The Touchstone for Innovation

This blog entry was originally posted on the Readership Institute’s Get Smart blog.

OK, so stories about the First Family’s new dog, Bo, probably drew more Web traffic on Easter weekend than an Associated Press investigation into the detention of U.S. citizens who have been mistaken for being illegal immigrants, or a Los Angeles Times look at how investors are benefiting from a federal program aimed at helping poor families buy homes.

Does that mean the future is dim for online readership of investigative journalism or that in-depth or explanatory reporting is not valued by digital users?

In a recent Presstime article, Charlotte Hall argues that one of the strengths of the print newspaper is its ability to help readers step back and assess bigger-picture issues.

Hall, editor of the Orlando Sentinel and outgoing president of the American Society of News Editors, says the newspaper can offer “the kind of in-depth and analytical work that the 24/7 breaking news world on the Web cannot provide. Print is good at the things the Web is not good at - watchdog, explanatory, enterprise, narrative storytelling. The two media complement one another. One is the flowing river, changing constantly; the other is the rock on the shore, fixed and solid.”

I agree that the two media complement each other - and I’d like to see print editions put more emphasis on long-form journalism, good storytelling and strong use of photos and other visuals. Too often these days, the newspaper is simply a summary of what was already reported online, rather than a unique product.

That’s one reason I am interested in the experiment under way at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Editor Nancy Barnes explained in this post why the organization is breaking in-depth reports in print first, and then publishing them several days later on the Web.

I’m not sure delaying publication is the right answer, but at least it is an effort to differentiate the print and online products.

What I’d rather see is more effort by newsrooms to create different versions of the story for different audiences. You’d create a long-form version for the print edition, displayed with photos and graphics. And, while you could make the full text available online, you’d develop a shorter text version for prominent display online, supplemented by video and audio, plus maps, satellite images and interactive graphics, as well as tie-ins to searchable databases. Online versions would be full of links - to original source materials and to related stories (including from competitors). And, of course, readers would be encouraged to participate in improving the online content and commenting on it.

In these ways, online can be a powerful ally to in-depth and investigative journalism.

Need proof it can be done by a mid-size news organization? Check out “I Didn’t Do That Murder,” from the Times Herald-Record, of Middletown, N.Y. This Ottaway paper, which has a strong online track record, was recognized for its work with a 2008 Sigma Delta Chi Award for online investigative reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists. The report uses online storytelling techniques, mixing in videos, a crime scene map and an interactive timeline.

Another good example comes from USA TODAY and its special report on toxic air near America’s schools. In addition to the text, the online version of the series included several video reports, plus an interactive map and an exhaustive, easy-to-use database. You can search by state and then by city/county or by school name to find out how your school or area rank in terms of air quality. And once you’ve identified an area, you can look at details on local sources of pollution, and learn more information about potentially dangerous chemicals in the air.

Imagine the amount of newsprint required to provide the same amount of information.

Investigative journalism in the public interest is the mission of ProPublica and the site has a cleverly done Investigations section that helps readers keep track through a simple feature called This Week in Scandals.

Talking Points Memo won a Polk Award for its use of crowd-sourcing that helped lead to the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Of course, there are many other good examples of how online journalism is developing. But don’t take my word for it.

Jay Rosen, the deep thinker from New York University and ubiquitous PressThink blogger, recently engaged his Twitter followers with the following observation about Charlotte Hall’s Presstime comments.

“It’s 2009, and the president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors is saying ‘the Web is not good at explanatory?’” Rosen wrote. When asked for more details, he responded: “One example is 538.com, which does a better job explaining the polls than all newspaper stories about polling combined.”

For more online investigative reporting, I urge you to check out the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism’s web site, WisconsinWatch.org.

This blog entry was originally prepared for the Readership Institute’s Get Smart blog.

What do octuplets’ mother Nadya Suleman, the “25 Random Things” lists on Facebook and the weather have in common?

They are all something to talk about.

In my consulting work and speaking engagements, I’m frequently asked to reveal the secrets to building readership in print and online. If only it was a secret, my consulting business would be much more lucrative.

As detailed in the Readership Institute’s 2003 Experience Study, the experience of “something to talk about” is a powerful motivator that drives readership. Across all demographics, researchers found similar responses – people want a source of information that gives them something to talk about with other people.

Certainly big news events – just like the weather — are easy fodder for conversation with family, friends or co-workers, or for or those uncomfortable moments in the elevator. And nothing beats a great story to prompt conversation, even between strangers on a train, whether it is passage of a federal stimulus bill or something offbeat like the recent tragedy in which a pet chimp had to be killed after mauling a woman in Stamford, Conn.

But I’m a believer in planning ways to beat the odds rather than rely on random news events, so I am always on the look-out for regular features offered in print or online that get to the heart of giving people something to talk about.

Here are some examples of what I mean, including many items I highlighted in a recent presentation at the Minnesota Newspaper Association convention in Bloomington.

Good editorial pages often provoke thought and conversation, but I like a quirky feature from the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison. Each Sunday, Sticker Shock features a photo submitted by a reader of a bumper sticker that struck the reader as clever, funny or making an important point.

The Sioux City (Iowa) Journal goes one better with its daily front-page letter to the editor called The Mini. Readers compete for this coveted bottom-of-the page space to say in 1-2 sentences what takes the normal letter writer 250-300 words to say.

The Journal, which deserves a look if you are trying to find a small daily worth imitating, also has recently started an online feature called Afternoon Delight. Editors describe it as “a midday feature on something non-news related that helps take your mind off of everyday worries.”

Humor is a difficult thing for many newsrooms, but one that has been doing it regularly for more than 10 years is the Oregonian in Portland with its feature called The Edge. It’s a collection of news of the weird and the kinds of jokes often traded around through e-mail. It used to run on the cover of the Oregonian’s feature section (along the edge) and moved to the back page recently, running along the TV page. Says Executive Editor Peter Bhatia: The Edge is “very popular with younger readers, but also with older sick readers like me.”

At the opposite end of the spectrum, you’ll usually find just the facts in the Waterloo-Cedar Falls (Iowa) Courier’s long-running feature called Call the Courier.  The paper answers reader questions ranging from the serious to the trivial, including questions about the paper’s operations.A safe bet for something to talk about is in writing about people. One of the best online examples out there is The Washington Post’s onBeing nteractive video feature on “musings, passions, histories and quirks of all sorts of people.”i

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Some of my favorite people items include simple items, like this regular feature in the suburban weekly Wellesley (Mass.) Townsman, highlighting high school Artists to Watch. I’ll take a little credit for having helped create another feature focusing on students that has lasted more than a decade. In the La Crosse (Wis.) Tribune’s A+ Achievers section, you’ll find the Extra Effort awards. Each week, a senior from an area high school is profiled – but these are extraordinary kids who have overcome serious obstacles in their lives, ranging from personal health issues to the death of a parent. The stories are gripping – and each student wins a small scholarship, with three students each year winning full-year scholarships to one of three local colleges. Prep sports are also a great source for those talker stories. A good small newspaper example I’ve seen recently is the Faribault (Minn.) Daily News, which is chock-full of fun, easy-to-do features, including Senior Spotlight, Coaches Corner, Athletes of the Week, a question of the week, photo galleries and a fun blog called “Sports Talk with Mark (Remme) & Marc (Zarefsky),” in which two sports staffers duel over a sports question.

Of course, no good journalism discussion these days can ignore Twitter with its ubiquitous plea for you to answer the most basic something-to-talk-about question: “What are you doing?” Los Angeles Times’ columnist James Rainey does a great job explaining the value and appeal of Twitter for those of you not yet on board.  I highly recommend following that old gentleman, Colonel Tribune, to see how this new tool can be used by a news organization wanting to engage its readers.

Editors need to be increasingly open to more features about local shopping and consuming, providing readers with more value.

The Quincy (Mass.) Patriot-Ledger provides a couple of good examples.

One Home Living feature, In the Shops, is a straightforward look at various products for sale in local stores, and often features locally made items. The writer has a little fun with each item, providing a basic description, and includes the price as well as information about the store. Readers are directly encouraged to submit items for inclusion in the column.

The second idea is a bit riskier, but less local. Fab or Flub, which runs in a women’s section, is subtitled simply: Stuff we love and hate. It might be a product or a service, or a place for editors to make a snappy comment about celebrities (such as the example with a comment about Miley Cyrus).

These ideas hit on several experience hot-buttons, especially something to talk about and reader interactivity.

I’d like to see more editors pursue shopping-related features and consumer-oriented content, particularly in times when money is tight. It can add a lot of value to the newspaper or web site.

The folks at The Bakersfield Californian and Bakersfield.com have been at the leading edge of innovative readership efforts in recent years and the web site’s community map section is just another example.

Using mapping software from ZeeMaps, the web site offers a host of interactive maps – some serious, but many just fun.

Among about 40 maps currently available are those for potholes, murders, restaurants, places of worship and ethnic groceries. You can find locations for graffiti and murals, check out the pools and spray parks or locate Wi-Fi hot spots. My favorite: Bakersfield’s Quirks, showing local “landmarks,” such as the Kool Aid Man, a belly-dancing studio and the location of a park known as a hangout for “perverts and weirdos.”

And reader interactivity is high as users can navigate around and are encouraged to submit items for some maps. In all, a great use of online tools to catch the reader’s eye, to help them feel smarter or just to provide a break from the routine.

Over the years, I have seen the powerful effect editors can have on readers by being open. Whether it be through regular columns in the paper, answering reader phone calls or making public appearances, the editor can be a great asset to increasing reader confidence in the paper — and increasing readership.

One of the powerful tools nowadays for openness is an editor’s blog, such as Ken Tingley’s blog, The Front Page, produced for the Glens Falls (N.Y.) Post-Star.

Ken’s blog deals with the day-to-day work of the newspaper, mixing in links to current and previous stories, as well as other online content. He writes in a nice, readable online style (relatively short, frequent bites) and has generated some good reader interactivity. I appreciate that he will take the time to respond to a reader’s comments on a previous posting.

He also takes time to explain newspaper decisions and even coverage plans, as he did around the time of Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s resignation as governor of New York. This kind of work helps the reader feel smarter about things — and helps them feel that the paper is looking out for their interests.

Many other editors around the country are writing blogs. The American Editor online has compiled a list of blogs by editors and other members of the American Society of Newspaper Editors.

If you’re looking for examples of community newspapers doing innovative things, you’d do well to follow the efforts of the staff at the Bloomington (Ind.) Herald Times.

The Green House blog is just one example from the free portion of the web site (most daily news is in the subscription portion of the site).

Leora Baude, a copy editor/reporter at the Herald-Times, started the blog in May 2007 and has provided a steady series of enlightening and entertaining entries on her efforts to be “green” in everyday living. 

Here’s how she described it in her initial entry: “I’d like to do better — be a less trashy, less gassy, more resourceful, more knowledgeable householder — even if I can’t see my way to a really radical project, like giving up toilet paper, or growing a beard and becoming an urban homesteader, or even just wearing the same dress every day for a year. I want to figure out what changes I can make that are really for the better, what changes I will, realistically, live with — and also what changes the other member of my household, who is a lot less excited than I am about this foray into green housekeeping, will put up with.”

Leora is doing a particularly good job providing external links to her blog entries and she has faithfully categorized entries for easy reference for readers.

While the number of reader comments appear inconsistent, this blog offers a lot of opportunity for interactivity, plus helps readers feel smarter and lets them see that the staff at the paper is looking out for their broader interests.

I have long loved this simple feature from the Wisconsin State Journal and it’s one that any paper could launch quickly and easily.

On its Sunday Forum section front and now online, the State Journal invites readers to share bumper stickers (generally political in nature) that they see in their everyday travels. The reader gets credit with the photo.

 This feature is great for several reasons. First, it gives people something to talk about. Second, it gives regular people another avenue to participate in the dialogue. Presumably, most people send along a photo of a sticker that reflects a point of view they share — and that invites more discussion, like a good editorial page should. Of course, it’s also great to get reader involvement and the State Journal seems to have no shortage of bumper stickers to run each week.

If you want to see a great example of old-fashioned community journalism combined with some of the latest cool tools in multimedia, check out the washingtonpost.com weekly feature, onBeing.

 As explained by Jennifer Crandall, who does the video interviews, “onBeing is a project based on the simple notion that we should get to know one another a little better. What you’ll find here is a series of videos that takes you into the musings, passions, histories and quirks of all sorts of people. The essence of who they are, who we are.”

The project was conceived by Crandall, designer Jesse Foltz and Rob Curley, who is well known in Web-land for his innovative ideas, now being brought to bear at Washington Post-Newsweek Interactive, where Curley is vice president for product development.

Curley writes about “onBeing” in a blog on his own site, but here is a quick excerpt in response to a question about whether smaller papers could do something like “onBeing.”

“I would argue that, at least from where I’m sitting, this is just an “updated-for-online” idea that at least some smaller newspapers have already been doing for years. No, make that decades.

“I’ve always heard these stories about that ‘quirky editor’ who opened up the phonebook for his or her town, randomly threw a finger into the pages, and then had a reporter write a story about that person.
“To me, this is the new-media version of telling the stories of ‘everyday’ people. Just not done as haphazardly as picking someone randomly from the phonebook.”

 The feature is promoted prominently on the front of washingtonpost.com each Wednesday.

A few of the neat multimedia options include the ability to: download videos (including to cell phones); resize the video while watching; and even to watch in high definition if you are so-equipped.

This idea hits a lot of buttons — getting ordinary people into our products, giving people something to talk about, providing a break from the routine, etc. Well worth considering as a long-term project or a one-shot special.

Many newspapers have realized that advertising and shopping information is a major reason some people buy the paper, so they have found ways to provide editorial content to satisfy that need.

  The Examiner papers offer a regular weekday series of pages called Shelf Life.

 Each day highlights a different topic — beauty/cosmetics, technology/gadgets, food/beverage, stuff for children, active gear and home/garden.

 These are hot-button topics for the consumer-oriented reader, skewing toward women.

I like the presentation, the regular commitment and the editors do a nice job of mixing high-end and low-price products.

 I could not find an online section of Shelf Life, although they offer an e-edition with PDFs of all pages that is easily accessed from the upper-right corner of the home page of print editions, for example, the Baltimore edition.

A perfect marriage of evergreen content (news and advertising), reader interactivity and helpful tips is the Pet-Friendly Travel section of ExploreNewEngland.com, a joint venture of the Boston Globe and Boston.com.

 We all know dog lovers and cat lovers (rarely are they one and the same) are devoted to their pets and this site plays to the audience.

 In addition to a couple of nice feature stories and loads of tips, the site includes links to some other helpful resources and trip-planning guides.

The real power, though, is in the reader interactivity, especially submitted photos showing pets’ favorite vacation spots. The site also offers message boards for readers to exchange ideas on topics such as locations of good off-leash parks.

A site like this connects emotionally to the readers, plus makes them feel like the paper/web site is looking out for their personal interests. It helps them make smart decisions about use of time and money.