We know from research one of the primary reasons people pay for news now is for coverage of a specific topic they care about. In 2018, the reason people pay for news will be less transactional and less about the tangible exchange of goods, but instead based on the ~emotional~ relationship a news organization has with its audience. And that emotional connection is built on trust, transparency, and community.
People are increasingly spending money with companies and organizations that are radically transparent, that they connect with, want to belong to, or align with the world they want to live in. And younger people who pay for news are more motivated than older news payers by a desire to support to a news organization’s mission and purpose.
If this year was about transparency of the journalistic process and how we do our job, next year it will be about transparency of values and why we do our job.
First above is Malachy Browne’s tweet that shared the steps in how The New York Times covered the Las Vegas shooting using so-called video forensics. Then there’s The Washington Post’s new series on how reporting works and explaining the journalism process.
Take companies like Everlane and Spotify.1 Both have paired making great products with building a values-based brand — and in the process created a new kind of connection with their audience news organizations have yet to achieve. Everlane focuses on manufacturing transparency and forgoes traditional retail tactics like sales. Spotify used their policy on parental leave and flex holidays as an opportunity to showcase their values.
Everlane’s About page explains their mission of “radical transparency” and shows it through cost breakdowns and price comparisons of various products.
Other brands like Away and Glossier have found success in leading with the emotional connection and making their community integral to what they do. Away’s president Jen Rubio said luggage brands talked too much about product details and not enough about what inspired people to use them. One of Glossier’s most popular products, the Milky Jelly Cleanser, was crowdsourced from their site. Last year, 79 percent of its sales were from “organic and peer-to-peer and earned sources,” a.k.a. their community.
Away’s About page leads with its mission and the inspiration behind the product. Glossier’s call out for what became the Milky Jelly Cleanser, and the product page for the cleanser lists every ingredient and highlights some with an accompanying explanation for why it’s included.
Social media, from which two-thirds of Americans get their news, has diminished news organizations’ brand, obscuring the values by which they do their work and the resulting connection. People are more likely to remember which platform they they found content on than the news brand that produced it. News organizations will need to continue the radical transparency of how we do the work, but also couple that with the why.
Taken together, articulating and acting on clear values alongside an aggressive commitment to transparency and community can be a roadmap for news organizations wanting to rebuild and strengthen trust and the emotional relationship with its audience.
Millie Tran is global growth editor at The New York Times. Stine Bauer Dahlberg is managing director, brand at The New York Times.
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Renée Kaplan The year of quiet adjustments (shhh)
Borja Echevarría TV goes digital, digital goes TV
Emma Carew Grovum Newsroom culture becomes a priority
Kinsey Wilson Facebook and Google: Help out or pay up
Dan Shanoff You down with OTT? (Yeah, DTC)
Tracie Powell The muting of underserved voices
An Xiao Mina Memes and visuals come to the fore
Mira Lowe The year of the local watchdog
Damon Krukowski Reviving the alt-weekly soul
Emily Goligoski Looking beyond news for inspiration
Michael Kuntz The only pivot that might work
Julia B. Chan Looking for loyalty in all the right places
Cory Haik Suffering from realness, pivoting to impact
C.W. Anderson The social media apocalypse
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen The Snapchat scenario and the risk of more closed platforms
Umbreen Bhatti The trust problem isn’t new
Craig Newmark Working together toward sustainable solutions
Felix Salmon Covering bitcoin while owning bitcoin
Carrie Brown-Smith Transparency finally takes off
Alfred Hermida Going beyond mobile-first
Andrew Haeg The year journalists become relationship builders
Jim Moroney Newspapers have to be good enough for readers to pay for
Imaeyen Ibanga Longform video leads the way
Michelle Garcia Navigating journalistic transparency
Alice Antheaume Are you fluent in AI?
Lucas Graves From algorithms to institutions
Caitlin Thompson Podcasting models mature and diversify
Amy King Let’s amplify visual voice
Feli Sánchez The year for guerrilla user research
Carlos Martínez de la Serna The new journalism commons
P. Kim Bui The reckoning is only beginning
Jennifer Choi Standing up for us and for each other
Ray Soto VR reaches the next level
Corey Johnson The pro-fact resistance
Frédéric Filloux External forces
Rodney Benson Better, less read, and less trusted
Jessica Parker Gilbert Design connects storytelling and strategy
Adam Thomas Sharing is caring: The year of the mentor
Sydette Harry Listen to your corner and watch for the hook
Ståle Grut Reclaiming audience interaction from social networks
Betsy O'Donovan and Melody Kramer Skepticism and narcissism
Jesse Holcomb Information disorder, coming to a congressional district near you
Laura E. Davis Writing answers before you know the question
Justin Kosslyn The year journalists become digital security experts
Pia Frey Address users as individuals
Lam Thuy Vo Breaking free from the tyranny of the loudest
Taylor Lorenz Social and media will split
Molly de Aguiar Good journalism won’t be enough
Andrew Ramsammy The year ownership mattered
Hannah Cassius The year of the echo-chamber escapists
Mary Walter-Brown Show a little vulnerability
Christopher Meighan Passive partnership is in the rearview
Tanzina Vega It’s time for media companies to #PassTheMic
Mi-Ai Parrish Blockchain and trust
Matt Boggie The intellectual equivalent of the Dead Sea
Raju Narisetti Mirror, mirror on the wall
Niketa Patel Live journalism comes of age
Jim Brady With the people, not just of the people
Rachel Davis Mersey AI, with real smarts
Heather Bryant Building the ecosystems for collaboration
Tamar Charney We get serious about algorithms
Joyce Barnathan It will be harder to bury the news
Kristen Muller The year of the voter
Zizi Papacharissi Women come back
Doris Truong Computer vision vs. the Internet vigilantes
Joanne McNeil Gatekeeping the gatekeepers
Luke O'Neil The end is already here
Julia Beizer A longer view on the pivot
Marie Gilot No assholes allowed
Sally Lehrman Trust comes first
Raney Aronson-Rath Transparency is the antidote to fake news
Pete Brown Push alerts, personalized
S. Mitra Kalita The arc of news and audience
Rubina Madan Fillion Unlocking the potential of AI
Evie Nagy Pivot to mobile video frustration
Manoush Zomorodi Self-help as a publishing strategy
Millie Tran and Stine Bauer Dahlberg (Hint: It’s about your brand)
Cristina Wilson The year of the Instagram Story
Mandy Velez texting is lit rn, fam
Will Sommer The year local media gets conservative
Francesco Marconi The year of machine-to-machine journalism
Claire Wardle Disinformation gets worse
Dheerja Kaur Fun with subscription products
Pablo Boczkowski The rise of skeptical reading
Vivian Schiller Pivot to tomorrow
Ruth Palmer Risks will grow for news subjects — especially minorities
Caitria O'Neill The new court of public opinion
Errin Haines Whack At the ballot, it’s time to count black women
Aron Pilhofer We can’t leave the business to the business side any more
Tim Carmody Watch out for Spotify
Rachel Schallom Better design helps differentiate opinion and news
Kathleen McElroy Building a news video experience native to mobile
Rick Berke Value is the watchword
Kawandeep Virdee Zines had it right all along
Alastair Coote The year of self-improvement
Basile Simon We need better career paths for news nerds
Bill Keller A growing turn to philanthropy
Cindy Royal Your journalism curriculum is obsolete
Matt Carlson Attacks on the press will get worse
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Seeking trust in fragmented spaces
David Skok Finding an information-life balance
Hossein Derakhshan Television has won
Amy Webb Listen to weak signals
Elizabeth Jensen Show your work
Trushar Barot The Jio-fication of India
Marcela Donini and Thiago Herdy Collaboration is the way forward for Brazilian journalism
Nikki Usher The year of The Washington Post
Alexios Mantzarlis Moving fake news research out of the lab
Sam Sanders Shine the light on ourselves
Kyle Ellis Let’s build our way out of this
Matt DeRienzo A recession, then a collapse
Jassim Ahmad Thriving on change
Daniel Trielli The rich get richer, the poor scramble
Joanne Lipman Journalists inventing revenue streams
Juliette De Maeyer A responsible press criticism
Nushin Rashidian Publishers seek ad dollar alternatives
Nicholas Diakopoulos Fortifying social media from automated inauthenticity
Juleyka Lantigua-Williams Women of color will reclaim and monetize our time
Debra Adams Simmons And a woman shall lead them
Eric Ulken The year local publishers get smart(er) about change
Eric Nuzum Beyond the narrative arc
Jacqui Cheng Retailers move into content
Ernst-Jan Pfauth Publishing less to give readers more
Sam Ford The year of investing in processes
Miguel Castro The arrival of the impact producer
Rodney Gibbs Tech workers turn to journalism
Kim Fox Audience teams diversify their approach
Brian Lam Sketchy ethics around product reviews
Federica Cherubini The rise of bridge roles in news organizations
Edward Roussel Eyes, ears, and brains
L. Gordon Crovitz Serving readers over advertisers
Corey Ford The empire strikes back
Tanya Cordrey Finally, the seeds of radical reinvention
Monique Judge Letting black women tell their own stories
José Zamora Revenue-first journalism
Mary Meehan Real lives are at stake in rural areas
Jennifer Coogan The future is female
Vanessa K. DeLuca Women’s voices take center stage
Yvonne Leow The rise of video messaging
Amie Ferris-Rotman More female reporters abroad (please)
Sarah Marshall Loyalty as the key performance indicator
Susie Banikarim R.I.P. Pivot to Video (2017–2017)
Sara M. Watson Feeds will open up to new user-determined filters
Jamie Mottram From pageviews to t-shirts
Matt Thompson Here come the attention managers
Lanre Akinola Making noise is not a strategy
Mariano Blejman News games rule
Jarrod Dicker Honesty in advertising
Alan Soon The rise of start of psychographic, micro-targeted media
Steve Grove The midterms are an opportunity
Richard J. Tofel The platforms’ power demands more reporters’ attention
Mike Caulfield Refactoring media literacy for the networked age
Andrew Losowsky The year of resilience
Mario García Storytelling finally adapts to mobile
Nicholas Quah Stop talking trash about young people
Mariana Moura Santos Think local, act global
Jennifer Brandel and Mónica Guzmán The editorial meeting of the future
Dannagal G. Young Stop covering politics as a game
Jared Newman Venture funding and digital news don’t mix
Helen Havlak Keywords, not publishers, power the world’s biggest feeds