The 2025 Midyear Media Stat Pack

11 stats that prove just how fast the comms game is changing and what you need to do next.

hi, team pr@ctical.

if you’re still building comms plans on last year’s media model, you’re behind.

because here’s what 2025 is telling us—loud and clear: visibility is shifting, platforms are fragmenting, and the old media math doesn’t add up.

this is your midyear reality check. the new media + comms baseline:

1. 📉 -55%: Business Insider’s organic search traffic collapse

   1. → retrievability ≠ reputation.

   2. even legacy names are losing AI-era discoverability.

2. 🎥 $72.4B: digital video ad spend in 2025 (up 14%) 58% of all video ad spend now goes to digital

   1. → if your comms plan doesn’t include video-first PR, you’re not just late—you’re invisible.

3. 🧠 80% of creators now use AI, but Gen Z (<25) remains hesitant

   1. → AI-native storytelling is the norm—except for your next wave of talent. train them now.

4. 💸 $700B: global digital ad spend projected for 2025

   1. → media isn’t shrinking, it’s just not earned-only anymore.

   2. PR must speak paid, search, and AI fluently.

5. 📉 Journalism layoffs: down 54% YoY

   1. → good news? not exactly. it's a floor, not a rebound.

6. 🔄 WSJ lost 44% of traffic after leaving Google’s First Click Free—but saw a 4x bump in subscriptions

   1. → reach ≠ revenue. smart media is optimizing for depth, not mass.

7. 🧾 Average media company margin: 5% (vs 10% industry benchmark)

   1. → media brands are under pressure. fewer reporters, more syndication, less context.

   2. your brand needs to fill the gap with structure.

8. 🧠 52.5% of creators using AI for video

   1. → video is the top AI-adopted format.

   2. build media that’s trainable, transcribable, and multimodal.

9. 📉 U.S. pay TV now under 50M subscribers (from 100M+ a decade ago)

   1. → traditional broadcast is not the backbone anymore.

   2. streaming + on-demand > prime time.

10. 🔗 Facebook ↓ 21%, Twitter ↓ 34% in PR effectiveness

    1. → old social is fading. LinkedIn, YouTube, TikTok, Reddit: that’s your new frontline.

11. 🔄 40% of news traffic still comes from search

    1. → but AI overviews are rewriting how answers are sourced.

    2. if your content doesn’t surface there—you don’t exist.

bottom line: media strategy isn’t a channel plan. it’s an infrastructure play.

What to do now:

1. Reaudit your media mix.
   Still prioritizing print, broadcast, or legacy digital? Time to reallocate toward formats with AI retrievability and audience traction (video, transcripts, structured blogs, LinkedIn).

2. Shift your measurement mindset.
   Stop reporting impressions. Start tracking AI surfaceability, subscription lift, and multichannel reinforcement.

3. Prioritize formats built for reuse.
   Think podcast clips, AI-optimized blog posts, and video transcripts—assets that show up in search, LLMs, and social all at once.

4. Rethink what “coverage” even means.
   A quote in a top outlet isn’t the win. A citation that trains ChatGPT, ranks in Perplexity, and builds long-term authority? That’s the new tier 1.

5. Train your team on AI fluency.
   Especially Gen Z creators. Your next-level advantage is a team that knows how to feed AI systems—not just react to them.

structure your message.
optimize for answers.
engineer your visibility.

—

stay sharp, stay visible,
sarah

🪄 pr@ctical—where sharp taste meets sharper tools.