Conference keynotes to address rise of social journalism, changing story for local news NEW YORK, April 1, 2025 – The Local Media Consortium (LMC), a strategic alliance of local media companies, today announced the speaker lineup and sponsors for its 2025 conference, which will be held May 5-7 at the Hilton North Scottsdale at Cavasson in Arizona. Sponsored by Google and AdCellerant, the LMC 2025 Digital Connections Conference will offer valuable insights and discussions on the latest trends and innovations shaping the local media industry.
Registration for the event is now open to LMC members, partners, vendors and non-member local media publishers here.
“It’s inspiring to see the traction this conference continues to gain year after year, as we broaden our sponsor, speaker and attendee list,” said Fran Wills, CEO of the LMC. “We continue to be optimistic that the meaningful discussions and ideas stemming from this annual event will provide the momentum the industry needs to pivot in a rapidly changing digital ecosystem.”
This year’s keynote speeches will be given by The Parnas Perspective’s Aaron Parnas, a social media journalist with more than 5.5 million followers, and Mi-Ai Parrish, managing director of ASU Media Enterprise and Professor for Media Innovation and Leadership at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Parnas will present “The Rise Of Social Media Journalism,” addressing the way social media has changed the landscape in news reporting, and how newsrooms can utilize social media to their advantage, both to get wider reach and to earn more revenue. Parrish’s address, titled “Changing the Story for Local News,” will share industry experiments and successes, and highlight examples of how local news is a bright spot among legacy media. Communities with healthy local news have higher voting rates, more people who donate to local charities, and are more aware of shared problems.
Marine Wing, strategic partner manager of web gaming at Google, will present a featured keynote session, “The Untapped Power of Play: Why HTML5 Games are Your Website's Secret Weapon,” sharing the untapped potential of casual games for non-gaming websites to boost audience engagement and revenue. And Adcellerant’s Adam Lee, chief business development officer, and Ben Bouslog, VP new business development, will discuss, “Driving Efficiencies and Optimizing Resources in a Multi-Channel Advertising Ecosystem,” highlighting how media organizations can leverage automation, unified sales strategies and operational efficiencies to do more with less.
The conference will also include a panel titled, “Maximizing ROI from Strategic Programmatic Partners,” on how media organizations can evaluate, choose and maximize value from their long term strategic vendor partnerships. Additional session topics will include, “Accelerating Digital Success: How Digital On Demand Services Helps You Get Things Done” with case studies on how local media outlets have leveraged the LMC’s Digital On Demand Services (DODS) to accelerate their digital transformation; and “Ready, Set, Grow!” showcasing audience and revenue growth success stories. Other topics will include maximizing AI opportunities, NewsPassID local news ad network, video monetization and leveraging audience data for growth.
The full agenda can be found here.
Additional 2025 Conference sponsors joining Google and AdCellerant include Audience, EX.CO, Hashtag Labs, Media.Net, Monster, OpsCo, RevContent, Media.net and SimpleFeed Inc. Other LMC partners and vendors are welcome and encouraged to participate.
About the Local Media Consortium The Local Media Consortium delivers more than $50M in annual economic value through digital partnerships and strategic initiatives on behalf of more than 150 local media companies in top markets across the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico, and includes more than 5,000 newspaper, radio, TV and online-only news outlets. By harnessing the combined volume and scale of its members, the LMC reduces costs and increases revenue with technology and service providers like Google, Meta, Monster, and others. The aggregated LMC audience footprint spans 200 million unique monthly visitors, and its member companies serve more than nine billion pageviews to consumers. More information is available at http://www.localmediaconsortium.com.
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