Dear American colleagues: Look abroad. Your predictions for 2017 are probably already happening somewhere else.
The time when everything in journalism and media happened in the States and was then exported to the rest of the world is over. The financial crisis hit European countries so hard that not only the news industry was reconfigured, but so was the whole political framework in which they develop their businesses. And from there, innovation is growing. If you want to make predictions for your future, have a look at our present.
The New York Times had a huge increase of digital subscriptions after receiving some direct accusations from new president-elect Donald Trump. Is that an isolated event? No, it is not.
We at eldiario.es have been 4 years now developing our membership program as an innovative funding model. Our members (we call them “socios”) are not paying to read the news; they pay for the news to be spread. No paywall, no gifts. They are not interested in being our clients but our partners-in-crime for that social mission called journalism. We have 20,000 members, paying 60 euros a year, who are there to protect us, to encourage us, and to send a message: We believe democracies need better journalism.
The Guardian has been building for a year its membership program too. Have a look at their marketing for fundraising while surfing the site. They all talk about the need for the project and independent journalism “more than ever,” an implicit general allusion to Brexit. It’s not about the news — it’s about the project’s attributes. Are you credible? Are you trustable? Are you part of the problem or part of the solution?
Then we can visit a few more small newsrooms in Europe, such as Atlatzo in Hungary or Denník in Slovakia or Mediapart in France. These are projects which have developed quality journalism, even investigative skills, based on the support of their audiences. Audiences who are part of the project, not the product being sold to advertisers who sometimes don’t care whether the content is fake, post-factual, a lie, or whatever.
Building trust is building quality. And if you have a loyal community then you probably can ask them for help. How do you grow a public who has that sense of belonging? Try social networks, try newsletters, try to use your personal touch, try to treat the readers as adults…We all know that. And then try creating little communities who are short in numbers but strong in engagement.
For instance, at eldiario.es we have a Telegram group for readers. We have now more than 15,000 members in that group. We share with them some insights of our newsroom, audio notes, and, yes, sometimes funny gifs or stickers. Of course, their usefulness in a comScore competition is none. But their value for us is huge.
We also focus on personalization in our new app for smartphones. You will receive notifications not about whatever the managing editor finds important, but on the topics you find most important to you. If you’re not interested in NBA results, why would you want to be bothered after dinner with the score? If you are really interested in LGBT rights, why shouldn’t you be notified when a gay marriage law is passed in Argentina?
If you want to escape noise, know better your audience. If you want to run away from post-factual journalism, find a trustable social contract with your readers. If you want to be respected by people, try to get closer to them. Not as clients, not as the product being sold, but as your best friends.
Juan Luis Sánchez is deputy editor-in-chief at eldiario.es.
Cory Haik Navigating power in Trump’s America
Millie Tran International expansion without colonial overtones
Amy O'Leary Not just covering communities, reaching them
Michael Kuntz Trust is the new click
Swati Sharma Failing diversity is failing journalism
Julia Beizer Building a coherent core identity
Nushin Rashidian A rise in high-price, high-value subscriptions
Renée Kaplan Pure reach has reached its limit
Robert Hernandez History will exclude you, again
An Xiao Mina 2017 is for the attention innovators
Pablo Boczkowski Fake news and the future of journalism
Mary Meehan Feeling blue in a red state
S.P. Sullivan Baking transparency into our routines
Megan H. Chan Cultural reporting goes mainstream
Tim Herrera The safe space of service journalism
Mary Walter-Brown Getting comfortable asking for money
Cindy Royal Preparing the digital educator-scholar hybrid
Melody Kramer Radically rethinking design
Juliette De Maeyer and Dominique Trudel A rebirth of populist journalism
Caitlin Thompson High touch, high value
Dhiya Kuriakose The year of digital detoxing
Liz McMillen The year of deep insights
David Chavern Fake news gets solved
Anita Zielina The sales funnel reaches (and changes) the newsroom
Corey Ford The year of the rebelpreneur
Sarah Wolozin Virtual reality on the open web
Carrie Brown-Smith We won’t do enough
Gabriel Snyder The aberration of 20th-century journalism
Ken Schwencke Disaggregation and collection
Aja Bogdanoff Comments start pulling their weight
Amy Webb Journalism as a service
Joanne Lipman The year of the drone, really
Alice Antheaume A new test for French media
Dan Colarusso Let’s make live video we can love
Erin Millar The bottom falls out of Canadian media
Tanya Cordrey The resurgence of reach
Jon Slade Trusted news, at a premium
Andrew Ramsammy Rise of the rebel journalist
Andrea Silenzi Podcasts dive into breaking news analysis
Olivia Ma The year collaboration beats competition
Bill Adair The year of the fact-checking bot
Alexis Lloyd Public trust for private realities
Steve Henn The next revolution is voice
Rachel Schallom Stop flying over the flyover states
Reyhan Harmanci Bear witness — but then what?
Nicholas Quah Podcasting’s coming class war
Ariane Bernard Better data about your users
Mathew Ingram The Faustian Facebook dance continues
Maria Bustillos “It’s true — I saw it on Facebook”
Eric Nuzum Podcasting stratifies into hard layers
Rachel Sklar Women are going to get loud
Tressie McMillan Cottom A path through the media’s coming legitimacy crisis
Taylor Lorenz “Selfie journalism” becomes a thing
Emily Goligoski Incorporating audience feedback at scale
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen News after advertising may look like news before advertising
Keren Goldshlager Defining a focus, and then saying no
Rebekah Monson Journalism is community-as-a-service
Asma Khalid The year of the newsy podcast
Doris Truong Connecting with diverse perspectives
Emi Kolawole From empathy to community
Amie Ferris-Rotman Вслед за Россией
Hillary Frey Forests need to burn to regrow
Jim Friedlich A banner year for venture philanthropy
Sydette Harry Facing journalism’s history
Andy Rossback The year of the user
Christopher Meighan Unlocking a deeper mobile experience
Lee Glendinning A call for great editing
Dan Gillmor Fix the demand side of news too
Helen Havlak Chasing mobile search results
Erin Pettigrew A year of reflection in tech
Mandy Velez The audience is the source and the story
Tracie Powell Building reader relationships
Peter Sterne A dangerous anti-press mix
Bill Keller A healthy skepticism about data
David Weigel A test for online speech
Mira Lowe News literacy, bias, and “Hamilton”
Andrew Haeg The year of listening
Sarah Marshall Focusing on the why of the click
Matt Karolian AI improves publishing
Ole Reißmann Un-faking the news
Rubina Madan Fillion Snapchat grows up
Ashley C. Woods Local journalism will fight a new fight
Matt Waite The people running the media are the problem
Adam Thomas The coming collaboration across Europe
Alberto Cairo Communicating uncertainty to our readers
M. Scott Havens Quality advertising to pair with quality content
Kawandeep Virdee Moving deeper than the machine of clicks
Ryan McCarthy Platforms grow up or grow more toxic
Tim Griggs The year we stop taking sides
Ernst-Jan Pfauth Earn trust by working for (and with) readers
Sara M. Watson There is no neutral interface
Molly de Aguiar Philanthropists galvanize around news
Elizabeth Jensen Trust depends on the details
Laura Walker Authentic voices, not fake news
Burt Herman Local news gets interesting
Lam Thuy Vo The primary source in the age of mechanical multiplication
Ståle Grut The battle for high-quality VR
Mario García Virtual reality on mobile leaps forward
Nathalie Malinarich Making it easy
Moreno Cruz Osório The year of transparency in Brazilian journalism
Umbreen Bhatti A sense of journalists’ humanity
Michael Oreskes Reversing the erosion of democracy
Katie Zhu The year of minority media
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Truthiness in private spaces
Jeremy Barr A terrible year for Tiers B through D
Juan Luis Sánchez Your predictions are our present
Libby Bawcombe Kids board the podcast train
Jonathan Stray A boom in responsible conservative media
Richard Tofel The country doesn’t trust us — but they do believe us
Guy Raz Inspiration and hope will matter more than ever
Ray Soto VR moves from experiments to immersion
Priya Ganapati Mobile websites are ready for reinvention
Mike Ragsdale A smarter information diet
Jonathan Hunt Measurement companies get with the times
Geetika Rudra Journalism is community
Almar Latour Thanks, #fakenews
P. Kim Bui The year journalism teaches again
Sam Ford The year we talk about our awful metrics
Dannagal G. Young The return of the gatekeepers
Errin Haines Chaos or community?
Margarita Noriega From pinning tweets to tweeting pins
Zizi Papacharissi Distracted journalism looks in the mirror
Samantha Barry Messaging apps go mainstream
Javaun Moradi What can we own?
Vivian Schiller Tested like never before
Sue Schardt Objectivity, fairness, balance, and love
Carla Zanoni Prioritizing emotional health
David Skok What lies beyond paywalls
Liz Danzico The triumph of the small
Claire Wardle Verification takes center stage
Annemarie Dooling UGC as a path out of the bubble