But theses same journalist also report often not finding what they are looking for on company sites, and a few have even suggested that their coverage of companies with poor Web presence is skewed negative, if they cover the company at all. This negative perception of corporate sites by the media has, as could be expected, lead to investigations aimed at laying bear just what is available on corporate Web pages. In fact, content analyses of company Web sites have been conducted, and researchers have confirmed media allegations that these sites are not sufficiently providing information journalists seek, and the content that is provided is overly difficult to locate. What these researchers have not investigated, however
, is the manner in which companies are specifically trying to meet the needs of journalists and what array of public relations collateral material is being made available. Past studies have coded only news releases, release archives, and contact information as media-focused content and these anywhere they are found (Esrock & Leichty, 1999; Esrock & Leichty, 2000). Undoubtedly, journalists accessing the Web may also be interested in financial statements, downloadable photographs, executive biographies, corporate profiles, and a host of other materials not coded as media content in previous studies. Likewise, researchers have stated that sites could do journalists a great favor by locating all media materials in centralized press centers linked to the homepages of sites. To this point, however, no study has investigated the use of press centers on the Web. The present study attempts to fill this gap in the literature by specifically investigating corporate Web sites for the presence
 of press centers or pressrooms and the presence of up to 31 public relations content items that could be housed in these corporate Web page media rooms.
Research Questions
In Better Access, Better information, Better News: The Ten Essential Elements of an Online Newsroom, Bransford (2001) states that the best way to create a journalist-friendly Website is to furnish a special, separate, online pressroom. Esrock and Leichty (1999, 2000) echoed this sentiment stating that locating media materials in a centralized area would simply journalists' search for information. To determine what percentage of sites do in fact harbor pressrooms and how the rooms are labeled, research questions 1 and 2 guided the study.
RQ1: What percentage of corporate Web sites have clearly labeled pressrooms?
RQ2: What pressroom labels are most common?
Related to research questions 1 and 2, it would seem that more successful companies would be more media savvy and, as a result, be more likely to include pressrooms on their sites. While it could be debated that any company included on the Fortune 500 is successful, the data collection procedure allowed for an examination of how ranking does in fact affect the use of Web pressrooms, and research question 3 guided the research.
RQ3: Are pressrooms more common on the Web sites of companies ranking
        higher on the Fortune 500 list?
Researchers evaluating corporate Web sites have not only been critical of media materials being scattered throughout a site, but they have also commented negatively on sites not indicating on the homepage the presence of pressrooms (Bransford, 2001; "Corporate Web Sites Get a 'D'," 2001). Esrock and Leichty (2000) went as far as to state that Web sites may be viewed as slighting audiences who are not clearly addressed on the front page. No doubt, quality media relations and media coverage would be facilitated by not only including pressrooms somewhere on the site but also quickly directing journalist to them by linking them from the front page. To help determine the importance corporations place on directing the media to information that may be needed by journalists, research questions 4 guided the research.
RQ4: What percentage of pressrooms are linked to the homepage?
While researchers have searched Web sites for media content, few items that could be considered of interest to the press have been coded. Esrock and Leichty (2000) counted only press releases, release archival systems, and contact information as media content. Others have indicated that items such as executive speeches and biographies, product information pieces, technical fact sheets, case histories, and downloadable photographs among other collateral material can be deposited on a Web site (Major, 1995; "What a Journalist Wants," 2000). Because one goal of the research was to determine what array of materials, in addition to those previously coded, companies includes on their Web sites, research question 5 guided the research.
RQ5: What materials are included in pressrooms?
Mimicking research questions 3, it seems plausible that companies with higher revenue would be more financially capable of committing resources to their Web sites and thus create more media-useful sites. To exam this assumption, research question 6 also guided the research.
RQ6: Does quality of companies' Web pressrooms increase with Fortune 500 ranking?
Method
Selection of Web sites
 A content analysis of all 2001 Fortune 500 company Websites was conducted. In most cases, the Web site of each company was accessed by linking from the 2001 Fortune 500 list maintained on the Fortune Web site (http://www.fortune.com/lists/F500/index.html). When a site address was not included on Fortune's list, a simple Web search using www.yahoo.com was performed. The Web site of one company (Fortune # 284-Union Carbide) was not functional during the coding period and thus was excluded from analyses.
Coders and Coding Instrument
The Web sites of all 500 companies were randomly assigned to two coders, who visited the sites from July 23 to Aug. 6, 2001. Due to a data entry error, two sites had to be revisited and coded four weeks after the initial coding.
In addition to company name, Fortune rank, and Web address, each site was coded for the presence of a pressroom and the presence of collateral materials and information within the pressroom. Because it would seem that truly media-friendly corporate Web homepages would efficiently direct journalists to media material (Bransford, 2001), sites were coded for the presence of a clearly labeled pressroom. Any page within the site that was labeled with one of 40 monikers was coded as a pressroom. A list of labels that indicated a pressroom is included in Table 1. Additionally, coders indicated if the pressroom was linked from the homepage (Esrock & Liechty, 2000), another sign that a company recognized journalists as an important public and that the site operators had tried to ensure any media quest for information successful.
Because the researcher expected some pressrooms to not be linked from the homepage, coders indicated if another term ("About Us" for example) had to be clicked to enter a secondary page that could serve as a pressroom. Also coded was what label was used in lieu of one of the 40 labels, and how many clicks it took to traverse from the "buried" homepage to the pressroom.
Once a pressroom was located, coders investigated the content of the room. A total of 31 types (see Table 2) of content were coded as present or not. Only content linked to or included in the pressroom was coded. Again because the aim of the study was to determine how efficiently members of the media could find information sought, no items buried in the site was coded as present. For example, if executive biographies were not listed in the pressroom but were located once the coder clicked on "Company fact sheets," the coder did not indicate that biographies were available. The rationale behind this decision to not code buried content centers on the idea that any material that a journalist could not quickly locate in a pressroom listing of contents would be assumed to not be present on the site ("Corporate Web Sites Get a 'D'," 2001).
Next, the contact information included in the pressroom was coded. Coders were asked to determine if information provided was for the company in general, for the PR staff in general (no names given), or for a PR practitioner identified by name. Only the most intimate contact was coded. For example, if a PR staff person's contact information was listed along with the general contact information for the corporate office, the coder only considered the information for the practitioner. For the most intimate contact, the means of contact provided was also coded. All means of contact coded are listed in Table 3.
Finally, several aspects of the coding should be noted. First, only pages clearly identified as an area intended for journalists were coded as pressrooms. If a site housed, for example, press releases under an "Investor Relations" link and nowhere else, absent using one of the labels listed in Table 1, the site was coded as not having a pressroom. Again, the purpose of the study was to determine what Fortune 500 companies are doing to make their Web sites more useful to the media. It was concluded during the planning phases of the project that scattering materials throughout a Web site does little to make a journalist's life easier. Second, not all coding categories are mutually exclusive. One category in particular, Media kit, does not stand alone. Online media kits often simply house links back to other pressroom content-executive speeches for example. In this case, both a media kit and executive speeches would be coded as present.
Intercoder Reliability
        Both coders separately investigated 50 randomly selected common sites of the 500. Agreement on coding decisions was figured by the Holsti method per site. Across the 50 sites, intercoder agreement averaged .86.
Results
Percentage of Web Sites with Clearly Labeled Press Rooms
The first research question considered the percentage of Fortune 500 company Web sites with clearly labeled pressrooms. Of the 499 sites examined, 195 (39.08%) had pressroom labeled with names that clearly identified the linked area of the Web site as a media resource.
Pressroom Labels Commonly Used
        The second research question considered the names used to label pressrooms. Of 195 pressrooms, 60 (30.8%) of the rooms were labeled "News Room," 40 (20.5%) were labeled "Press Room," 17 (8.7%) were labeled "Media," and 11 (5.6%) each were labeled "Media Center" or "Media Relations." No other label was used more than 10 times. Table 1 provides a list of labels used, the frequency of label use, and the percentage of pressrooms using the label.
Use of Pressrooms and Fortune 500 Ranking
        The third research question considered the relationship between Fortune 500 ranking and the use of Web pressrooms. To answer the research question, the number of clearly labeled pressrooms was compared among grouped Websites. To facilitate the use of a chi-square goodness of fit test, sites were clustered according to company Fortune 500 rank. Sites representing companies ranked 1 through 100 were grouped as were sites representing companies ranked 101 through200, 201 through 300, 301 through 400, and 401 through 500. Analysis revealed that the top 100 sites possessed 52 pressrooms, the second 100 sites 45, the third 100 (99 because one site being down during coding) sites 38, the fourth 100 sites 35, and the final 100 sites 25. The significant test statistic (_2 (4, N = 499) = 17.53, p = .002) suggested that pressrooms become more common as site sponsors are ranked more favorably by Fortune.
Percentage of Press Rooms Linked to Site Homepage
The fourth research question considered the percentage of pressrooms linked to the homepage of their host sites. Of the 195 sites with pressrooms, 122 (62.6%) of the pressrooms were linked to the homepage. Further analyses showed that the remaining 73 pressrooms not linked to the homepage required an average of 2.1 (s.d. = .32) clicks to reach them. It should be noted here that pressrooms linked from the homepage were coded as requiring one click to reach their content, as a link such as "News Room" would mandate that it be selected before the actual pressroom would appear.
        Because the link from the homepage that had to be selected before reaching the pressroom was recorded, analysis revealed the labels or headings under which these 73 buried pressrooms were located. Twenty-five (34.2%) were housed under a link titled "About ______" where the trailing word represented the respective company name. Another 19 (26.1%) were included under a generic "About Us" link, 11 (15.1%) under "Company/Corporate Information," five (6.8%) under "Our Company," two (2.7%) under "Site Map," two (2.7%) under "Inside ______," and nine others that were included under unique labels. These unique labels included the following: "Business Today," "Click from Home Page," "Corporate," "Dominion News," "Index," "Learn More About," "News," "Quick Links," and "Who is 3Com."
Materials Included in Pressrooms
        The fifth research question considered the items contained in pressrooms. In the 195 pressrooms, coders searched for the presence of 31 different items. Analyses revealed that an average of 6.46 (s.d. = 3.62) different individual items appeared in the pressrooms, and the number of items in a pressroom ranged from one to 16. The most common items found in pressrooms were Press/News Releases, Executive Biographies, and Executive Photographs. Table 2 provides a complete list of all items, their frequency of inclusion, and the percentage of pages that included each item.
        Analyses also revealed that the most frequently occurring number of items in pressrooms was 6, appearing in 23 (11.8%) of the 195 rooms. The next most frequently occurring number of items was 2, appearing in 20 (10.3%) of the pressrooms, and 15 (7.7%) pressrooms housed only one item. The highest number of items, 16, occurred in only one pressroom-the pressroom of #52-ranked United Parcel Service, which incidentally was not linked to the site's homepage.
        Type of contact information included in the pressroom was also coded. Contact information was not included in other analyses, such as total number of pressroom items, because while useful to the media, is not considered typical public relations collateral material. For each pressroom, the most intimate form of contact information was coded with contact information for the company in general being recognized as less intimate than contact information for an unidentified PR practitioner or a practitioner listed by name, the most intimate contact. Of the 195 pressrooms, 112 (57.4%) listed as its most intimate contact a practitioner identified by name, 21 (10.8%) listed a PR staffer in general, and 14 (7.2%) listed information for the company in general. Forty-eight (24.7%) pressrooms did not list any contact information.
        Additionally, means of communicating with the listed contacts was coded. For sites listing general company contact information as the most intimate, office telephone numbers were the most often included means of contact with the numbers appearing in 78.6% of the pressrooms. Email addresses were the most often included means of contact for sites listing PR staffers not identified by names as the most intimate media contact with the addresses appearing in 71.4% of the sites. Office telephone numbers again were the most included means of contact for PR practitioners listed by name with the numbers appearing in 96.4% of the pressrooms where an individual was the most intimate contact. In fact, one PR practitioner from BB&T Corporation, a financial holding company, listed his home telephone number for media use. For a complete listing of all means of contact delineated by media source type see Table 3.
Quality of Pressroom and Fortune 500 Rank
The sixth research question considered the relationship between Fortune 500 rank and pressroom quality. For this question, pressroom quality was operationalized as number of items included in the pressroom. A pressroom with many items would be seen as more media friendly and useful than a pressroom with fewer items. Again, the Websites were grouped according to Fortune rank. The top 100 sites were grouped as were the second 100, the third 100, the fourth 100, and the last 100. Because the top-100 site grouping was the only one where more than half of the sites possessed a pressroom, the decision was made to exclude all sites without pressrooms from analysis. It was feared that the inclusion of a large number of sites lacking any media content would not allow for an accurate measure of quality. The rationale was that quality cannot be considered where no content exists. Ultimately, grouped Web sites with pressrooms and number of items in pressroom were submitted to analysis of variance (see Table 4 for means and comparisons). The ANOVA (F(4, 190) = 8.24, p < .01) and post hoc comparison revealed that pressrooms in the top, second, and fourth tier
of Fortune 500 rankings have significantly more items, and therefore more quality, than pressrooms in the third and fifth tiers.
Discussion
This study was designed to provide a systematic and representative glimpse of how successful companies are using the Web to foster quality media relations by delivering information commonly sought by journalists. The site content analysis, which is the first investigating all 500 of the Fortune companies, revealed that little over one-third of companies provide clearly labeled site areas focused on assisting journalists. Consultants and researchers both have recommended that the best way ensure that Web sites are delivering the right information to journalists is through dedicated pressrooms (see Bransford, 2001; "Corporate Web Sites Get a 'D'," 2001; Esrock & Leichty, 2000). Despite these urgings, the majority of companies have yet to centrally locate and label materials that may be of interest to the media.
        Fortunately for members of the media seeking information on corporate Web sites, over half off all pressrooms are labeled either "News Room" or "Press Room." This would suggest that some standardization of pressroom labels is in effect, which should ease journalists' hunt for Web information. It would seem that knowing that the majority of pressrooms fall under two monikers would facilitate the media quickly locating materials sought, which after all is the essence behind the popularity of the Web as a research tool (Gleason, 1997).
        Analyses also revealed a relationship between pressrooms and Fortune 500 ranking. This does not indicate, however, that by including a pressroom on its Website, a company would begin to experience success leading to a lofty Fortune ranking. Obviously, many factors other than the possession of a Web pressroom influence company revenue. Ultimately, one could possibly explain the more pronounced use of pressrooms by successful companies by stating that top-ranking companies have more extensive histories, which include longer standing public relations departments aware of the importance of media relations. This explanation, however, is merely speculation and one of many possible reasons behind the finding. Just as plausible is the notion that companies with pressrooms rank higher because they receive better media coverage, which drives revenues. Again, without testing these theories, the exact effect of a pressroom on success is unknown. Nonetheless, evidence remains that companies r
anking higher on the Fortune 500 are more likely to have pressrooms than companies ranking lower, a fact that companies without pressrooms may want to note.
        In addition to having clearly labeled pressrooms, it has also been recommended that pressrooms be linked from the homepage (Bransford, 2001; Esrock & Leichty, 2000). Nearly two-thirds of all sites with pressrooms included links to the pressroom on the homepage, indicating that the sponsors of these sites see journalists as a key public (Esrock & Leichty, 2000). It was also encouraging that Web users could reach buried pressrooms in an average of two clicks. This suggests that journalists would be able to locate most pressrooms with minimal effort if the most efficient route through the Website was followed. Of the sites with pressrooms not directly linked to the homepage, taking this route would involve clicking on About "_____" or About Us. More than half of the buried pressrooms were linked from one of these two areas.
        Clearly linked pressrooms offer little value if their content is lacking. The average number of items in a pressroom was 6.5. The most extensive pressroom housed 16 items while nearly 20% of the rooms had two items or less. These figures indicate that simply including a pressroom on a site does equal quality media relations. No doubt journalist appreciate pressrooms, but it would seem that they would like to find more than press releases, executive biographies, and executive photographs (the most commonly occurring items) once they reach them. In fact, seemingly useful items such as company logos for publication use, media kits, corporate profiles, and company backgrounders among others appeared in less than 25% of pressrooms. If most media members agree with Los Angeles Times Syndicate columnist Larry Magid and want one-stop shopping for an array of media materials (Lissauer, 2000), even sites with pressrooms are a far cry from being the information supermarkets of journalists'
dreams.
        One positive sign for journalists, more than half of all pressrooms listed a practitioner by name as a media contact. Less than 10% of pressrooms listed only general contact information. Telephone numbers and email addresses were the most common means listed for reaching media contacts, suggesting that new technology is being phased in with the old.
        Finally, the data suggested that pressroom quality, defined as number of items in pressroom, was different across sites grouped according to Fortune 500 ranking. Although the quality of pressrooms did not increase exactly with Fortune 500 ranking, the top tier Fortune companies did have pressrooms with more items than the pressrooms in the lowest tier. Again, it would be misleading to suggest that top Fortune ranking is influenced by pressroom quality, but data does show that top companies have more complete pressrooms than bottom ranking companies. This finding does nothing but lend support to the idea that those organizations without pressrooms or with pressrooms lacking much content would do well to upgrade.
Conclusion
        As with any study, this content analysis has several limitations that must be kept in mind when forming conclusions based on the data. First, the data collected may not represent typical companies and their Web presence. Fortune 500 companies differ from other companies on total revenue if nothing else. The companies analyzed represent the most successful, and thus would presumably have the assets to develop better Websites than companies in general, although that could be questioned. Another limitation centers on the fact that pressrooms were narrowly defined to include only those with one 40 labels. This limitation, however, was mandated by the focus of the study, which was to determine how corporations are making press materials readily available. In fact, coders made a point of recording the number or would-be pressrooms that would not qualify because of their name being excluded from the codesheet. There were none. Finally, coded pressroom content was limited to that include
d on the codesheet. Again, every attempt was made to be as exhaustive as possible when listing possible content, and in no case could one of the coders remember uncovering pressroom content not listed on the codesheet.
        Despite limitations, the analysis does provide a general impression of how successful corporations are using the Web to facilitate media relations. Looking at the entire Fortune 500, the present study has shown that pressrooms are a rarity. More encouraging is the fact that few pressroom labels are used, possibly increasing the usefulness of the sites to the media. Equally positive is the fact that the majority of pressrooms are linked to the homepages of corporate Websites suggesting that sites that follow this guideline do in fact view the media as a primary and important audience. However, it should be noted that although the use of pressrooms is encouraged, the information included in the pressrooms in this study is present in seemingly low numbers. In the end, the present study outlines that efforts are being made to aid the media via the Web, but much room for improvement exists. Ultimately, a quote from an article published when the Web was first becoming recognized as a useful PR medium still rings true-"Getting on the Web with a homepage is a no-brainer. Getting the most from the Web's global reach and information delivery capabilities takes a lot of gray matter," (Marken, 1995, p. 36).
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Table 1
Fortune 500 Company Web Site Pressroom Labels

        Label   Frequency       Percent Used of All Labels

News Room       60      30.8%
Press Room      40      20.5%
Media   17      8.7%
Media Center    11      5.6%
Media Relations 11      5.6%
News Center     10      5.1%
Press Center    8       4.1%
Media _______*  8       4.1%
Press   7       3.6%
Press _______*  5       2.6%
Media Resources 4       2.1%
Media Room      4       2.1%
Press Office    2       1.0%
Public Relations (PR)   2       1.0%
Press Materials 1       0.5%
Press Services  1       0.5%
News Desk       1       0.5%
Public Relations (PR) Room      1       0.5%
Journalists     1       0.5%
Journalists _______*    1       0.5%

Media Desk      0       0.0%
Media Materials 0       0.0%
Media Office    0       0.0%
Media Services  0       0.0%
News Materials  0       0.0%
News Office     0       0.0%
News Relations  0       0.0%
News Resources  0       0.0%
News Services   0       0.0%
Press Desk      0       0.0%
Press Relations 0       0.0%
Press Resources 0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Center    0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Desk      0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Materials 0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Office    0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Resources 0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) Services  0       0.0%
Public Relations (PR) _______*  0       0.0%
PR Relations    0       0.0%

Note. 195 sites had pressrooms. If the word electronic appeared before any of the 40
labels, the label (sans "electronic") was coded.
* Any descriptor following the label adjective was acceptable.
Table 2
Items Included in Fortune 500 Company Web Site Pressrooms

                Number of       Percentage of
                Pressrooms      Pressrooms
        Label   Possessing Item Possessing Item

Press/News Releases     189     96.9%
Executive Bios/Profiles 100     51.3%
Executive Photos        95      48.7%
Company Fact Sheets     69      35.4%
Annual Reports-Financial        66      33.8%
Company History 62      31.8%
News Alert Service For Media    60      30.8%
Company Staff Speeches/Presentations    58      29.7%
Product Or Company-In-Action Photos     55      28.2%
Press Release Search Engine     50      25.6%
Company Logos For Use In Publication    44      22.6%
Media Kits      41      21.0%
Corporate Profile       39      20.0%
Quarterly Reports-Financial     34      17.4%
Material Presented In Archived Video    34      17.4%
Company Philanthropic Activity  32      16.4%
News Published Or Aired About Company   31      15.9%
Company Backgrounder    30      15.4%
Material Presented In Archived Audio    26      13.3%
FAQ Section Aimed At Media      22      11.3%
Company Perspective Pieces On Current Issues/Trends     20      10.3%
Opportunity For Press Personnel To Register With Company        18      9.2%
Company Mission Statement       17      8.7%
Material Presented In Real-Time Video   16      8.2%
Feature Stories Written By Company Staff        14      7.2%
Material Presented In Real-Time Audio   14      7.2%
Company Value Statement 9       4.6%
Company Vision Statement        9       4.6%
Editorial Stories Written By Company Staff      6       3.1%
Broadcast Release       0       0.0%
Broadcast Release Search Engine 0       0.0%

Note. 195 sites had pressrooms.

Table 3
Media Contact Information and Frequency of Communication Means Listed in Fortune 500 Company Web Site Pressrooms

        Most Intimate Media Contact Listed in Pressroom

        Means of        Company PR Practitioner PR Practitioner
        Communication   in General      in General (No Name)    Identified by Name

Office Telephone Number 11 (78.6%)      14 (66.7%)      108 (96.4%)
Email Address   10 (71.4%)      15 (71.4%)              90 (80.4%)
Fax Number      2 (14.3%)       3 (14.3)        39 (34.8%)
Physical Address        7 (50%) 5 (23.8%)       27 (24.1%)
Cell Phone Number       0 (0.0%)        0 (0.0%)        6 (5.4%)
Pager Number    0 (0.0%)        1 (4.8%)        5 (4.5%)
Home Telephone Number   0 (0.0%)        0 (0.0%)        1 (0.9%)

Note. 147 of the 195 pressrooms listed contact information. All percentages are calculated using the frequency per individual media contact category. Most intimate media contact listed in pressroom was Company in General on 14 sites, PR Practitioner in General on 21 sites, PR Practitioner Identified by Name on 112 sites.







Table 4
Number of Items in Pressroom by Fortune 500 Rank Grouping

        Fortune 500 Rank        # of Sites      Mean # of Items Standard
        Grouping        With Pressrooms In Pressroom    Deviation

        1-100   52      7.46b   3.20
        101-200 45      7.56 b  3.91
        201-300 38      4.71 a  2.86
        301-400 35      7.14 b  3.70
        401-500 25      4.12 a  2.89

Note. Means not sharing a superscript letter are significantly different at p < .05 as determined
by Student Newman-Keuls tests.