The Weekly Bulletin | June 20, 2023

Hi SODP community,

Let’s recap on what’s been happening last week, the new content, industry updates, tips, and more.

EDITOR’S NOTE

The Reuters Institute published its latest annual report on the state of the news industry last week, revealing that audience trust in news media continues to slide.

The UK-based think tank’s 160-page Digital News Report 2023 report (PDF download) — built on data mined from surveys of around 93,000 individuals from across 46 markets — notes that trust in the news fell by 2 percentage points this past year, with just 40% of respondents saying they “trust most news most of the time”.

The reasons for this lack of trust range from mounting criticism of the news media to greater polarization within public discourse.

When reading the report, however, the thing that kept popping up at me was the apparent lack of audience enthusiasm for news. The stats not only show a lack of trust in news but also a growing apathy to it.

The Reuters Institute found that just 48% of its aggregate sample were very or extremely interested in news, down from 63% in 2017. At the same time, only 22% of respondents were actively participating with the news, while 47% didn’t participate at all.

In the report’s foreword, Reuters Institute director Rasmus Kleis Nielsen made an interesting point that people’s “platform preferences rarely regress”. Nielsen likened this to people in the 1980s unlikely to trade in their mobiles for landline phones upon buying their first home.

The argument is that as the tide of technology rises it lifts all boats. This applies as much to news platforms as it does to mobile phones.

Nielsen said: “There are no reasonable grounds for expecting that those born in the 2000s will suddenly come to prefer old-fashioned websites, let alone broadcast and print, simply because they grow older.”

His comments made me think of deputy editor-in-chief of Swedish daily Aftonbladet, Martin Schori, who argued some weeks ago that many publishers are stuck making online newspapers.

While there are many steps publishers have to take in order to build trust with their audiences, the first step is to engage them in order to build a relationship with them. If audiences aren’t engaged by the news, why will they care if its publisher is trustworthy or not?

Interestingly, while those surveyed expressed concerns over how algorithms surfaced news stories in their feeds, content recommendation engines were the preferred choice over human curation. In the end, these engines know their audiences better than the audiences know themselves.

TikTok’s growing importance as a news source has been widely documented in recent years, not least of which by the Reuters Institute itself. The think tank noted this year that that social media platform reaches 44% of 18-24 year olds across markets and 20% for news.

But it isn’t just TikTok that publishers should worry about. The Reuters Institute noted that 30% of those surveyed relied on social media for news, compared with the 22% that relied on direct access to websites or an app. An almost mirrored reversal of fortunes from five years ago.

The news media has long talked about rebuilding trust, but the approach of the industry at large appears to be missing the mark. It’s not enough to advocate a service’s merits, when the audience’s interest in that service is eroded.

Reinvention is difficult, but publishers that hold fast to the creation of digital newspapers may find themselves without an audience willing to listen to arguments of trustworthiness.

ANNOUNCEMENT

Next month, in partnership with Multidots, we are running an online event – WordPress Publishers Performance Summit. 12 panelists will go through best practices on optimizing performance, securing and scaling your WordPress-based digital property, and improving publisher workflow.

This event will not be streamed live. There will be no recording available after the event. So if you want to learn from the amazing board of panelists, make sure to grab your spot and join the event!

LEARN MORE

SODP POSTS

5 BEST CONTENT ANALYTICS SOFTWARE FOR PUBLISHERS IN 2023

The fast-paced nature of the digital publishing landscape means leveraging data-driven insights to optimize content strategy is essential.

Exact figures are hard to come by, the number of new blog posts each day count in the millions. After all, WordPress powers more than 40% of the world’s websites and claims that its users publish 70 million new posts every month. Suffice it to say, leveraging data-driven insights to optimize content strategy is essential.

With the help of content analytics, publishers can gain valuable insights into how their content is performing, who their readers are and what type of content resonates most with their audience.

But with so many software options available, how to select the right one?

Let’s explore what a content analytics tool is, how it works, why publishers should use it and then review the best content analytics software solutions available in 2023.

SEE MORE

JOB BOARD

➡️ The Harvard Magazine is looking for a publisher to co-lead the publication in the digital age. SEE MORE

➡️ News Corp Australia is looking for an Audience Growth Editor to help execute the strategy to drive audience growth on The Daily Telegraph. SEE MORE

NEWSLETTERS WE RECOMMEND

➡️ Niche Media Publishing’s weekly newsletter shows you how to produce the best content for your audience, grow with the best paid and organic traffic tips, monetize your content & get paid, and lots more… SEE MORE

➡️ Subscribe to the Scrappy Podcasting Newsletter for one two-minute tip per week on how to punch above your weight as an underdog brand or creator. SEE MORE

➡️ Join the bite-sized newsletter read by 1000's of creators every day. 8AM delivers just one story, idea, or gem of advice every morning. SEE MORE

MEMBER PROFILE OF THE WEEK

Each week, we’ll introduce one of the community members – either one of the newest additions or those who’ve been actively contributing to discussions. Feel free to give them a shoutout on our Slack channel or connect on LinkedIn.

This week, the member of the week is one of our own – Swapnil Pate, Head of SEO at SODP.

Swapnil, congratulations on being awarded the Outstanding Leadership Award in Marketing by Marketing Conference 2.0. Well deserved! As a true leader, you provide guidance not only to our team at SODP, but you regularly share your knowledge at industry conferences, roundtables, and through your insightful LinkedIn posts.

COMMUNITY BUZZ

INDUSTRY NEWS

➡️ Reuters Institute has released the findings of its annual Digital News Report. READ MORE

➡️ The EU has ordered Google to divest parts of its advertising business, accusing it of monopolistic practices. READ MORE

SOCIAL MEDIA DISCUSSIONS

➡️ John Shehata on LinkedIn:

Very excited to announce that NewzDash now offers News Topic Authority tracking. While There is no direct way to measure News Topic Authority, the only way is to report on the top authoritative sites so it can be analyzed!

So we track all rising new trends around a News Topic every 15 minutes. We aggregate the data and report on the top 100 most authoritative sites over the past 30 days for thousands of related new news trends along with their content production, ranked trends share, URL strength and other metrics.

SEE THE FULL POST

These are the highlights for last week.

Until next!

Andrew Kemp and the editorial team at SODP