Breaking the News

Society’s digit­al trans­form­a­tion is break­ing the news.

In this brief art­icle, I’ll show you why online journ­al­ism must first break to sur­vive in the online media landscape.

As a digit­al strategist, I’ve mon­itored media trends and digit­al trans­form­a­tion for organ­isa­tions for over a decade.

Today, news pro­viders have a choice to make.

Here goes:

A New Model for Online Journalism

In the past, read­ers, listen­ers, and view­ers found the news in either news­pa­pers or broadcasts.

However, the news media land­scape of tomor­row will have little to do with news­pa­pers or broad­cast net­works. Our tra­di­tion­al news pro­viders are slowly becom­ing dusty rel­ics of our non-digit­al past. Change is unavoid­able. However, one can­not just take these two types of organ­isa­tions, add digit­al dis­tri­bu­tion chan­nels, and expect them to work.

We know that news sites and stream­ing ser­vices work, but unfor­tu­nately for many tra­di­tion­al news cor­por­a­tions, these two media plat­forms don’t work in tan­dem; this is why tra­di­tion­al news­pa­pers and broad­cast net­works must first break.

Starting Points: Before Breaking

The Newspapers

Most “news sites” aren’t what they claim to be; they’re news­pa­pers pub­lished on web­sites. Producing mul­ti­me­dia news for a digit­al con­text takes years — espe­cially if the trans­ition to digit­al rev­en­ue streams is slow and laden with tri­al and error.

Also, a news site can­not be suc­cess­ful on its own; it must coex­ist in sym­bi­os­is with search engines and social media plat­forms. Quality is always a factor in report­ing the news, but the trans­ition­ing news­pa­per must build speed and volume. ¹Silfwer, J. (2010, April 21). Digital First is the Way. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​d​i​g​i​t​a​l​-​f​i​r​st/

The Broadcast Networks

Broadcast net­works gen­er­ally have two sep­ar­ate value pro­pos­i­tions: On the one hand, they pro­duce high-qual­ity news shows, and on the oth­er, they provide epis­od­ic enter­tain­ment. Daily news con­tent won’t sur­vive if the broad­cast net­work migrates into a stream­ing net­work. ²Silfwer, L. (2013, August 10). How to Pitch Television News. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​p​r​-​s​t​o​ry/

Conversely, their epis­od­ic enter­tain­ment won’t sur­vive if they move into the news site mod­el. Since both mod­els require a lot of effort, split­ting the broad­cast net­work into two sep­ar­ate entit­ies might dilute the resources needed for the transformation.

Possible Outcomes: After Breaking

The News Sites

Some news pro­viders will trans­ition into news sites.

First, the news pro­vider must build a user-friendly site with a best-in-class con­ver­sion design. Second, the news pro­vider must be able to pro­duce video news stor­ies and qual­ity news shows.

Also, they must trans­ition their ad-based print mod­el into a loy­alty-based online sub­scrip­tion ser­vice — without lock­ing away the actu­al news behind pay­walls. ³Silfwer, J. (2020, February 12). The Future of Online News: How To Convert News Junkies. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​f​u​t​u​r​e​-​o​f​-​o​n​l​i​n​e​-​n​e​ws/

The Streaming Services

Some news pro­viders will trans­ition into stream­ing services.

Streaming net­works have the most straight­for­ward suc­cess strategy in the new land­scape; they provide pay­ing sub­scribers with the highest qual­ity epis­od­ic enter­tain­ment. To stand out and accel­er­ate growth, pro­duce ori­gin­al con­tent to attract and main­tain audiences.

The main chal­lenge is that stream­ing is costly, with fierce com­pet­it­ors like Netflix, HBO, and Amazon Prime. Like Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, some news shows can sur­vive as a stream­ing format, but these are likely to be few and far apart. ⁴Silfwer, J. (2013, February 2). House Of Cards is Changing the Streaming Game. Doctor Spin | the PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​h​o​u​s​e​-​o​f​-​c​a​r​ds/

Breaking the News

Tomorrow’s news must evolve into formats com­pli­ant with digit­al-first media logic regard­less of the chosen route. ⁵Silfwer, J. (2020, February 12). The Future of Online News: How To Convert News Junkies. Doctor Spin | the PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​f​u​t​u​r​e​-​o​f​-​o​n​l​i​n​e​-​n​e​ws/