Posted in Online media, tagged database, engagement on May 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »
(Originally posted on June 29, 2010)
If you have put a lot of effort into a project, especially a multimedia or other online element, be sure to point to it again or update it when the news makes it relevant again. Tampa provides a perfect example today, though the circumstances are tragic: the killing of two police officers in the line of duty. TBO.com already had done an interactive on officers killed in the line of duty, so when the news broke, it was a matter of updating the database.
Posted in Online media, Print media, tagged engagement, innovation on May 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »
(Originally posted May 20, 2010)
I can’t MAKE you read it, but a Poynter.org post about the early lessons of the reformed Journal Register’s “digital first, print last” approach ought to be required reading. Why:
“When we started out, we said, ‘We’re going to do what? How are we going to do this?'” said Laura Kessel, managing editor of the Willoughby News-Herald. “Now we’re showing ourselves that we can operate in a world that, even six months ago, used to be foreign to us.”
The lessons are useful for both newspapers and television stations because many of them deal with audience-interaction and moving news online first. From Perkasie News-Herald Managing Editor Emily Morris:
“It’s been such an interesting experience to find out what residents are concerned about and then incorporate that into our coverage. We still have to get out there and cover stories, but I think all the reporters are thinking a lot differently now about what tools we can use to do that.”
Posted in Broadcast media, Online media, Print media, tagged database, engagement on May 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »
(Originally posted on May 7, 2010)
One of my least favorite parts of any local-election season was always compiling profile information, especially when there were a lot of candidates. You knew it was going to take forever to pull together, it would be largely boring stuff, it would disappear almost forgotten, and most people who needed it might never see it. The Web, of course, lets this stuff have a longer, more useful life. This year the Winston-Salem Journal made it easier for people to sift through it by compiling it into a searchable database. It might still be tedious to compile, but it’s more useful for voters.
Posted in Broadcast media, Mobile media, Online media, Print media, tagged engagement on May 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »
(Originally posted April 27, 2010)
The RTDNA site posts tips for better video storytelling from NBC News Correspondent Bob Dotson, who presented an RTDNA@NAB session called “How Better Storytelling Can Save Your Job.” Among the tips: avoid pack journalism, meaning that when covering a news event that others are also covering, find something different that no one else can see.
This reminds me of a discussion about covering annual events, such as major festivals, during a recent peer review at the Danville Register & Bee. One editor said he won’t send reporters anymore to cover such events. And it’s true that if you tell a reporter to bring you a report on the festival, you’re going to get the same expendable story every year. That’s why it’s better to ask the reporter to come back with a story about someone or something particular that he or she finds at the festival. For instance, a Winston-Salem Journal reporter once went to cover the Grandfather Mountain Highland Games, one of the all-time big annual events in the region. Stories about it are almost always interchangeable — scenery, weather, a few happy quotes. But this one reporter came back with something different — he had gone to the area where the competitors in the strength events, the guys who toss around telephone poles and big rocks, were waiting for their event. They were passing the time by showing off, bending nails and smashing things against their heads. Fascinating stuff, and no one else had ever gotten it before.
Posted in Mobile media, Online media, tagged engagement, mobile on May 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »
(Originally posted April 13, 2010)
If there’s a large event that’s going to attract many people from your market — a big festival, a sporting event, a concert — you have a built-in opportunity to get your live coverage and updates to a motivated audience. Better yet, here’s the outline for how to do it (the link provides a better, fuller explanation than the above slideshow). Here’s why you should print that out and save it:
“These events are ideal because the people involved have a shared interest that you can serve for content. Advertisers from your community and the distant community share interests with this audience. The people are not going to be reading a print edition of your home newspaper (even if you ship to the venue, you won’t reach many of the people) and they won’t be watching a TV station back home. They will be away from their office computers and if they travel with a laptop, they will leave that in the hotel room most of the time, while they are at the arena (or the National Mall) or out enjoying the host city at restaurants, bars and tourist attractions. But more and more, these travelers will have smart phones that will make great vehicles for distributing your content about the event they are attending, for engaging them in conversation about the event and for enlisting their help in covering the event and the related community travel experience.”
Newsroom With A View 