Review-Journal names social media, photo, digital content leaders

A new social media director and director of photography have been hired by the Las Vegas Review-Journal, with a long-time staff member promoted to director of digital content.

Caitlin Lilly and Sam Morris have joined (or, rather, rejoined) the Review-Journal’s staff as social media director and director of photography, respectively. Brett Steidler, who has worked for the RJ for nearly 20 years, was promoted to director of digital content in recognition of his decades of work growing its digital platforms.

Lilly, Morris and Steidler’s strength come from their outstanding knowledge of Las Vegas and its history, Vice President/Digital Strategy Jim Prather said.

“We’ve assembled a super team of locals who have local market knowledge,” Prather said. “That makes a difference to know what stories are important to the audience, to know how to approach them on social media, (and) how to deliver that best story.”

Caitlin Lilly

Lilly returns to the RJ after departing in 2019. She first joined the RJ in 2015 and worked as its social media manager from 2016 to 2019. Her last four and a half years were spent at KVVU-TV, Channel 5 as social media executive producer.

She is also a Las Vegas native and graduated from UNLV and Arbor View High School.

Lilly said she is excited to experiment with new methods of content-sharing in the ever-changing social media landscape.

“When I was here before, Instagram was still very much just pictures, whereas now, there’s so much new (content) being shared on social media with graphics and videos,” she said. “Social media has grown so much, just in four and a half years … It’s such a good time to be back and get rolling.”

Sam Morris

Morris rejoins the Review-Journal after previously working as a sports photographer at the paper from 2014 to 2015. He has worked as a photographer in the Las Vegas Valley for nearly 25 years, having previously worked at the Las Vegas Sun and Las Vegas News Bureau, a media agency within the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

Morris said he’s excited to work with the RJ’s team of award-winning photographers and get back to doing journalism again.

In journalism, “you have plans one minute, and something happens the next minute, and you’re doing something else,” he said. “I like the pace of print — you work to do something as best as you can, and then you get it done and you’re on to the next day.”

Brett Steidler

When Steidler joined the RJ in 2004, he worked with a small team to manage the website — which, back then, was put together with basic HTML code and updated only once or twice a day.

The RJ’s digital presence has grown tremendously since then, Steidler said, and he is looking forward to continuing to work with the organization’s digital team on growing its online presence.

“Now, we’re almost a 24/7 operation, feeding content to the website and other channels constantly, and the digital team is right in the center of the newsroom,” he said. “I look forward to working with everyone (on the digital team) and producing the content and breaking news that people out there are looking for.”

Prather said he is excited for Lilly, Morris and Steidler to work together with Carrie Roper, who became the RJ’s director of digital broadcast in June, to deliver the best stories for digital audiences in Las Vegas.

“Carrie, Caitlin, Brett and Sam have exceptional capabilities across multiple disciplines, and most importantly, they know Las Vegas,” he said.

Contact Taylor Lane at tlane@reviewjournal.com.