As far as I’m aware, you still need eggs, flour, sugar, butter, baking powder, vanilla extract, milk… and I’ve not even started on the icing. You need a mix — as many of us who rely on Betty Crocker know too well.

Many planners and strategists are making the same mistake with media plans. While the media mix is a well-worn phrase these days, the ingredients going into a media plan are becoming vanishingly fewer for a so-called ‘fragmented’ ecosystem.

Low-attention media — often the moreish chocolate of media plans — is taking up an ever-larger share of the mixing bowl. And as delicious as chocolate is, it’s balance that makes a chocolate cake taste so good.

The result of all this is media plans that are all short-term deliciousness and none of the structural heavy-lifting ingredients that provide real effectiveness. With many plans skewing heavily towards low-attention and low-effectiveness platforms, leading industry voices are calling media planning a ‘lost art’. When short-term gains and instant measurement dominate conversation, long-term strategy suffers.

High-attention media like news brands are getting much less of a look-in, leaving plenty of return on investment on the table. Countless studies over the years have shown that they’re trusted, engaging, profit-building — so what’s the hold up?

We've found many media professionals aren’t always aware, either of news brands’ effectiveness or what they offer to advertisers in 2026. They might think about news brands in their classic print form, but they might not realise it’s the same media owner making their favourite podcast or a 60-second Instagram explainer on last night’s big match. They might even block news entirely if they think it's not brand safe — even though they're some of the internet's most trusted environments. 

These misconceptions might lead them to that familiar refrain: “no one reads news anymore”. Except 23 million people read it every day, young and old, from London to Llandudno. 

Whether you’re fresh off the grad scheme or running a department, busy schedules mean it's difficult for anyone in media to wade through all the evidence. That’s why we built the Newsworks Academy, an online training course that doesn’t ask you to. Only got 30 minutes per week? That's enough time to come out sounding like you really know your stuff — whether it's why journalism matters, why news brands punch above their weight in campaigns or what news brands really offer advertisers.

Best of all? It’s free. Not even chocolate cake can say that.

Sign up to the Newsworks Academy by Sunday 31 May to join our summer course. 

The Newsworks Academy is the digital learning platform helping media and marketing professionals harness the UK news publishing industry.