A former regional daily editor has warned that using web analytics rather than journalistic “gut instinct” to determine story placement risks destroying trust in newspapers.
Richard Bowyer, who was in charge of The Sentinel, Stoke, for 15 months, said in a blog post that he had been asked to make decisions on placing stories based on how well they had peformed online.
He said the traditional “gut instinct” of editors for choosing local news stories was being edged out by web analysts in “faraway offices,” risking “insurmountable” damage to papers.
Richard, pictured above, edited The Sentinel from July 2013 to October 2014 and is now a senior lecturer in journalism at the University of Derby.
He wrote: “As an editor, I was asked to make decisions on story placement based on how well they performed online, this is now gaining momentum in some quarters.
“It may have some merit, but falls down on some key principles. Firstly, as we all know, stories which perform well online do so because the audience is different.
“If the performance of stories online was reflected in the front pages of our daily papers then editors would be forced to make their front page splash football gossip, food hygiene reports or a trivial video showing probably a cat or dog performing some bizarre trick.
“So if a front page story has low ‘engagement’ on the web, the editor will undoubtedly get the cane from the headteacher for failing to pick the right story to feed the web monster.
Added Richard: “The long term damage is insurmountable. Local newspapers are all about trust. Once the trust is broken, the game is over.”
“Obviously, content analysts with little soul and far removed from the heart of any community, just won’t get this because it’s all about chasing figures, not longevity, and who cares if the audience comes from America or Japan… maybe the advertisers.”
His comments come after National Union of Journalists’ chapels in Birmingham and Coventry earlier this month passed motions of no confidence in plans by Trinity Mirror to give individual journalists targets for online audience growth which will be written into their job descriptions.
Last week Johnston Press chief executive Ashley Highfield told the Society of Editors’ regional seminar that such a move was a “worry” and would lead to the creation of “‘clickbait’ stories and listicles.”
In his blog post, Richard also said the use of web analytics had also hampered attempts to lighten the news agenda by splashing on good news stories.
“When I was an editor I was told there was too much doom and gloom on the front pages and the audience was being turned off by this sort of news, move over Martin Bell,” he wrote.
“So the editorial team against its own gut instinct splashed with a happy story, only to be told there’s no engagement online and sales dropped. Basically, you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
“Meanwhile, the story which did well online, usually with the word sex in the headline, which is just a brief because it is 40 miles outside your real circulation area, flies on the web.
He added: “Asked why you didn’t splash on that story, head in hands, the editor says ‘because you asked for a happy, positive story and no-one buys the paper in Llanfairpwllgwyngyll, our paper is for the people of Lincoln, Bristol, or Hull.’
“The argument has always been that web and newspaper content are different. However, this is ignored by those who believe analytics are more accurate than the instinct of an editor.”
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Too late.
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At last. Words of common sense!
Well said.
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Does he mean move over Martin Lewis?
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Er, I hate to be picky but “insurmountable” means “incapable of being surmounted, passed over, or overcome; insuperable”. Perhaps Richard meant “irreparable”, which damage certainly can be if it’s bad enough. I know this is fiddling while Rome burns and all that’ but we should get these things right because that’s the life we’ve chosen.
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I’ve seen the damage first hand, and it all happened overnight. One minute I’m a photographer working on a great regional daily, being despatched by a team of reporters who have got great stories they need photographing. Human stories, tragedies, triumphs. The next, the reporters leave for better work, they are replaced with a web team, and suddenly the photo diary is empty. None of these new employees know how to write an article, or phone to get quotes, or book a photographer. And it isn’t their remit to do so. Is this progress?
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Surely this is only what journalists have been saying all along but all the words have fallen on deaf ears. Sad that that Richard has chosen to leave the industry but he isn’t the first and he certainly won’t be the last.
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Well said Richard!
I would also go as far to say (although it sounds daft) that the websites are overly led by the analytics gurus as well.
Obviously web statistics are important for advertisers, but a lot of sites I have been on recently are in danger of losing their local soul and they are writing too much generic buzzfeed/listicle crap to chase web hits or placing articles that just aren’t right for the local audience.
The local audience aren’t idiots and they will pick up on this. There is a lot to be said for keeping local and keeping the focus on news. The web ‘gurus’ are going to wreck the entire industry as we head towards a singularity for every website where they are cheap local daily mail clones.
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I’m farily certain I didn’t get a business reporting job once based on the fact I didn’t have many Twitter followers. True story.
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And well said, Dave.
The website of the local daily I work for is dominated by irrelevant national news, listicles and celebrity gossip with fatuous or obscure ‘connections’ to the local area. Completely unsubbed, often misspelled and factually dodgy.
And yes, the audience does pick up on this and often comments along the lines of “Why is this local news?” and “Can’t the (paper) get anything right?”.
But by that time it’s too late, the dear reader has fallen into the trap and given the statistics another web hit for the facebook-it-tweet-it-and-lets-frantically-move-on-to-the-next-trumped-up-bit-of-tosh-obsessed editor
The only evidence of digital having any commercial impact is the painfully slow website being overpowered by pop-up ads, takeover banners, things that cover up what you’re trying to read, etc etc, all of which also increasingly annoy frustrated readers trying to find what news is actually of relevance and interest to them.
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“Editor asked to make decision on what is news”
No wonder he left if that’s his beef.
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“The web ‘gurus’ are going to wreck the entire industry as we head towards a singularity for every website where they are cheap local daily mail clones”
– absolutely spot on. This is exactly what has happened to my paper and it is just tragic. Chasing these cheap web hits on trashy stories that have no merit to the reader or me just demeans the whole business. I mean, what are we actually doing? Pointing people towards meaningless trash. Not exactly holding up that important mirror to our local society are we? Makes a mockery of my NCE and all I have learned. Times change, yes. But am I really looking at it through rose-tinted glasses? It just WAS better before
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There’s nothing more annoying than calling up a story on my old paper’s website to find the report of a fatality/ court case / major incident is nothing whatsoever to do with the town but from elsewhere in the group’s circulation area – in one case hundreds of miles away.
I used to read my old weekly online religiously, every week. Now I don’t because it’s an insult to readers to include clickbait from places most of them have never heard of, have no interest in and are never likely to visit.
Meanwhile, the town’s real news goes unreported. Unless of course its citizens have become so dull that there is no real news there any longer. Which seems unlikely to me when it was once a four edition newspaper.
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Take last week as an example….
The shootings in Tunisia were all over every local newspaper site, the links all over Facebook and Twitter to the ‘local’ webpage.
This was before there was a local angle.
Trying to do *all* the news doesn’t work. Leave the big stories to the nationals, and get the interesting local angle if it appears.
Too much noise, not enough interest.
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Short-term gain but long-term problems in simply chasing web hits. Why not monetise a loyal local audience who trust your paper/website, rather than grasp for Uniques from anywhere? It’s the obsession with audience – however you get it – rather than the founding principles that helped to build trust.
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What a load of rubbish. This web-bad, print-good attitude that pervades newsrooms is one of the many reasons that print circulations and the revenues that go with them are on the slide.
Web analytics have given editors an amazing window into what interests the readers, and used well they can help develop a print title into something that really reflects what the readers want.
And if that turns out to be football gossip, hygiene reports or cat videos so what? Just because the editor thinks that sort of stuff is beneath them doesn’t mean it has any less value to the readers.
But of course, we’re journalists, and that means pig-headedly pushing the agenda that our gut tells us is worthy and then scratching our heads when no one buys the paper. What a brilliant strategy to be promoting to the next generation of journalists.
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These rubbish bloggers, eh Dick Minin (sic)? HTFP, how dare you reuse content with such an error!
Mr Bowyer makes several great points about the obsession with chasing web stats, but there are other issues to consider.
The big question for me has always been why people buy the paper. As journalists, we all like to think this is because of a great scoop or amazing splash but the reality is, for most people, it’s not!
The vast majority of local newspaper readers have historically bought it for the jobs, property, cars, classifieds, BMDs and even the TV listings or crossword. I remember the paste-up guys occasionally putting the wrong answers to the previous day’s crossword in and we’d have 50 calls about it by 9am!
This means that the majority of local newspaper sales have been lost to Rightmove, Autotrader, eBay and numerous recruitment websites.
The last Jicreg data I saw in 2010 suggested that only 22 per cent of readers still bought their local paper purely for the news.
For as long as regional publishers want 20 to 30 per cent profit margins, they’ll bleed the declining print profits dry via cuts – even though they still account for around 60 per cent of the overall profit, according to Local World’s recent figures. Instead, they’ll focus on the only growing revenue stream, which is digital.
This causes all the issues Mr Bowyer raises about ‘chasing web stats’, but the reality is there will never be a magical return to the glory days of print. The audience has changed its habits.
Get local papers back in the hands of local enterprises, community groups etc which would be happy with a five per cent profit margin and local editors will then have the opportunity to win back some of that trust… whether that’s in print or online!
For the record, I’ve worked with Richard and he’s a very talented journalist and editor.
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Arturo Bandini, I’ve just spoken to Zigie and he tells me there’s a 78.8% chance you’re a web guru.
What people choose to watch and share for free online, and what they’re prepared to pay for in print, are two different things – and two different audiences.
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Arturo Bandini – as a former journo now working in communications, I agree with you. There’s so many people on this site who seem to think they know what is ‘news’ and what they think readers should want to read. I don’t want to read about Kim Kardashian – but a lot of people do. Who’s right then? I’m not saying that newspapers should be filled with idiotic listicles and skateboarding puppies but people need to realise that things have changed. It’s sad, possibly, but true.
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Rubbish. And my data says so.
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Did you spill my soya latte?
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I agree. As a local newspaper editor for 40 years I have seen many ‘meetings’ to decide on policies and in the end the biggest bulls#@##@ has pontificated and influenced decisions. I know of a largish weekly newspaper where executives met for three hours to discuss falling sales and came up with the decision to include more local news. Amazing. Time was when you were not officially dead until your obit had appeared in the local paper. And time was when newspapers were run by newspaper people.
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Never mind all this erudite stuff….who wants to listen to a low rent wanabee BGT entrant destined for a life in cruise ship cabaret?
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Talk all you like about this print rubbish. I still get to drive a Ferrari if I’m top of the web stats league table. I’m all right Janner.
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This farce is going to run until the few surviving newspapers and decent local websites are in the hands of independent owners or community groups happy with low profit margins or even as ‘not-for-profit’ trusts.
The big groups will never be able to support their expensive top-heavy organisations through online revenue, but in the meantime executives will be busy with “change management” to build their pension pots. Hence rubbish like journalists being given ‘web hit targets’.
Eventually the advertisers on regional sites will catch on that they are not getting reader response from these nonsense numbers, and the house of cards will fall. You need a relationship of trust between readers, advertisers and the product, whether that’s in print or online.
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Ah, Oliver, your comments are as invincible (sub; please check) as ever – yep, me and my outmoded insistence on using the English language correctly! But you’re absolutely right on one matter – most people in the good old days bought a local to check that their ad had gone in, to buy a motor or house, or to look for a new job. One bloke even told me that as I, in my teen paper delivery boy phase, brought the Argus to his door. Now that’s all migrated online papers face impressionistic difficulties, as you would doubtless say with a smile on your face and a song in your heart.
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I recall when web analytics really were web analytics. That would be when Nero was the editor of the Rome Evening News.
He based the content of his paper by listening to the hordes in the Coliseum.
This bread and circuses approach may not have done much for lions but it kept the Rome Evening News readers satisfied alright.
You need a certain arrogance, a sense of responsibility, a healthy dose of cynicism and the courage of your convictions to become a halfway decent journalist capable of serving the community which you serve.
If those qualities are to be replaced by a degree in web analytics, I for one am happy to confess I would rather mainline on ink and take by Helvetica bold.
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Late to the party here as I was finishing my popcorn.
Some interesting arguments from both sides.
Firstly I would say on the idea of gut instinct: do we give people what they want or what we think they want. Also gut instinct, even in print from, is founded on analytics….similar stories that have worked well I the past. It is not just a sixth sense.
as for analytics now we have to use them….but use the right metrics. Yes we need big numbers but we also need a loyal local audience from a regionals perspective.
The only way we do that is seeing what works, call it gut instinct, call it analytics. I prefer having the numbers to back me up.
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This is hilarious – which great success story are you and your gut instinct defending? What’s embarrassingly clear these days is that editors and their instincts are and have been massively out of touch with what thee audiences want for a generation or more. The world has moved on Mr Bowyer.
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#bitter #people #multiple #personalities #helpme
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Calm down people! It’s all AMAZING and like Totally Coolio. Hashtag Quirker Burka.
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I was totally embarrassed by my biggest web hits when working for a trashy JP weekly. Trivial would overstate their importance. My bosses loved them. I left as soon as I could.
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Hello, relax, local printed news is not dead, just different.
I visited my web-offset printer yesterday, who print over 140 titles every month. They are seeing an increase in ‘new’ start titles. These being started mostly by journalists who have taken a package from the big boys. They print the sort of material that the web boys don’t even know or care about. it’s going back to when I started in local papers in 1966. Journals of report. Many people are still interested in this and the young of today may not be interested in this content but give them 20 years and they will be. Views and habits change with age.
Just keep going with interesting unique stories, the margins are tight but it can be done.
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It’s perfectly obvious that any leaders in our industry with honour, integrity, strategic vision and any true talent left yonks ago.
Instead we are left being answerable to a bunch of talentless spivs, chancers and lunatics who are only in it for themselves.
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As I say, there’s a vast difference between what people view for free and what they’re willing to pay for, nobody in their right mind would pay for a paper that contained pictures of Kim Kardashian shopping and a sunset over the Thames.
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Interestingly 97.3% of the comments on here are of a derisory nature which must put this post among the top 43% of HTFP stories responded to this week,reason and stats enough to publish I’d say.
Bearing in mind 68.4% of all stats are made up and us grey bean counters can make figures show anything we flippin well want them to you know where the real power in the regional press lies.
Who thought it was with the editors??
Just 3.8% of you I believe
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Offer a child a choice between broccoli and chocolate and we all know which one they’ll pick, but someone has to be the responsible adult or you end up with a nation of crapulous diabetic shut-ins. If that sounds patronising, tough. A nation of morons – who still get to vote – is the primrose path to despotism.
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