TRADITIONALLY, newsrooms wielded the power to determine the biggest story of the day and the audience had no choice but to consume and believe what was available.
So, legacy media highly depended on guessing what audiences want and believing that they had control over news content generation.
Today, with the advent of digital technologies, where a wide choice exists, attention spans are fleeting, newsrooms are confronted with a monumental challenge: capturing audience engagement in an increasingly ever busy digital space.
As legacy media face challenging times with declining print readership and circulation, there has been an awakening in media organisations; analytics have emerged an essential tool, both for surviving and thriving.
There is a growing need to understand what captivates the audience and what doesn’t, and why certain types of content fail to attract more audience yet other do.
Newsrooms are transitioning from digital first to audience first.
But there is a need to understand the best analytics that give value to editorial content decisions.
Among a plethora of analytical tools available today, a few key performance indicators stand out: unique visitors, page views, average time on page, bounce rate, and social shares.
- The fiddler: Lost in translation
- The fiddler: Lost in translation
- TelOne picks EOS Data for agric platform
- Why reputation management is critical in social media era
Keep Reading
Each of these metrics delivers vital information. The number of unique visitors reveals how many different people are engaging with the content, while page views indicate overall interest.
Average time on page can indicate the depth of engagement, while bounce rates highlight how well content retains attention.
Social shares offer insights into what resonates with audiences beyond the immediate page view, reflecting the potential for virality.
While pageviews give an idea on how well a story has been marketed and promoted on various platforms, actual consumption demands looking at other metrics to get the best value out of journalism.
Analytics will also help newsrooms understand whether they are overproducing or underproducing.
While in the past many newsrooms believed in traffic as a key metric, the user needs model suggests the need to go beyond pageviews.
If 100 articles are produced daily, amounting to 3 042 per month, does analytics show you total read-rate per user/month?
While journalism serves as a public good, is there any use in producing content that nobody reads?
What if newsrooms could identify 100 articles that are most relevant? What will happen to subscription performance and what will be the impact on reader revenue?
For journalism, analytics are no longer nice-to-haves or tools that help accounting clicks.
It involves a constellation of sophisticated metrics that can provide critical insights into reader behaviour, preferences and engagement levels.
While data is one critical part of the process to understand the audience, the other question is: Does the newsroom have goals?
No doubt, the story lifecycle is now heavily dependent on analytics and these should be user-friendly, responsive, goal-driven, customisable and actionable.
It is now a requirement in newsrooms to understand these metrics as news content is increasingly targeted and strategies are tailored to meet user needs, as well as to remain relevant in the crowded information marketplace.
For instance, if analytics reveal that a particular topic attracts extensive engagement and higher average reading times, the indication may be a keen audience interest and this presents an opportunity to delve deeper into that subject.
Conversely, if analytics show a high bounce rate on a series of investigative reports, it may signal that the headlines may not be as compelling enough or that the content is not aligned with audience expectations.
However, some custom analytics dashboards break down data into audience needs, such that as newsrooms analyse, they easily comprehend what their users demand.
These may be very expensive for Zimbabwean newsrooms, but there is room to employ data scientists who can build these customised tools, and a fit for our Zimbabwean market.
Evidently, user needs must take centre stage in this analytical endeavour.
As readers become increasingly discerning about the information they consume, understanding what drives their engagement becomes paramount.
A nuanced approach to content creation involves analysing demographic data, user behaviour, and even broader market trends.
For sure, not all content is created equal, and the misalignment between audience needs and journalistic output can lead to dismal performance.
For example, while an editorial team may pour resources into comprehensive reporting on a niche political issue, it risks falling flat if its audience is more interested in lifestyle pieces or local events.
Newsrooms should put analytics at the centre of decision-making, analytics not simply as an operational tool, but as a cornerstone of their editorial strategy.
By understanding and analysing the metrics that matter, audiences can be engaged effectively, guaranteeing their survival in a rapidly changing industry.
It is critical for news media organisations pivotal for journalistic entities to remember that behind every click is a reader with unique needs and preferences and where analytics can illuminate those preferences, content can not only attract clicks, but also cultivate loyalty and trust.
- Silence Mugadzaweta is a digital and online editor for Alpha Media Holdings and content strategies blogger for International News Media Association
