The irony of the ever-shrinking PRWeek is not lost on me. The print publication used to be a lot thicker than the 20-page issue that recently arrived in my mailbox. The venerable magazine still monitors the pulse of the industry, and the online property is rich with content, but it’s perhaps emblematic of the general state the media.

After content, the lifeblood of any publication is money. Obviously, no business can operate without income, and it’s difficult to improve the quality of a product without investing in its development.

In times of economic “challenges” like these, marketing budgets can be the first to be slashed. For many companies that actively market, the biggest slice of the marketing pie is advertising. It’s not unusual for the advertising budget to be more than 10-times that of PR, so reducing advertising spending is a logical choice.

Media relations are still a cornerstone of public relations, and credible, objective, well-read journalism still carries much more clout than purchased messages. But when advertising declines, the decline of news outlets closely follows. When publications decline, the impact on the public relations industry can be felt, too.

It’s a circle. Cutting newsroom staff only serves to cut the quality of the product. An inferior product inevitably means that audience numbers fall. Few readers and viewers result in decreased ad and subscription revenue, so more cuts are made, and more decline.

What does this mean for PR professionals? On one hand it means that the outlets left standing will be that much more important. It also means that we as PR people more than ever need to change our clients’ and our own perception that public-relations equal media-relations.

The economic challenge of the next few years, be it deep recession or full-fledged depression, will demand that PR practitioners be more creative and innovative than ever.