It was a phrase that rolled too easily off the tongue, as if it was the product of a branding exercise by smart young marketers. Nonetheless, it contained an imperative that should sit at the core of journalism.
The phrase had been around for a long time. It was the title of a column in U.S. News & World Report in the 1950s. Later it would capture what passed for imagination in the minds of media management executives, and become so ubiquitous that it virtually lost meaning.
What was the phrase? It was “news you can use”.
It needs to be resurrected, not as a trite play for audience but as the central element of how journalism will be practiced and how news will be presented.
The contest between giving audiences what they like and what they need has been waged for as long as we’ve had mass-circulation newspapers. Research published last week suggests it’s time to put our money on the latter.
The latest global Digital News Report from the Reuters Institute at Oxford University not only surveyed where people get their news and how much they trust it but also what they expect it to provide.
Too much of our current news output is driven by emotional triggers – prompts that induce people to read, listen or watch almost in spite of themselves. Death, crime, and misfortune add little to our ability to function in society, but they are surefire ways to get our attention.
Or they were in the past.
It is clear from the Reuters report that in an information saturated digital environment, too much competition for attention means button-pushing will not drawn people to news outlets any longer. Internationally, only about a fifth of the online community identify news outlets as their sources of news. More are turning to short videos for ‘news’ and much of that isn’t being produced by news outlets but by online commentators and a new breed called ‘creators’. And, apart from that, interest in news generally is still on a downward trend.
However, the Digital News Report 2024 also points to what may be the salvation for news media if they have the sense to embrace it and to find new ways to reach their audiences.
The institute used a model of audience research, originally employed by the BBC, that measures needs rather than likes. It surveyed users on eight indicators under four headings of knowledge, understanding, feeling, and doing:
Update
Education
Perspective
Assistance
Engagement
Inspiration
Connection
Diversion
Unsurprisingly, the greatest need from news media was to update (72 per cent) but, significantly, it was closely followed by the need for news to educate (67 per cent) and to give perspective (62 per cent). Around 60 per cent also wanted news media to help them and keep them engaged with issues, two factors that were closely related. Around half needed the news for inspiration or connection. Less than half need the news for diversion.
The update role will continue to be core business for news media but cannot be relied upon to bring audiences to homepages. Much of this updating is spread through social media. It is in the more demanding functions that news media may secure their future.
Mainstream media’s relevance in today’s world has been dealt another blow by a new report on digital media.
The Digital News Report 2023 by the Reuters Institute at Oxford University covers 46 countries that account for more than half the world’s population. Sadly, New Zealand is not among them, but its findings are as applicable here as anywhere.
The bottom line: Many publishers are struggling to convince people that their news is worth paying attention to, let alone paying for.
The Reuters Institute has been tracking digital news audience behaviour in annual reports since 2012. Its first report (which surveyed five nations) noted mainstream media were investing heavily in ‘digital first’ strategies and the use of social media to access news content was on the rise.
The ensuing 11 years have seen that change accelerate but not in ways that news publishers and broadcasters would either anticipate or desire. The latest report provides few, in any, bright spots for them. Continue reading “No news is bad news”→
More than two-thirds of New Zealanders actively avoid news coverage and more than one in ten do so regularly.
Findings released this morning by AUT’s JM&D journalism research centre make sober reading. Its latest Trust in News report shows Kiwis are avoiding the news because they think it is depressing and biased.
In its 2023 survey, which is based on an international study by the Reuters Institute at Oxford University, JM&D asked for the first time about news avoidance and political influence. It used Horizon Research to conduct a nationwide online survey of 1120 adults in February.
Sixty nine per cent said they sometimes or often avoided the news. That is a statistic that sits well above the Reuters Institute’s multi-nation findings. That study found 54 per cent of Brazilians avoided news, followed by 46 per cent in the United Kingdom, 42 per cent in the United States and 41 per cent in Australia. At the bottom of the avoidance table were Japan (12 per cent) and Finland (20 per cent).
