Salt Lake City, Utah -- The Deseret News, Utah’s oldest daily newspaper and leading online news source, has named Chris Lee as publisher, Paul Edwards as editor and Rick Hall as the Utah edition editor.

Lee joined the Deseret News in June 2010. Prior to this appointment, he served as the vice president of digital. Lee was recently nominated to a three-year term on the board of the Suburban Newspaper Association of America, assisting in its transition to the Local Media Association. Prior to his arrival at Deseret News, Lee was chairman and CEO at Heritage Makers, a leader in web-to-print personalized photo products. Previously, Lee was the director of new business development for Ancestry.com and director of product management for MyFamily.com, a unit of Ancestry focused on building a social network for families, from 1999 to 2002. Lee holds a Master of Business Administration from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Arts with Honors (double major in Economics and Italian, magna cum laude) from Brigham Young University.

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Nearly 45 percent of Americans will make New Year's resolutions. Unfortunately, many of us will fall off after the first week. If you're one of those individuals, the Monday strategy could increase your odds for success: Make Monday the day to recommit to your resolutions with 52 Healthy Monday Tips.

Click here for the release about using the Monday strategy to stick to your New Year’s resolutions.

Health and lifestyle media representatives can receive a PDF or website widget of the 52 Healthy Monday Tips upon request. Share the tips with your readers each Monday, or use them as the basis for weekly editorial content.

Twitter-sized tips are also available to share on social media.

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Listening to the Mike Blinder webinar on how they created $600,000 in 60 days with GateHouse Media you realize that in a nano-second world that spending time researching and preparing for client meetings is more important than ever.

It does take a village when you put together a sales plan for a company as large as GateHouse: 79 dailies; more than 250 weeklies and 95 shoppers plus more than 400 websites. Blinder had a host of GateHouse executives from around the company (and the country) on the webinar to discuss how they’ve been successful with a focused sales approach.

According to Brad Harmon, Corporate VP of Sales & Marketing digital goals for 2012 will be double this year’s percentages of 25-25%. Harmon says “that is very achievable.”

In order to reach these goals it’s important that three things happen according to Harmon: we simplify, standardize and automate. Infrastructure is key. Currently they have 10 digital specialists in the New England area and plan to add many more where there are regional opportunities.

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Membership voted 5:1 to support name change

After forty years, Suburban Newspapers of America is changing its name. Local Media Association was recommended by a committee (including the SNA board of directors and the SNA marketing committee) that represented nearly 30 member companies. It was an intense five month process that included an enormous amount of healthy debate. The membership received ballots on December 1 and when the voting ended today, the motion had carried. In fact, SNA members supported the name change by a ratio of 5:1.

“It’s simple, self-explanatory, direct,” said Jon K. Rust, Co-President of Rust Communications and Chairman of the Board for SNA. “It puts ‘local’ first – just like we do as media organizations – and it shares that we’re not just newspapers anymore, but much more. It also says that we are united as an association, working together to become better.”

In 1971, SNA was formed when a group of entrepreneurial, family-owned newspaper publishers merged three other associations into this new one. The association has always carried the entrepreneurial spirit of those founding fathers with innovative and cutting-edge programs and research. In that vein, a new tag line has also been developed - “Innovate. Educate. Inspire.”

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Toronto, December 1, 2011 – U.S. and Canadian newspapers have lowered their expectations concerning most advertising revenue sources in 2012. The one exception is digital, for which 53% foresee a “large increase”.

In 2012, about 70% of newspapers have definite plans to start or upgrade content delivery on mobile devices and to improve their website for online visitors. Other popular 2012 operating initiatives include controlling or reducing both staff and non-staff costs, charging readers for digital content, and starting a new niche product.

In terms of advertising sales initiatives, 65% to 70% have definite plans to expand email, mobile or e-reader digital advertising, to improve website advertising programs and options, and to upgrade digital sales capabilities. Two other areas of attention for 2012 are upgrading print sales capabilities and improving ad pricing and rate structures.

Just over half of newspaper executives and managers surveyed said that current 2011 ad revenues are coming in worse than expected. The implication is that many newspapers will not achieve their budget forecasts this year.

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All SNA delegates (designated voting member for each company) received a ballot on December 1 to vote on a proposed name change for the organization. The SNA board of directors is recommending Local Media Association as the new name.

Many voices were involved in proposing this new name. In addition to the 14 companies represented by senior level executives on the SNA board of directors, another 12 companies were represented on the marketing committee. These companies include: GateHouse Media, Sun-Times Media Group, Journal Register Company/Digital First Media, New York Times Regional Group, Swift Communications, Metroland Media Group, Deseret Digital Media, Borrell Associates, Rust Communications, Wick Communications, ASP Westward, ThisWeek Community Newspapers, American Community Newspapers, Richner Communications, The World Company, Arizona Daily Star, NGM Partners, Holden Landmark Corporation, CrossRoadsNews, The Elkhart Truth, Dow Jones Local Media Group and USA Weekend.

There are many reasons for the proposed name change as you might imagine. The current name confuses people and is not reflective of the entire membership. It also does not account for the digital side of our businesses. As for the new name, "...it's simple, self-explanatory, direct", said Jon Rust, Chairman of the SNA Board of Directors, "It is also powerful: It puts 'local' first - just like we do as media organizations - and it shares that we're not just newspapers anymore but much more." The board has also put forth a new tagline: "Innovate. Educate. Inspire." These words truly reflect the spirit of SNA that will continue under the new name.

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