What to expect at the Digiday Publishing Summit, September 2025 edition

Execs from Bloomberg, The New York Times, People Inc, The Washington Post and many more will take the stage to share their strategies for facing the biggest AI threats and opportunities, and unveil what’s working — and what’s not — to prepare their companies for this next phase in digital media.

Next week there will be more in-depth recaps of what was said onstage and behind closed doors. For now, here’s a look at some of the topics that will be discussed at this fall’s DPS.

How Bloomberg is preparing for the media future

Bloomberg Media CEO Karen Saltser will set the scene for the event, discussing how the company is balancing AI innovation with strengthening direct audience relationships, and growing across platforms and revenue streams as search and social become less reliable.

Its strategy has helped grow paid subscriptions, adding about 100,000 new subscribers over the past year. Key to this is also Bloomberg’s diversified content distribution strategy across international studios, and channels such as linear TV, digital streaming, live video, original series and short-form content. Saltser will also discuss the different ways Bloomberg is implementing AI technology to improve click-through rates, and for data analysis and video curation. 

Adapting SEO and content distribution strategies for the AI era

Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode — and the growing user base of AI search engines from platforms like Perplexity and OpenAI — are fundamentally changing the way people search and find information. Publishers are seeing a decline in search traffic, and shifting their SEO and content strategies to maintain visibility. Sarakshi Rai, The Hill’s deputy managing editor of audience & content strategy, and Bhumika Tharoor, The Atlantic’s managing editor, will walk through the ways they are achieving this.

Companies like People Inc. and Wirecutter are introducing more tools and products to engage their audiences and encourage them to come directly to their sites, such as the People mobile app, and Wirecutter’s onsite product finder.

Leilani Hani, executive director of commerce at Wirecutter, will share how expanding into new coverage areas and formats for its shopping guides — such as beauty and kids, and producing more video — is helping to grow its direct audience.

People Inc. is razor-focused on diversification as it lessens its reliance on Google. Alysia Borsa, People Inc’s chief business officer and president of lifestyle, health and finance, will talk about the company’s strategy to grow its events by double digits, which is helping make up for traffic losses. She will also divulge adjustments People Inc. has made to its sales approach to grow ad revenue despite declines in programmatic ad revenue.

The evolution of new AI exec roles

New AI-focused executive roles have been cropping up left and right. We’ll hear from two people who hold those roles at DPS — at The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Sam Han, The Washington Post’s chief AI officer, and Zach Seward, The New York Times’ editorial director for AI initiatives, will discuss how these newly-created roles have evolved, and how they are handling the evaluation and rollout of AI tools and initiatives in the newsroom and beyond. These sessions will give an inside look at how these two large legacy publishers are overseeing AI strategy, with practical examples of how to make this process smoother. 

They will discuss areas within their newsrooms and companies where they have overseen the integration of AI technology (such as in audio and investigations), and areas that are insulated from these changes. 

How AI is powering search and personalization

Business Insider has made no secret of its plans to leverage artificial intelligence across all aspects of its business, rolling out a slew of AI-powered products over the past year, including an AI search engine launched last October and an AI-generated audio briefing tool released in June. The overarching goal of these products is to enhance the user experience by making it easier for readers to find relevant content and consume news in ways that fit their habits. For tools like the audio briefing, more personalized elements are in the roadmap, per Business Insider CTO Harry Hope.

But BI’s AI push has had positive downstream effects beyond the pure user experience. Tools like the AI search engine keep engaged readers on BI’s owned platforms, while AI-generated content products like the audio briefing represent untapped sponsorship inventory. And at a publication where over 70 percent of employees use AI tools regularly, artificial intelligence is freeing up Business Insider’s editorial staff to focus on higher-level reporting. At DPS Miami, Hope will join us on stage to discuss how leaning into AI has helped Business Insider improve its bottom line.

Hearst’s Amazon DSP strategy

Jen Dorre, Hearst Magazines’s svp of ad products and data, will outline how a publisher can work with Amazon’s demand side platform to grow its ads business. Hearst has integrated its first-party data targeting tool Aura with Amazon Ads, blending its content signals with Amazon’s purchase intent data. 

She’ll walk through how Hearst is offering advertisers the ability to reach new audiences who aren’t actively shopping on Amazon. That looks like showing acne treatments alongside skincare articles, for example. Dorre will also tease a new AI-powered native commerce format Hearst is developing that can automatically match products to the right content and readers.

Inside the nuances of AI dealmaking 

Publishers are increasingly tapping and hiring execs to oversee dealmaking with AI platforms and tech companies to figure out how to make money from the new, AI-driven media environment. Jacob Salamon, Trusted Media Brands’ vp of business development, will share how his team is evaluating AI publisher programs and licensing deals from tech companies, and what an ideal deal looks like – as well as what the dealbreakers are. 

Salamon will give an inside look at TMB’s AI committee and company policy, what the company looks for when evaluating AI platform deals (hint: pay-per-usage models) and what it avoids (another hint: unfettered access to content). He’ll also share the use cases and areas that AI technology could help evolve at TMB, and how AI partnerships could accelerate these efforts.

Alexander Lee, media and entertainment senior reporter, and Tim Peterson, video and audio executive editor, contributed to this story.