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Beyond the Algorithm: 10 Strategies for Attracting Young News Audiences

There are many assumptions but surprisingly little evidence of how to engage young audiences with news. Commonly voiced concerns are that young people just consume short-form video, trust creators more than news brands and won’t pay for news anyway because they are just not that interested, particularly not in politics. 

But reality is more nuanced: In some settings young people do trust media brands more than personalities, they follow the news avidly, and they demonstrate considerable attention spans if invested in something, even for text-based products. 

My co-author Jana Koch and I  tested these and more assumptions in a qualitative research project, commissioned by Austrian Wiener Zeitung Media Group. We based our study on structured interviews with young people and media leaders in Austria and with more than a dozen international experts, amounting to a total of 58 in-depth interviews. We then contrasted our findings with the latest research by leading organisations like the Reuters Institute’s “Understanding young news audiences” and the NextGen News project, a Knight Lab/FT Strategies cooperation. 

The full report, Knapp daneben ist auch vorbei is available in German and English  here. 

So, what is it exactly that media leaders need to know when serving young audiences? There is no one-size-fits-all solution, of course. But we have identified 10 evidence-based strategies to guide media leaders. 

1. Understand and Serve Audiences

There is no such thing as “the” young user. Expectations and habits differ not only between generational cohorts, but also within them. The old mass media formula “one size fits all” no longer works. You need to decide which community to serve on which platform, and to understand which codes to use to reach them. 

This can best be achieved by letting young colleagues in your organisation take the lead. 

Our interviews suggest: young users are indeed interested in politics, the economy, and international affairs, provided the perspective and narrative style suit them. 

Different platforms serve different purposes: Long podcasts, video documentaries, and games serve a different purpose than short videos, push notifications, and WhatsApp messages. 

What doesn’t work, for sure: Cramming everything into TikToks, or presenting every message as comedy. 

2. Add Value to People’s Lives

The digital world delivers content in abundance. Information overload and news avoidance are prevalent. Young people want to use their time wisely. 

They expect journalism to provide not just updates, but also explanations, solutions, and perspectives. 

They derive additional value from a particular voice or new forms of news experiences, local or niche context, narrative styles, or perspectives that surprise, dive deeper, or are closer to the reality of their lives. 

Marco Kruse, Managing Director of Ingame, Ippen Media’s youth initiative: “As a young person, you don’t just want to hear all day about the problems of the present; you want to know what your future looks like and what the solution is.” 

Doing less but doing it better is a valuable strategy. This holds particularly true for the AI era which is likely to put an end to copy-and-paste journalism. 

3. Be Confident

Journalism has something to offer, and young people get that. So, don’t sell yourself short, but deliver exactly what your core business is: independent, fact-based, strong journalism. Anyone determined to make any content funny or imitate slang is set up for failure. “Don’t try to be cool, because that is not your role”, says Pierre Caulliez, who leads Wan-Ifra’s News Creator Exchange programme. 

Users come to media brands precisely for what they can’t find elsewhere. And media companies can confidently promote that. The most successful German news brand on social media, public service ARD’s Tagesschau, shows how this can be done.

Timo Spiess, Tagesschau’s Head of Social Media, says: “We try to find a conversational tone (…) that conveys: ‘we take you seriously, we take this platform seriously, but we also take ourselves and our brand seriously.’”

4. Build Personal Brands

International research suggests that young people trust individuals more than brands. However, this perspective is shaped by experiences in countries like the US, where there are no public service media that have a mandate to serve all of society, or in settings where state interests have captured mainstream media. 

Creators sense gaps where they find them and happily step in. In contrast, our research shows that young adults in Austria and Germany continue to trust major media brands. 

However, individual creators gain traction when they have demonstrated clearly recognisable expertise in niche areas. 

That said, authenticity is a core value for young people. Amid the surging flood of automatically generated content, they’ve developed a particularly keen sense for whether something or someone is “real.” 

This opens opportunities for media: they can strategically build personal brands. The key though,  is not to stake everything on a single individual, but to develop clearly distinct voices. 

This also helps decrease the risk of losing popular content creators and their following. As Spiess describes: “The brand is the star. The brand is carried by faces. But these faces always step back a little behind the brand.”

5. Make Diversity Visible

Many young people are allergic to what newsrooms have long characterised as quality journalism: the know-it-all attitude, preachiness, complex phrasing, or irony and sarcasm. 

This suggests: Don’t talk about young people, but with them – and let them speak for themselves. Especially in ageing societies, the perspectives of young people are often overlooked. 

Co-creation can do wonders, but don’t assume that everyone wants to participate. In general, young people want more diversity of perspectives in news media, but this needs to go beyond the buzzword: different social backgrounds, experiences, and life stories need to be reflected. 

Funk, the youth network of German public media ARD and ZDF, for example, had determined through data analysis that it struggled to reach audiences with strong roots in rural areas. This led to “Sag mal,” which, in the words of Funk CEO Philipp Schild, became one of their most successful formats: “It focuses heavily on tradition and rural culture and is aimed at people who have a strong sense of identity in those areas.” 

Interestingly, the young Austrians we interviewed voiced rather traditional expectations in news, emphasising objectivity as a journalistic value. This contrasts with assumptions – also by some of our expert interview partners – that young audiences explicitly demand a point of view.  

6. Build and Retain Relationships

Media need to be present in the everyday lives of young adults to build connections, ideally relationships. Don’t wait for them to come to you, but go where they already are: on Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, in algorithmic feeds – or to their schools, youth clubs, and universities. 

Real-life encounters can foster closeness. If you can afford it, organise workshops, guided tours, even festivals. They do not necessarily need to be about media. Relationships are built through presence, relevance, and shared experiences.

Caulliez says that publishers underestimate the potential of events: “When someone attends a specific event, they are 10 times more likely to remember the brand than if they only watch 10 seconds of YouTube Shorts from the same brand. It creates added value to build connections to different types of events throughout a person’s entire life cycle.” 

7. Diversify Monetisation

Purely transactional monetisation models like subscriptions appeal to very few young adults, especially as, in many European countries, every household has to pay the public service media license fee. 

This does not rule out a willingness to spend money on private news media, but people will only pay for tangible added value such as an experience or a feeling of identity. 

Liesbeth Nizet, Head of Future Audiences Monetization at Mediahuis says: “Creating a sense of belonging is super important.” Many publishers fail to reach young people with their product offerings. Some are not even known to them, others come across as inflexible, overloaded, or outdated. Younger audiences are used to personalisation and choice. A student subscription alone is not an innovation.” 

Nadine Eibl (formerly Günther), new product and innovation manager at German publisher Funke says: “Media companies simply need to realise that it’s pointless to force the existing offers onto young audiences.” 

Our interview partners see products for young users primarily as an investment in the brand and thus the future; some found potential in branded content. Nevertheless, investing in young audiences often pays off in a different way.

Many media companies have learned that formats for younger people often attract broader segments of society than their traditional fare. 

8. Think in Formats

Simply investing in vertical short-form video won’t do the job. Social media channels differ, and the data from each platform reflects how the respective algorithms interpret certain signals.

Of course, this type of analysis is thankless, because just when you think you’ve figured out a pattern, third party-platforms might change it. A dataset compiled by the Financial Times in October 2025 for a story titled “Have we passed peak social media?” even revealed that time spent on social media has been declining since 2022.

Many young people are themselves unhappy with their excessive social media consumption, and political initiatives want to curb access for kids and teenagers. 

“There is definitely a backlash against noise” says Nic Newman, Senior Research Associate at the Reuters Institute in Oxford. While the extent of news consumption via social media platforms will remain significant for a few more years, media companies should develop formats that could also thrive on their own platforms.

George Montagu, who oversaw the NextGen News project for FT Strategies, recommends redirecting energies from content to formats: “Right now, they (journalists) spend 80 to 90 percent of their time thinking, researching, and writing, and 10 percent figuring out ‘How do I package this for social media?’

“But what if they invested 50 percent in research and writing and 50 percent in turning that into something cool and innovative? No one is asking for more content. They’re asking to receive content in different formats and styles.”

9. Optimise for AI and Convenience

In the digital world, consumer expectations are shaped by Netflix, Spotify, and the like. This applies to both content and user-friendliness, the so-called user experience (UX). 

Journalistic products must be easily accessible and navigable. Younger consumers also expect that important news will somehow find them. With developments in AI, media consumption habits are likely to change. Much content might soon no longer be consumed directly by humans but read by machines first. 

However, many of our interviewees see opportunities for media companies in the world of synthetic content and overload. 

For example, verifying factual accuracy is becoming more important. And some professionals see an advantage precisely for brands that focus on people. 

Smilla Schwörer, business development manager at Funke and herself a Gen Z, says: “People overestimate how open young people are to AI. Young people want real people, real opinions, real faces, and real stories. I’d say the Boomer generation is much more likely to listen to an AI podcast than we are. We’re probably also a bit quicker at recognising AI and are therefore a bit more critical of the whole thing.”

10. Innovate Fast

The media industry is losing young audiences less due to a lack of ideas than a lack of courage. Innovation requires a different mindset: less fear of failure, less clinging to routines, and more trust in experimentation. Innovation-friendly leadership means allowing for setbacks and delegating responsibility but also shifting resources from declining to growing parts of the company. Young media professionals who understand the codes, languages, and dynamics of digital communities, should be encouraged to step up instead of being cornered into some social media team with no career prospects.

Sophia Smith Galer, independent news creator and member of Mediahuis’ Future Insight Board, recommends media leaders to make explicit that all staff is responsible for a company’s financial health: “Everyone should be required to do something to innovate every year”. 

Conclusion

Reaching young people is a challenging task that requires a strategy: it involves lots of data analysis, experimentation, and a shift in thinking. Many assumptions need to be discarded, along with the structures that go with them.

But Gen Z displays less news fatigue than is often claimed. Spiess from Tagesschau: “The younger generation also wants to dive deeper into things. … (Reaching young people) is a challenge. But it can be done.”

The reward for these efforts isn’t just about securing the future of a newsroom or a company. As Funk’s CEO Schild says: “Anyone who does something for young people is doing something for democracy.”

This text was written for and published by the World Association of Newspublishers Wan-Ifra on 12 June 2026.

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“There’s definitely a backlash against noise”

Being the longtime lead author of the Reuters Institute’s Digital News Report, Nic Newman has collected data on news consumption for more than a decade. By analyzing data and leading focus groups, he and his co-researchers have observed significant changes in behavior by young audiences: These days they overwhelmingly access news via social media and expect the consumption experience to be frictionless. I interviewed Nic for a research project on Gen Z and News by Mediengruppe Wiener Zeitung.  

Nic, you have studied news consumption behaviour of different age groups for decades. What do media organizations need to know if they want to reach young people today? 

Nic Newman: People who grew up with social media show very different behaviours from those of previous generations. They want everything friction-free – ­and immediately –  and they want to consume content where they are. They don’t want to go to news websites or apps. And they want their consumption to be easy, entertaining, fun. That’s a big challenge because do you change your journalism to make it more entertaining and fun? Or do you just accept that they’re going to come less often to you because you’re not very entertaining and you’re not a lot of fun?

Is there such a thing as “the young audience” some in the media are talking about, or does your research reveal different young audiences? 

One of the defining features of this younger audience is just how varied their consumption is. We’ve done qualitative work where we’ve talked to individuals in different countries, and everyone has got different media habits. For example, it’s not true that all young people use TikTok for news. There are many who hate TikTok. We found people who had very clear routines, almost like those of newspaper readers. We saw them reading The Economist at exactly the same time every morning on their commute as they briefed themselves on the things they needed to know for work. You have the typical lifestyle effects when as you get older and go into a job, there’s information you need. Just young people’s way of accessing that information is going to be different, the unhappiness with any kind of friction applies to all. 

Presumably education and social status matter, too.

Education is always the biggest divider in terms of how interested people are in news. The more interested people are in news, the more likely they are to build a relationship with a brand or with an individual. That’s the other big trend: that many young people prefer to access news through an individual they trust. 

You did a major report on creators for the Reuters Institute. What were your key findings?

It varies by country. We all know the politically polarizing creators in the US, the Joe Rogan types. There are a lot less of these in Europe. There you see more of those educator types like MrWissen2go in Germany. In explanatory journalism creators are clearly filling a gap that traditional media does not fill. The third area is the specialists who are building really deep, authentic relationships in a particular subject area. This also threatens traditional media companies, because these individuals have an incredibly low cost base. Many of them came from mainstream media but now think it’s better to operate on their own. 

Some data shows we have reached peak social media – now that even the most backwards media brands have realized they need to give it a go. 

There’s definitely a backlash against noise. But it might be impossible to even talk about social media anymore. Social media used to be social: about what your friends were doing. But that has been declining. In the past two to three years, it has developed from content that came from someone you knew to content that is essentially driven popularity using AI driven algorithms. A lot of that is fuelled by video. People aren’t getting bored with YouTube or TikTok, that’s growing. 

What does that mean for the media industry? 

One of the implications is the competition for attention within the new discovery mechanisms. The platforms are setting themselves up as creator friendly, they want to attract the best content that’s going to keep people’s attention. And again, they find that although professional media is part of that, people are paying more attention to non-professional media, to authentic personalities. Younger people are paying a lot of attention to people who look like them. Traditional media are struggling to behave like creators, because their sometimes less objective approach doesn’t fit with journalistic norms. The other growth area is through AI. Young people are more likely to access news and information through AI, because it’s friction free, quick, easy, and gives them what they want, it is personalized. 

What would you recommend editors and media organizations to do in this situation where both is quite foreign to them: creators and AI-based discovery?

Most media companies are thinking about investing more in video, particularly in vertical video that builds an authentic trust relationship. You’ve seen the New York Times and a range of other media companies putting vertical video on their front pages, trying to bolster the visibility of their own personalities and journalists to the extent that these are looking directly at you in the camera, building that sort of authentic direct relationship. They’re trying to copy a few creator techniques. Other strategies are to partner with creators or to co-opt them and bring them on staff. A whole list of companies have done that, in the UK for example the Daily Mailand the Independent. The third possibility is to engage with existing creators in particular fields, for example in investigations to help with distribution or content creation

What are the most common mistakes that you observe in newsrooms – apart from not doing anything for young audiences?

Probably the biggest mistake is an old newsroom trying to be down with the kids. Some older television anchors have done very well on TikTok, but in general, young people do not want you to dumb down. They want you to maintain your credibility and institutional authority. Don’t not cover politics or other important subjects because young people are spending less time on these issues. Try and make it accessible. Think hard about the formats you’re using. This works for older people as well. The other common mistake is to do a brand for young people, unless you do it to learn something from it. There have been very few cases where that has been successful. 

Why is that? Some young editors in large media companies have put quite some effort into developing those brands. 

Because in most of those cases you’re trying to get young people to do something they don’t want to do, which is come directly to an app or to a website. And if it’s a brand that only works in social media, you might as well build a personal brand or try and amplify the message of the existing brand rather than trying to create a new one. It is different if you are a digital first brand like Zetland in Denmark where you have a very clear audience in mind to begin with. 

What is their secret sauce?

One important aspect of this is representation. Young people struggle with traditional brands because they don’t feel that the journalists and the newsrooms really understand what they’re interested in – both in terms of the agenda and in the way they like to consume media. For newsrooms that are primarily employing people age 45 and older, it’s very hard to speak authentically to a younger audience. Zetland’s founders were of that generation.

One of their recipes for success seems to have been their audio first concept. Because the data shows that young people like long stories – when they can listen to them. 

That’s another myth about young people: that they’re not interested in linear, they’re not interested in long form. Obviously, they binge on long television series, they binge on podcasts. But the kinds of podcasts they’re listening to are an accessible, easy mix of entertainment and information. There’s a lot of humour involved. And again, that works well with older people, too. Interestingly, podcast is becoming video. What we found in our research for the latest Digital News Report is that younger people watch podcast videos because they want to get closer to the host. Whereas older people say, it’s all about audio. And then you’ve got this third audience, which is people who just come across the podcast brands as short form video clips on TikTok and Instagram. So, podcasts are becoming kind of multi-platform brands with different appeal to younger and older people, depending on the platforms that are being used. 

Listening to you I get this feeling that about two thirds of today’s newsroom inhabitants are useless species because all they’ve ever wanted to do is write long stories. 

The other side of that coin is that the majority of traditional news organizations’ audiences are older and that they’re not dying anytime soon. Newsrooms will continue to serve those people, which is one of the things which makes it hard for them to change: Most of the revenue comes from older people. If they super serve young people, they’re likely to annoy these older groups. This is where personalization could come in: showing people who like these formats more of the video and showing people who don’t like them less of the video. When targeting younger audiences, there’s a bit around the news agenda, there’s a bit around formats, and there’s a bit around tone.

What about young people and news has surprised you most in all your research? 

That there is so much diversity in interests. Let’s take Sudan. That’s a country that gets very little mainstream media coverage, but on Instagram and TikTok there’s quite a lot of news about it, because it’s a completely horrific situation. You get a lot of surprises like that which challenge some of those myths that young people aren’t interested in anything outside their backyard or their friendship group.

Your creator report says that across the 24 countries you looked at, 85 percent of the creators were male. That looks like the opposite of increasing diversity. 

Yes, it is ironic that  that this new space that is full of creators is actually less diverse in some respects. That tells us quite a lot about who wants to get in front of the microphone. Political commentary is the one that is most dominated by men talking into their big microphones to other men, mainly consumed by older people. Then you’ve got the explanatory stuff, which is mainly created by young people and consumed by young people. And then there’s a whole load of more news adjacent creators who are in fashion or food and that’s much more gender mixed. There are some exceptions though. The Philippines has almost gender parity.

This interview was conducted as part the study “A miss is as good as a mile: A qualitative study on Gen Z and journalism in Austria, featuring perspectives from users, media professionals, and international experts.”  You can find more information and the full study here. The study was commissioned by Zentrum für Medienwissen of the Mediengruppe Wiener Zeitung, Co-Author was Jana Koch. The interview was published in full length here. 
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The Optimist’s Guide to the Digital News Report

If you work in the media industry and want to feed your pessimism, the  Digital News Report 2025 makes it easy for you, because this is what it tells you: influencers are challenging established media brands right and left, news avoidance is at an all-time high, and it is becoming increasingly difficult (and costly!) to reach audiences because they are spread across even more platforms – sorted according to political preferences and educational level.. Welcome to the journalistic dreariness of the propaganda age! However, if you want to pave the way for journalism’s future, the only thing that helps is to look at things through the optimist’s glasses. And through these, the media world looks much friendlier already. Here are a few encouraging findings from the publication by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, whose material media professionals like to dissect and discuss:

Firstly, trust in established media is stable. This has been true for the global average for three years – this time, the report covers around 100,000 online users in 48 markets – but also for Germany, where the long-term study on media trust conducted by the University of Mainz recently recorded similar figures. Yes, things looked even better in Germany ten years ago. But the figure currently stands at 45 percent (Mainz study: 47 percent), which is respectable by international standards. As elsewhere, public broadcasters perform particularly well. In addition, the researchers note that users of all age groups prefer traditional media brands when they doubt the veracity of information. The oft-repeated narrative of dwindling trust in the media cannot be substantiated this year either – although trust in the media and media usage are two different things.

Secondly, attracting audiences to your own platforms – that can be done. At least, that’s what the Norwegians, Swedes, and Finns have proven. Public broadcasters there have invested heavily in their own video platforms and are very restrictive when it comes to posting their content on platforms such as YouTube or X. The Finnish broadcaster Yle now attracts more users to its platform than all other providers in Finland combined. The study tours to Scandinavia by many media professionals are therefore justified.

Thirdly, energetic journalists can benefit from the influencer trend and successfully start their own businesses.Frenchman Hugo Travers (Hugodecrypte) now reaches as many users aged 35 and under in France as established media brands: 22 percent of them said they had heard of him in the previous week. The audience appreciates the (perceived) authenticity and approachability of such personal brands. The fly in the ointment: many demagogues on the political right have benefited from this so far, and the line between journalism and opinion-making is blurred. Research by the news agency AFP has revealed that politicians in Nigeria and Kenya hired influencers specifically to spread false messages.

Fourthly, willingness to pay remains stable – and there is room for improvement. Okay, the percentage of people who pay for digital journalism averages 18 percent – that could certainly be higher. But it’s also quite something to know that, despite all the free content available online, around one in five people are willing to pay for journalism – in Germany, the figure is 13 percent. The researchers believe that the subscription market is far from exhausted. Where paying is already common practice, the key is to intelligently bundle offerings and create more interesting pricing models that cater to different types of users. Incidentally, regional and local newspapers in Germany stand out in international comparison with their subscription rates. On the one hand, the researchers speculate that this is an expression of federalism and the fact that many users strongly identify with their regions. On the other hand, projects such as data pooling in Drive or Wan-Ifra’s Table Stakes Europe may also have contributed to this success; they encourage the exchange of experiences, networking, and a focus on targeting specific audiences and user needs.

Fifth, text lives on – especially in this part of the world. Yes, there are highly respected experts who predict at AI conferences that the future of journalism lies in chat – specifically, spoken chat. People would rather talk and listen than write and read, they say. Elsewhere, media professionals complain that young users only digest short-form video, if they pay any attention to journalism at all. The figures do not support these claims. Text is still the most important format for 55 percent of users worldwide. This is different in some countries in Asia and Africa, which could also have to do with later literacy rates. But it is definitely still worthwhile for media companies to invest in first-class texts. There is ample evidence that young people also enjoy listening to long podcasts or binge-watching series. Only one thing does not work today and will work less and less as AI delivers decent quality: poor text.

Sixth, the audience is smarter than many journalists believe. When it comes to the use of AI, for example, respondents expect pretty much what is predicted or feared in the industry: journalism production is likely to become cheaper and even faster, while factual accuracy and trustworthiness will decline. Young consumers in particular are skeptical about media use and verify a lot. In countries such as Thailand and Malaysia, where journalism is largely consumed via TikTok and Facebook, users are very well aware that they may be exposed to lies or fantasy news on these platforms. When it comes to “fake news,” 47 percent of respondents consider online influencers and politicians to be the greatest threat, which is likely a realistic assessment. And many users worry that they could miss important stories if media companies personalize their offerings more in order to turn these users into loyal customers. 

Incidentally, what respondents worldwide want from journalism is: more impartiality, factual accuracy, transparency, and original research and reporting. Media researchers couldn’t have put it better themselves.

This column was published in German for the industry publication Medieninsider on 17th June 2025.

 

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2023 Prediction for Nieman Lab: The Year Of The Climate Journalism Strategy

For the longest time, most newsrooms felt they were doing an okay job covering climate change.

They would go all out when reporting on potentially climate-related disasters, cover conflicts about energy, highlight what happened at the big conferences like COP27. But then again, they might not have been so sure. In the 2022 Reuters Institute’s “Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends and Predictions” that is a non-representative international media leaders survey, 65% of respondents judged their own organization’s climate coverage as good, but only 34% felt that the industry as a whole was doing a good job with it. This gap in perception clearly revealed there were second thoughts, consequently room for improvement. As the warnings of scientists about a heating atmosphere intensify but audience engagement tends to lag behind expectations, many news organizations in 2023 will decide that their climate coverage needs a serious upgrade. And this requires a climate journalism and sustainability strategy.

It is badly needed. While the issue of global warming has been out in the open for decades, the media until recently hasn’t been too eager to jump on the topic — with the notable exception of The Guardian, which has been able to connect a climate strategy with the needs of its audiences and its membership-driven business model. The reasons for the industry-wide reluctance were manifold: climate change is a complex, slowly moving topic that doesn’t lend itself to capture audience attention for longer stretches of time in a news-driven environment. Reporting on it in a way that resonates with users requires scientific skills, time and thus considerable resources. And it is depressing, risking to drive people into news fatigue. Furthermore, in many countries it had evolved into a politically polarizing issue, making it necessary for newsrooms to rebut accusations of taking sides.

But things have been moving in recent years. Editors-in-chief have graduated from calling it “one of the defining issues of our age” (Alessandra Galloni, Reuters) to “perhaps the century’s biggest story” (Sally Buzbee, Washington Post). In 2022, large organizations expanded their climate coverage capacities considerably, sometimes with the help of external funders. In September National Public Radio established a new climate desk. In November the Washington Post announced to triple their climate team to 30 people. And these are just current examples from the U.S. Assistance from networks like the Oxford Climate Journalism Network, Covering Climate Now, and the Earth Journalism Network has been sought after.

Still, consistent climate strategies that are openly communicated and implemented throughout organizations are rare. Some examples: Norway’s public service broadcaster NRK developed one that establishes the role of climate coverage in the newsroom and how (not) to report on it. Radio France in 2022 published a strategy that includes a massive training program for all of editorial and sustainability guidelines for the organization. And French news agency AFP created its “future of the planet hub.” These are important role models, because while smaller players won’t have the capacities to establish hubs or desks, they will closely watch what happens in the industry and draw consequences that fit their individual context and needs.

A full-blown climate strategy makes good sense for several reasons beyond the obvious. Here are five:

First, engagement with climate issues needs to pick up, and this will only happen with excellent journalism that fits different audiences’ needs.

Second, younger, educated audiences are likely to be invested in the issue, and news organizations need to attract younger generations. So, this is a business opportunity.

Third, climate change needs to advance from topic to frame, gaining relevance in every beat to become more subtle and less one-off alarmist.

Fourth, comprehensive newsroom training is vital to make everyone climate literate, help them to apply it to their particular field, and to detect greenwashing.

Fifth, an editorial climate strategy cannot exist in a vacuum, it needs to be linked to an organization-wide sustainability strategy to maintain credibility.

At some point in the future, the absence of a climate journalism strategy might be a similar kind of negligence as the absence of a digital strategy. (Credit goes to Wolfgang Blau, who helped to elevate the issue to this level throughout the industry in recent years. For more, watch or read the lecture he gave as a co-founder of the Oxford Climate Journalism Network: https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/calendar/climate-change-journalisms-greatest-challenge.) Hopefully, this will help media organizations, citizens, and the planet alike.

This piece was written for and published by Niemanlab at Harvard University in the context of the 2023 prediction series. 

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Climate Journalism Needs to Mature from Topic to Mindset

Scenes like this are probably familiar to many: At a preparatory meeting for an event later in the year one participant suggests that it could revolve entirely around climate change reporting. One of the participants, an editor-in-chief, is skeptical: “Won’t this be a little old by then?” The reflexes work, the man has done his job. Be fresh, be surprising, don’t ride anything to death  – everyone who is trained in the daily business of news has internalized this way of thinking. It is called news for a reason after all. But how does that fit with an earth-altering development that manifests itself mostly in slow motion and only at times with the force of catastrophes? Newsrooms have not yet had to cover anything like that, a for the most part unpredictable process which challenges our way of living and doing business right down to the smallest personal habit.  

Wolfgang Blau knows all about these reflexes. Few media managers are currently dealing as intensively with the demands and difficulties of climate reporting as he is. The former editor-in-chief of Zeit Online, who pursued his career at the Guardian and the publishing house Condé Nast, is currently focusing on the demands and difficulties of climate reporting. Being the co-founder of the Oxford Climate Journalism Network at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, he pinpointed the hurdles to overcome for those who want to report on climate change seriously and effectively in a lecture. The list is long.

In conversations with media people around the world, Blau identified operational but also cultural and ethical challenges. The compulsion to highlight the latest news, the fixation on disasters, the lack of expertise among reporters are the best known. Nic Newman’s media leaders’ survey “Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends and Predictions,” also reflected on some of these. In the 2022 edition, the nearly 250 editors-in-chief and top managers from around the world complained about two things in particular: First: There is a lot of good climate journalism, but the readership does not take to it to the extent they always claim in surveys. Second, there are too few experts in newsrooms, and the scientific culture is weak.

One of the biggest difficulties, however, that few are aware of who now dutifully identify topics, commission stories, develop explanatory formats, hire climate reporters, or set up special desks, is: Excellent climate journalism requires an entirely different mindset, explicitely a commitment to the very subject itself. It does not regard sustainability as just another topic to be dissected from an observer’s perspective alone, but as a goal. The preservation of the natural foundations of life would then be equivalent to the preservation of democracy and human rights to which independent journalism is committed.

Only, the problem is: At a time when some declare impartiality to be a religion and confuse pluralism with relativism, those who take climate journalism seriously tend to come under general suspicion. Those who openly strive for sustainability are accused to follow a green political agenda. Many owners, business managers, funders, and even quite a few editors who are committed to the journalistic principle of objectivity are therefore reluctant to follow suit. In addition, a corresponding attitude deeply interferes with personal lifestyle. It is comparatively easy to behave as a good democrat. Living as a responsible citizen of the earth places considerable demands on everyone and also raises many unanswered questions.

Blau argues that climate change requires a similar rethinking in the industry as digitization. There’s something to that, because it’s also down to the nitty-gritty: digital journalism requires a different attitude than classic print or broadcast journalism. Instead of assuming the position of the head teacher, as in the past, modern journalists are concerned with the needs of the users. Editors study and know their audiences, and ideally serve them so precisely that even demanding material is gratefully accepted – not just the clickbait scolded by digital skeptics. The goal is to build trusting relationships between senders and recipients. In climate journalism, it becomes something like a triangle: Users are supposed to engage with often uncomfortable facts and ideally derive consequences for their own actions: behave differently as consumers and/or get politically involved in preserving the planet.

This is where problem number two arises: Journalism that deliberately aims to change behavior comes under suspicion of activism. And yes, journalists who care about strong, independent reporting should be suspicious of the campaigning nature of activism. But can climate reporting that accomplishes nothing be good climate journalism at all? When it comes to the big issues like democracy, equality or even sustainability, something that could be called activating journalism is necessary. It is precisely in this balancing act that constructive journalism finds itself, which is sometimes accused of being activist. Constructive journalism works primarily against the audiences’ feelings of powerlessness. According to surveys, one in three people regularly avoids the news, mainly on the grounds that it leaves them behind helpless and/or in a bad mood.

What could climate journalism look like that doesn’t do that? The French news agency AFP, for example, has reorganized its entire newsroom into “hubs,” including one that deals with the future of the planet in all its facets. Every story needs a climate dimension, says AFP editor-in-chief Phil Chetwynd. Ritu Kapur, founder of Indian news platform The Quint, also believes looking ahead is crucial. Doomsday scenarios don’t go down very well with audiences, she says, but anything that involves people and the impact of climate change and strategies against it on employment, growth, mobility, and lifestyle. A big hit with the Quint-audiences was: How can the ecological footprint of a big traditional wedding be minimized?

Good climate journalism definitely needs to become a cross-cutting issue. Every reporter, every commentator should critically examine in all assignments what impact events, new products, projects, or political steps have on sustainability and climate protection – whether that’s the Olympics, new car models or transport projects. Correspondents must address was digitization does to energy consumption, they still do this far too rarely.

Problem number three arises from all of this: the contradiction between commentators’ demands and the media’s own role model function. Media companies, which are often medium-sized and financially strapped, seldom excel in practicing sustainability. While it has become increasingly common in many other industries to calculate and document the ecological footprint of products and processes, this is rarely seen with publishers and their newsrooms. This mirrors a common trait, witnessed also in other areas, for example gender equality or diversity: There is a gap between flaming commentary on the one hand and corresponding, transparent action on the other. Only a few companies have understood that this puts nothing less than their very credibility at stake.

So, what would help climate preservation is an activating journalism, supported by a commitment and mindset that is reflected in the entire organization, its products and practices. So much for the ideal. If you want or need to start a little smaller, start with a qualified, energetic, and outspoken climate correspondent. But he or she should have a seat at the table every day, not just in case of floods, storms, or fires. 

This column was first published in German on 16th February 2022 by Medieninsider.         

 

 

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Forget About Extinction: The Pandemic Has Been A Media Empowerment Event

Moaning can be a strategy, and the media has been using quite a bit of it in recent years. When the pandemic struck in the spring of 2020, it even felt like there was a competition for the bleakest headline. Who in the industry doesn’t remember Buzzfeed’s reporter Craig Silverman concluding that the coronavirus was a “media extinction event“. Last year though things went surprisingly quiet in the horror scenario department. And now the latest trend report by Oxford-based Reuters Institute is predicting something like a bull market for the industry: The subscription business is flourishing and even the digital advertising market, which had long been declared dead, has made a strong comeback. 59 percent of the surveyed 246 media executives from 52 countries reported rising revenues, and three out of four respondents expected an even better business in 2022. Hooray, we are playing again!

It should be noted that the annual survey is not representative. Mostly those respond who are already committed and possibly proud of their successes. Nevertheless, the situation is apparently better than the mood. Instead of a “media extinction event”, the pandemic has become a “media empowerment event.”

Fuelled by increased user interest and trust levels, editorial and management teams at many publishers have finally taken their fate into their own hands. They are developing new formats and workflows geared to user needs, fine-tuning subscription models, and even taking care of their customers. The crisis has accelerated innovation, dozens of media executives had already gone on record for the EBU News Report, published in late November 2021 (transparency note: I am lead author of the report).

This is about time. For decades, journalists have left the money-making part of the business to the publishers. These, in turn, had often just administrated advertisers and subscribers rather than selling advertising formats and journalism. But suddenly, advertising revenues dwindled, whereas on the content side, the quality supply multiplied. Journalism had become a consumer good, to be developed and sold accordingly. Only the producers had noticed it rather late. These days things are different. In many media outlets, teams of journalists, marketing, and tech have started to work together on products for different audiences. And what’s at least as important is that publishers look at how their neighbours are doing it, support each other, and – the master discipline – even develop solutions jointly. For 2022 and beyond, the smart ones are collaborating, cooperating and/or training together. This is happening on an international and national level. There are several examples:

► In the project “A European Perspective“, led by the European Broadcasting Union, public broadcasters share important content and make it accessible in different languages with the help of automated translation.

► In the Table Stakes Europe program, managed by the World Media Association Wan-Ifra, European publishers train their editorial teams in the “audiences first” principle and support each other; they recently started their third year (transparency note: I work as a coach in the program).

► In the award-winning Drive project, led by Deutsche Presse-Agentur, more than a dozen German regional publishers pool their user data and jointly analyse the findings.

And the number of international training programs, in which seasoned journalists and media managers look into each other’s decks and learn new skills, continues to grow. When it comes to innovation, scarce resources render it not only impossible but also stupid to be a lone warrior. This is especially true for public service media, where waste is hard to justify in front of the license fee or taxpayers.

Of course, there are also those who want to – and possibly can –  go it alone. In the first week of January, The New York Times announced its acquisition of sports journalism platform The Athletic. It did so for $550 million, giving it access to subscribers across America and beyond. The industry has been debating ever since whether this is a new killer virus for local journalism or not all that bad, as Joshua Benton of Harvard’s Nieman Lab reflected.

And then there’s Axios, another U.S. digital journalism provider, which plans to redefine local journalism in a land of news deserts. It launched Axios Local and is expanding into audience-centric business journalism with Axios Pro. In addition, there are plenty of creators on both sides of the Atlantic who are making their debut as founders, either alone or in teams. Young journalists seem to have overcome their shyness when it comes to business models. Just a year ago, Project Oasis, a major study on media start-ups in the U.S. and Canada, analysed that many founders’ lack of business knowledge was the biggest hurdle to becoming successful media entrepreneurs.

So, are the many appeals to support journalism superfluous because the industry can manage without help? It’s not quite that simple. Pressure on press freedom is growing in many countries, and journalists are increasingly exposed to aggressive attacks. In addition, many customers could develop a kind of subscription fatigue and thus bring the positive development to a standstill. In the “Trends and Predictions” report of the Reuters Institute, significantly more respondents were convinced of their own company success than predicting a great future for journalism. This demonstrates a new sense of agency but also a certain humility. The diligent workers outnumber the visionaries. Most respondents said their focus this year would be making what they had already built better, more efficient and more user-friendly. Making growth sustainable, this should be a central goal – in 2022 and beyond.

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The Moral Dilemma of Paywalls: Why Journalism will Increasingly Move into Two Different Worlds

Selling journalism is no crime. In fact, only a few reporters and editors are ashamed of the fact that much of what they go great lengths to research, edit, and produce can only be consumed for money. After all, even bread is not for free. However, potential users who are stranded at paywalls at times make journalists feel like sleazy used car dealers. “It’s outrageous to make important information available to paying customers only,” complain those who are turned away at the login. Some even go further and argue, this promotes the division of society. Nikki Usher made this point in her book “News for the Rich, White, and Blue” that was published by Columbia University Press in 2021.

So, feeling attacked like this, who can blame journalists for getting a bit pathetic at times when talking about their craft? They prefer to elaborate about enlightenment and democracy, about holding power to account and citizen service, rather than about user loyalty and business models. The truth is, however, that without rapid progress in the commercialization of their offerings, many publishers will not survive.

This is why the journalism of the future will most likely move into either one of two worlds: On the one hand, there will be the increasingly sophisticated world of commercial journalism, in which highly professional providers offer their distinct audiences custom-fit, high-quality content, and user-friendly products that inspire them. On the other, there will be the world of public service or non-profit journalism, which steps in where the market fails. In this second world, journalism of the watchdog type will be created that only a few people are willing to pay for, or it will be about journalism that serves audiences which cannot or refuse to pay for news. Democracy needs both worlds. So, instead of fuelling today’s fights between public service and commercial media in tightening markets, it is about time for an honest discussion about this division of labour. Journalism would benefit from it – and so would citizens.

The highly professional world is currently emerging at a rapid pace. Most publishers have understood that only the sale of digital subscriptions, or at least memberships and other products, will secure their future. They are increasingly using experiments and meaningful data to figure out which customers or customer groups are most lucrative and how best to serve them. The audiences-first focus is at the core of media innovation programs like Table Stakes, in which close to 150 publishers in the US and Europe have already taken part (disclosure: the author of this is a coach in the Table Stakes Europe program run by WAN-IFRA). A lot of great journalism is created this way. But decisive for gaining and retaining subscribers is individual customers’ time spent on certain media. An extensive German data-gathering project called Drive has revealed that this was the key metric for selling digital subscriptions, not the clout of individual stories or subject areas that “convert well”. This summer, the industry organisation INMA named Drive, that bundles data from more than a dozen regional publishers and is led by German Press Agency dpa, the word’s “best news media innovation project”.

Focusing on “media time” though means that many publishers won’t be able to afford much journalism that doesn’t zero in on lucrative audiences. As resources become scarcer, newsrooms must inevitably ignore target groups that promise little commercial success. They are better off making those even happier who they already serve. This may be an audience with a certain level of education, political lineage or background. News organizations like the New York Times and the Financial Times have long understood this. Despite proclamations to the contrary, it is hardly worth many newsrooms’ while to reflect the diversity of society in its entirety. To the contrary, this can even alienate their core clientele. This is a sad truth and sounds reprehensible for journalism on a mission to safeguard democracy. But media companies with too little focus will sooner or later risk their existence.

This makes the role of public service media or non-profit offerings all the more important. With public service media at least in the traditional European concept, every citizen has to pay the license fee. That’s why the broadcasters have a mandate to reflect society in all its diversity and – this is important – meet all groups at eye-level. Unlike commercial publishers, they must remain impartial and use all formats necessary to reach users. Public service media has an obligation to go where the market of journalism fails. However, this also means that they have to make offerings for the mass market in order to not disappear into insignificance. When some commercial publishers argue public service broadcasters should retreat into niches, they don’t understand market dynamics. Such fear of competition always demonstrates a lack of confidence in their own offerings. To defy international platform or streaming monopolies, public service providers must cover the breadth. The commercial ones, on the other hand, should provide their audiences with so much added value that these are happy to pay for it. Ideally, both sides should cooperate on new technologies, innovative services, or education, rather than antagonize each other.

Complementary to public service news, there will also be a niche for non-profit news organisations, particularly in markets without strong public service media like the U.S.. They will establish themselves in areas where the market fails. The Texas Tribune, one of the most prominent non-profit U.S. media companies, for example, has focused on local political coverage. Readers typically don’t like to pay for that, their founder Evan Smith has argued. But when no one holds local politicians and administrators to account, it has been proven to hurt communities and their citizens. This is where funders who want to do good for society will be needed.

An open debate about the different journalism worlds would also enliven the discussion about trust in media. The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism in Oxford recently published a study based on discussion forums with media executives from the U.S., the U.K., Brazil and India. What emerged was that newsrooms target their trust-building efforts at very different audiences. For some, it’s about breadth. The aim is to win back those who have turned their backs on the public debate – an endeavour that is honourable, arduous and important, yet rarely successful commercially. For the rest, it’s about stable customer relationships and thus depth. Nevertheless, building trust as a means to an end is not reprehensible, on the contrary. It safeguards the plurality of the media landscape and consequently democracy.

This text was first published in a slightly different version in German by Medieninsider on 8th December 2021.

 

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Desperately Seeking Youngsters – Seven Insights About a Demanding Audience

This phrase keeps popping up regularly in editorial meetings: Everyone is presenting their topics, and then one of the bosses throws it in: “We have to do something for young people.” Perplexity escapes the eyes of older participants. Maybe something about Tik Tok? About hip music or the approaching high school graduation? Everyone younger than 30 goes into hiding, just in case. They know that their most important job is to impress their over-40 superiors with clever suggestions that will go down well with the over-60 clientele. After all, they want to be taken seriously.

Established media companies and young audiences have a hard time with each other. While the former cannot do without the latter, because this would result in their economic starvation, the latter can very well do without many things that ensure the livelihood of publishers and broadcasters: Subscriptions, apps, and live TV, for example. Even with digital there is no guarantee. According to the Digital News Report 2020, 84 percent of under-25s don’t go directly to a media brand’s website, but get information from what social media, search engines or news aggregators flush into their timelines or onto their screens via push messages. This is why established media put it on the agenda again and again: Young users desperately wanted.

But what about young people’s media consumption, what do they like, what do they ignore, when do they tune in and when do they tune out? Judging by how much and how long the topic has preoccupied newsrooms, research on this is fairly slant. For the German market, two studies revealed important findings this spring.  One is “#usethenews”, published in April 2021 by the Leibniz Institute for Media Research Hans-Bredow Institute. The second one puts an emphasis on media literacy and was published in March by the Stiftung Neue Verantwortung. From this, my own research and from countless conversations with students from various disciplines, a few things have emerged that editorial strategists should know.

First: The house is indeed on fire on this topic, not only as far as the future of publishers is concerned, but also with regard to civic engagement in democracy. According to the research team at the Hans Bredow Institute, around one in two young people do not consider it important to be informed about current events. They provide the explanation right away: “Journalism often lacks a connection to young people’s everyday lives.” So it’s not enough to shrug and point to the generally rising proportion of news avoiders, which the Digital News Report puts at around one-third internationally. Among the younger generation, news abstinence is much more pronounced. Anyone who is serious about journalism as a pillar of democracy should therefore take urgent action.

Second, the gap between those who are well informed and competent and those who can barely find their way in the new information landscape is widening. Whereas formerly, even those with a low level of education used to be reasonably well informed, perhaps because there was a newspaper lying around here and there, because they watched TV news out of boredom, or were force-fed hourly radio news while driving, all of this can be completely avoided in the age of maximum distraction possibilities. The information gap that the Internet was supposed to close is opening up more and more as a digital divide between the social classes – if nothing is done. Public broadcasters with their mandate to offer journalism for everyone have a special obligation here.

Third: Fortunately, many young people are interested in the world around them after all – just not always in what seasoned politics and feature editors find exciting. Those who enjoy journalism like to check out the local news. Anything to do with environmental protection and science is thought after, at least by the better educated. Incidentally, in a recent American study on news avoidance (“The head and heart of news avoidance”), it were also stories touching health, science, the environment and local affairs that news avoiders of all generations were most likely to be interested in. Newsrooms whose informal pecking order starts with the politics desk followed by a large gap will have to adjust.

Fourth, what unites all users of the younger generations is a preference for light subject matter. According to the Leibniz study, “funny and strange” is consistently well received. In any case, humor is a pretty sure way to get a hearing among generations Y and Z, as evidenced not only by Böhmermann and Co. But beware, it’s not necessarily the kind of humor that those same mature executives like. Joking at the expense of weaker people is not acceptable. Those who dish it out have to at least take a joke themselves once in a while. In the humor department of journalism, the same applies as with uncertain sources: If in doubt, leave it alone.

Fifth: There’s no way around influencers, but they don’t have to be Instagram marketing heroes. When the Swedish daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter had Greta Thunberg head the newsdesk for one day last year, digital subscriptions came rushing in, several thousand in one day. Celebrities increase reach and help get messages across. Rule of thumb: Celebrities should come across as people, not officials. Having the movie star talk about politics and the politician talk about movies can make both more credible, if they mean it honestly. Young people are trained to distinguish between genuine authenticity and staged approachability.

Sixth, diversity counts – and not just as a box-ticking exercise. Young people expect a program or brand to portray the world as they experience it. They may be able to identify with protagonists and perhaps even contribute something themselves. This includes language that is both casual and respectful and content that – see above – has something to do with their everyday lives. News should be useful and fun, was the conclusion of a study on young journalism users published by market researcher Flamingo together with the Reuters Institute in 2019. Constructive journalism that opens the world wide with perspectives is therefore particularly well received by the young generation. Rule of thumb: You can trust the audience with something. The success of science-driven formats such as Brainstorm by Irish public broadcaster RTE or the German magazine Katapult are proof of this. It’s a pity for cost killers that in-depth research is usually more time-consuming than dishing out news copy-and-paste style. But quick news is everywhere these days. You could say that young people are journalism gourmets.

Seventh: Journalism must be easily accessible and well prepared. Digitization trains all generations for convenience; Amazon, PayPal, Spotify and Co. have set the gold standard for user-friendliness. The old world, in which people still read instruction manuals, wrote down phone numbers and went to the kiosk on the corner, is disappearing. For journalism, this means it has to go where the users are and make it easy for them. The American study mentioned above says that barriers to understanding and a lack of self-confidence in dealing with the media are the main reasons why people give news a wide berth. When in doubt, the interactive infographic with three bullet points beats the 200-line editorial. This is bitter for some authors. While complexity used to be a sign of quality, today it has to be well justified. This is good. Because in the past it has all too often merely concealed incompetence or laziness.

This column was published in German on May 17, 2021 by Medieninsider. It was translated by DeepL and then edited.

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The Power of the Middle – Not even media leaders themselves think that they have the best ideas

Middle management in companies more often than not suffers from its infamous reputation. They are branded as rule-abiding busy bees, nitpickers who stick to processes just as much as they stick to their own chairs, managers, definitely not leaders. If they were, they would have long been promoted to the top – or so it is taught in many a business school. Former Siemens CEO Peter Löscher once spoke of a “clay layer,” the term even survived his own career in the company. A word that is like a slap in the face of all those tireless getting-things-doners who not only keep the company running on a daily basis, but also strive for constant improvement and overhaul, whether there is a crisis or not.

In the media industry, bosses are apparently no longer so sure about that clay layer. In the new “Journalism, media and technology trends and predictions” report by Nic Newman, which the Reuters Institute in Oxford publishes regularly at the beginning of the year, top managers were at least refreshingly self-critical about their own capacity to generate top ideas. Only about one in four (26 percent) of the 234 executives surveyed from 43 countries said they were convinced that top management generates the best ideas. The problem, as Nic Newman frames it: Innovation might not come from the top, “but companies are still run that way”. The report is not representative, but it is a must-read in the industry precisely because the respondents tend to be leaders who are particularly concerned about progress.

But where do they see innovation coming from? Nearly three-quarters revealed that data and audience research were most likely to give them a leg up, 68 percent bet on mixed teams from different areas, and still just under one in two admitted to borrowing the best strategies from other media companies. Okay, according to the survey, editors-in-chief and media managers trusted middle management as such even less (17 percent) than they trusted themselves. But who meets in the mixed teams, who evaluates audience data and derives strategies from it, who attends the relevant industry meetings, reads up on foreign material and then reports to the C-level? That’s right, in the very most common case, it’s the mid-level.

It is often those who are not celebrated as heroes in any industry publication and who neither management literature nor research has an eye on. They are the ones who are closest to the difficulties – and often therefore to the solutions. But they are also the ones for whom demands from employees and customers alike pile up into a sandwich of expectations. They are expected to be both operationally reliable and to think strategically and manage change. And if something goes wrong, it’s up to them to pick up the pieces and rebuild them into something else – in management-speak this is coined as “celebrating failure.

This layer of dedicated and loyal drivers of innovation, many of whom are at an age and in situations where family work demands additional work from them, is – no surprise – most at risk of burnout. Lucy Küng, who researches cultural change in media companies that go digital, has revealed this in countless interviews, including in her latest book: “Hearts and Minds: Harnessing Leadership, Culture and Talent to Really Go Digital.” This results in a huge brain and talent drain, she emphasizes again and again.

Yet many managers consider the mid level worthy of support only as long as they themselves are part of it. As soon as they have made it into top positions, they recoin themselves as visionaries. Gianpiero Petriglieri, a professor at INSEAD Business School, calls this “leaderism.” Instead of valuing reliable and constructive management, which is so necessary especially in times of crisis, he says, people celebrate visionaries whose ideas all too often go down with them. The glorification of leadership on the one hand and the devaluation of management qualities on the other is a dangerous pair of opposites that is still taught, but does more harm than good, especially in crises, he eloquently describes in the essay: “Why leadership isn’t a miracle cure for the Covid-19 crisis (and what can really help).” It is time to put less hope in leadership and more humanity into management, Petriglieri said. Judging by the “Trends and Predictions” report, many media managers already understand this. Humility can be the first step toward innovation.

This text was first published in German with Hamburg Media School Blog on 15th January 2021, then translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator and edited. 

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Beyond the headline race: How the media must lead in a polarized world

When US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg succumbed to cancer recently, the headline race was on once again. Instead of pausing for a moment to honor a great personality for her leadership and stamina in the quest for justice, most of the news media didn’t miss a beat. Who would President Donald Trump nominate as her successor, and how would that reshape American society? Reporting instantly took second place to speculation and opinion, drowning out the announcement of the 87-year-old’s death in a sea of noise.

The predominant frame for interpreting today’s world is winning and losing, and the media has bought right into it. Being faster, smarter, delivering yet another interpretation, speculation and judgement – a certain breathlessness has always been inherent in journalism. But in pre-digital times, news media only competed against each other. The difference now is that they are up against everything an average smartphone holds. The battle for attention shapes their very existence. And readers are responding by leaving in droves. According to the Reuters Institute’s Digital News Report, one in three people now regularly avoids the news. A rising share of audiences find journalism too overwhelming, too negative, too opinionated with too little relevance for their daily lives. And they believe it can’t always be trusted.

This is bad news – for democracy. In a world of noise, propaganda and misinformation, leadership by independent media that provide the facts is needed more than ever. Studies show that voting turnout is higher, more people run for office and public money is spent more responsibly where local news media keep citizens informed and hold institutions to account. But business models are broken. Platform monopolies have gobbled up advertising money and optimize for attention; too often the media has followed suit.

Now there is no way that media companies can outsmart Google, Facebook and the like. News media have to go where their audiences are. But when opinion is everywhere, quality information becomes a critically important currency. Covid-19 has demonstrated that people crave trustworthy journalism. According to the Edelman Trust Barometer, in the first weeks of the pandemic more people relied on major news organizations than on government agencies or even their own friends and family for information. This is a huge responsibility, but what to do with it?

First of all, listening to audiences is vital. Many journalists still spend more energy on beating the competition than attempting to find out what their audiences need. Among these are more explanation, more solutions, a clear distinction between facts and opinion, less noise, clickbait and talking down to people. Instead of indulging in thumbs-up, thumbs-down journalism, more constructive reporting is needed.

The news media cannot go it alone, though. The political sphere needs to secure press freedom; supporting the economic viability of the industry is part of it. And the platform companies that shape today’s communication infrastructure have to take responsibility too. Their algorithms have to optimize for quality content.

Yet blaming Silicon Valley for everything that is going wrong has been the easy way out for too long. A recent study by the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society confirmed what other research has already pointed out: the mass media are much more responsible for spreading misinformation – for the most part thought up by political leaders – than social media is. This is bad news and good news at the same time. Bad news, because journalism has not lived up to its potential. Good news, because the media still has plenty of agenda-setting power. Instead of blaming platform companies or foreign meddling for spreading “fake news”, the news media and its leaders should confidently reassert their historic mission to lead through a world of information confusion: that is, to deliver the facts, be transparent about their quest and stimulate serious public conversation. The health of our societies depends on it.

This article was published in the “shape the debate” series relating to the fully digital 12th Global Peter Drucker Forum, under the theme “Leadership Everywhere” on October 28, 29 & 30, 2020