D2: Making�Data-based decisions

How to WIN: Dealing with online harassment

One of the challenges to press freedom, highlighted in WAN-IFRA’s report on World Trends Outlook 2021-22, is online harassment of journalists.

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Nearly four in 10 of respondents in developed countries and just over four in 10 in developing economies reported that they – or one of their colleagues – had encountered online harassment, the report said.

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In 2021, Euronews highlighted the experience of Blaz Zgaga (pictured), an investigative journalist from Slovenia. “After questioning the legitimacy and management of the COVID-19 crisis unit set up by the government at the start of the pandemic, he was the subject of a violent smear campaign on social media,” Euronews reported. “This occurred after the government's crisis unit republished an anonymous tweet insulting the journalist.”

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INTRODUCTION: D2: Making Data-based decisions

Image source: Socialni demokrati

How to WIN: Dealing with online harassment

After receiving dozens of death threats, and support from several press freedom organisations, including WAN-IFRA, the Slovenian government was asked by the European Commission to ensure Zgaga’s safety. The threats ended almost immediately, Euronews says.

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The picture is often darker for women and female-identifying journalists. A 2018 survey from the International Federation of Journalists found almost two-thirds of women journalists globally have experienced online abuse.

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As of early 2025, WIN was due to publish its Newsroom policy guide to fight online harassment.

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Further reading: Protecting journalists in the Digital Age: an inside look into the workings of the world’s first Online Safety Editor - WAN-IFRA

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INTRODUCTION: D2: Making Data-based decisions

Image source: Socialni demokrati

What is covered�in this lesson?

SECTION 1: Editorial analytics and dashboards - a reminder

• Reminder: data is key to grabbing users’ attention
• Reminder: tools for tracking
• Reminder: editorial dashboards

STOP AND THINK: What niche �markets does your organisation cover? Are there any gaps?

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SECTION 2: User needs

• Reminder: the BBC User �Needs matrix
• What do we mean by niche content?
• Planning versus breaking news
• Test your assumptions
• Where does video and audio �fit in?

SECTION 3: Publishing schedules and social media strategy

• How publishing schedules work
• Social media - the new news desk
• How to drive traffic post-publication

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INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT: Write up a business case for your idea for a new niche product that you thought about in Slide 22. Is your idea backed by data? Is there a gap in the market for it?

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Section 1: Editorial analytics and dashboards - a reminder

Reminder: Tools for tracking

• In Module A5 we looked at tools that are used for tracking content in newsrooms.

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• One of the easiest and most effective ways to collect data on publishing sites is through Google Analytics

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• GA is free until you pass a certain usage level at which point charges kick in, but it is perfect for smaller sites with lower traffic

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• Chartbeat is also a very popular news site tool - but more to use within the newsroom to track readers, and it does charge quite a lot in licence fees

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• There are other tools available for free, or for smaller fees: do some research, but Clicky gets good reviews

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Google Analytics: insights

Google’s News Consumer Insights tell you about:

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• Casual readers - those users who only visited once in the last 30 days
• Loyal readers - those who has at least 2 visits and less than 14
• Brand lovers - those who had at least 15 visits

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Loyal Readers and Brand Lovers represent 20% of your audience, drive 80% of your pageviews and 85% of your ad revenue, according to Google.

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Focus on your reader engagement to push your Casual Readers down the funnel to become loyal or brand lovers. We look at the funnel in more detail in Module D3: Audience Acquisition and Retention.

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In doing experiments, newsrooms can set a target in the rate of engagement to increase brand lovers and loyal readers in the hope that newsrooms can monetize their content. You can read more on Google Analytics Dashboards here.

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Reminder: The most important metrics to know

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Reminder: tracking tools give you information on…

• Traffic to the site
• Most popular / most read stories
• Pageviews (PVs)
• Unique browsers / viewers (UBs / UVs)
• Device tracking (mobile, desktop etc)
• Usage Patterns over day / month / year
• Per story stats
• Dwell time (how long a reader spent)
• Total time spent on visit
• Scroll depth (how far did reader read?)
• Frequency per visitor
• Geography / basic demographics

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Reminder: They also provide information such as:

• Heat maps (show you on a homepage which areas are getting the most traffic or movement - so you can move stories around)

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• Bounce rate (how quickly reader leaves)

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• App stats

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• Social referral stats (how many readers came to that story from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc)

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• Sharing stats - how often it was shared

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• Recirculation (how much of your traffic is recirculated on the site from links to your own articles - “inbound” links)

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• Engagement - how “sticky” a story is

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Reminder: Editorial analytics and dashboard

• Editorial can benefit greatly from having information on the stories they produce

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• However, the introduction of data in newsrooms has been controversial: journalists worry that they will be measured on audience reaction, that they will be commissioned to write “click-bait” kinds of stories

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• The defence from editors and managers is often: �“We are data-informed rather than data-led.”

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• Understanding the movements of readers is incredibly powerful and can lead to immense efficiencies in a newsroom: for example, if you are producing a lot of stories on municipal meetings, and your data shows that readers are not engaging, you may want to look at changing the headlines to use more search terms, repromote the content on social media or just reduce this type of coverage if resources are limited

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Reminder: Editorial analytics and dashboard

• Your job is to entertain, inform and delight your readers, and audience data can help you to do that

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• Editorial dashboards generally include metrics like “Most Read”, and would include almost instant feedback on popular stories, stories that are converting to subs, most shared, and site traffic.

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• Scroll depth (how far down an article a reader reads, eg 30%) can indicate how engaging a story is

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• Further reading: Press Gazette on Audience analytics deep dive�Reuters Report from 2016 on Editorial Analytics, �Nieman Lab on The Guardian’s analytics system, Ophan Medium article on why Google Analytics is good for your newsroom.

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Reminder: The Guardian’s�Ophan analytics tool for journalists

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The editorial dashboard for The Guardian will show journalists the page views on a story, how people read a story, where they found it and from where it was being read. ��This information can be used to make further editorial decisions, such as promoting the article on Facebook, commissioning follow-ups or interviews etc that will add value for readers. This is vital, especially in paid environments.

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Loyalty versus volume

• Media companies that want to make money are generally moving away from chasing volume (reach) to building loyalty.

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• This means reducing the emphasis on measurements such as growth metrics, page views and reach.

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• And instead focus on time per page, pages per session and repeat visits.

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• They may also consider reducing dependence on social media to drive traffic as these social media platforms become more sophisticated at retaining users on their sites.

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Section 2: User needs

Reminder: The BBC User Needs Matrix

In Module B3, as part of Digital ABC, we looked at user needs:

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• The BBC World Service audience research team developed a user needs matrix, which has evolved over the years
• They were looking for ways to connect with their audience
• “Being a secondary news source in most countries, it was challenging for the BBC digital team to connect with users by just doing ‘agenda’ news, or ‘hard’ news, as we say. Most readers would have seen the headlines of the day already, before seeing BBC content. There was little need to fill the website with those same headlines; a new approach was needed.

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Reminder: The BBC User Needs Matrix

In Module B3, as part of Digital ABC, we looked at user needs:

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• The BBC research team listened to how people were talking about news, eventually identifying six reasons for consuming news stories. They are on the right.
• These six needs can be divided into three groups: 'what has happened', 'how does this event make me feel or what do I do about it', and 'what more do I need to know about this'."
• One of the original pioneers of this way of thinking was Dmitry Shishkin and you can read more about this journey, and watch Dmitry speak about it, here.

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Reminder: Tapping into the needs of interaction for news

• Dmitry has gone on to develop a guide to user needs with a company called Smartocto. Read their white paper here

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• He says: “The user needs fulfil demands that come from a very basic human interaction model: it's all about feeling involved and getting more social currency with your peers. Something that makes readers say: 'oh, this is interesting, oh, I didn't know that, I will tell my friends about this, or this is something I will share with my parents in the evening.

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Reminder: Tapping into the needs of interaction for news

• These user needs are six different perspectives or editorial treatments of a news fact - and a great way to differentiate yourself. It's like this: you take a piece of news, then try to cover it in different ways that answer these six user needs. It's a really interesting exercise, which I loved doing. It's almost always possible to do so, even though the circumstances and the user needs might be a little bit different."

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• For detailed guides on each and how to write to fill the needs, click on these links: Update me / Keep me on trend / Educate me / Give me perspective / Inspire me / Divert me

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Reminder: Using data effectively in your newsroom

The graph on the left is a great example of how data can be used to demonstrate the need for change. The shadow peaks in the background of the graph show audience visits (page views) in a 24-hour period for a daily newspaper and website. The reading peak is clearly between 6am and 9am. The bars (look at grey first) show the number of articles published online: showing clearly that most publishing was happening late afternoon and evening (the pull of the newspaper) - the time when the least number of readers was present.

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Image source: Lisa MacLeod

Reminder: Moving to an audience-centric viewpoint

Once this was obvious to the newsroom attempts were made to change shifts and processes, and the orange bars show the progress made. This publisher is now a huge digital publisher, but it is valuable to use such data points when attempting to activate positive newsroom change.

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Image source: Lisa MacLeod

Test your assumptions. Base decisions on data

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Think about a new audience, from your Module D1 assignment. Now consider the data analytics you have access to. To start with, break down an audience you already know and have. Fill in that data for Audience 1. Then think about what data you have for identifying your new audience from D1. Perhaps they are supporters of a local football team, or maybe they are young business people or music fans. Consider coverage from their perspectives. Or something else. You decide.

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What do we mean by niche content?

One way smaller newsrooms can address user needs is by covering niche content. “Nichification” is specialist copy that targets particular audiences.

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You should be able to glean this information by for example asking users what topics they want to read about or watch when they register to your site.

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When “nichification” is done well, it can add value to your website, driving traffic, registrations and conversions to subscriptions because this content should cater to users’ specific needs and answer problems or issues in their lives.

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Image source Screenshot from BBC Food - Recipes and inspiration from your favourite BBC programmes and chefs

What do we mean by niche content?

To develop a niche vertical or hub, you should also be analysing your audience data to identify what topics that could be of further interest.

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A great example of niche content is: Food. Everybody eats! Going out to eat or cooking at home, buying ingredients from the same shops as top restaurants chefs, swapping foodie tips can all make great content - and generate shows, newsletters, videos, audio and text - see the BBC Food content as one example.

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Local news succeeds with niche content

Local news sites have had success with this approach. According to an article published by WAN-IFRA Heidenheimer Zeitung, a German newspaper, has seen a strong increase in digital subscriptions by focusing on the following topics:

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• Crime and justice
• Shopping, eating and leisure
• Traffic and commuting
• Local football team (FC Heidenheim, pictured right)
• Local amateur football
• Coronavirus

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Other examples of niche markets include agriculture and mining. According to Zimbabwe’s YAFM, the radio station has positioned itself to cater for “the voice of the miners, which has an audience not currently catered for by any other media medium in the country”.

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They also broadcast all their programmes in Shona/Karanga, English and Ndebele. Local languages can offer huge potential for niche markets.

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Case study: AlMasry AlYoum, Egypt

Egyptian news group AlMasry AlYoum had built up a reputation for serious coverage of politics and the economy.

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But in the digital world it wanted to expand into sub groups - so it has built dedicated “sub sites” to cover niche content, including:

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1. sport: https://sports.almasryalyoum.com
2. celebrity gossip: https://lite.almasryalyoum.com
3. lifestyle and house and home: https://icona.almasryalyoum.com

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With sports coverage, for example, they will not just cover the game but look at other aspects such as:

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1. How you can watch a certain football game, on what channel and frequency
2. The expected formation for the match
3. What the coach was saying before the match.

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And they have seen great success, with “huge audiences” particularly when their are big events or games, says Ehab Zelaky, executive editor in chief at AlMasry AlYoum.

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Ehab Zelaky, executive editor in chief at AlMasry AlYoum; and Below, the coverage on the lifestyle site Icona

Image supplied by: Ehab Zelaky

Planning versus breaking news

Weighing up how much content should be planned versus how much should be breaking news can be the subject of heated debate in newsrooms.

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In a digital-first business, planned content should make up the majority of what is published because the value-added story that requires an interactive graphic, video or audio, takes time to research and collaborate with visual desks.

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These are typically agenda-setting, exclusive investigations that once published should dominate the news agenda of the day. Or background context, opinion and analysis explaining to the user what the story means for them.

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And it is the type of content that will set your business apart from rivals. For a subscription site, these stories should be the type of content that drives conversions or registrations, and greater traffic.

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Breaking news is still very necessary in a digital-first Editorial. But these types of stories are typically generic, readily available elsewhere and probably for free on rival sites. But they are still valuable to drive traffic - and increase reach - despite being of limited value in terms of revenue.

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A good rule of thumb is to aim for 60 per cent of planned content and 40 per cent breaking news.

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Case study: Manila Standard, Philippines

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If breaking news is covered extensively in your region by other organisations, it may not be efficient or make business sense to compete to cover the same story.

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This is a stance that Manila Standard (pictured right) takes in the Philippines.

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Joyce Pañares, news editor, says the newsroom will focus on explaining the bigger picture, contextualizing the story and presenting it in a way that may be long form, but easy to digest. “That's how we try to differentiate our story,” she says.

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Stop & Think

Let’s stop and think for a moment:

• What niche markets does your organisation cover? Are there any gaps? What new market could be developed? Use Slide 10 to help you.
• Think of an idea for a new newsletter, for example. Who would it be aimed at and why?
• How much content is planned at your news group?

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Section 3: Publishing schedules and social media strategy

Working to a playbook

Editorial departments are long used to working with style guides that lay out grammar and preferred spellings. But how many have playbooks on how to handle a major breaking news story or investigation? A political scandal? Or a terrorist incident?

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Digital journalism calls for a playbook - because what works and what doesn’t can change year by year.

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A playbook lays out a plan for how to handle particular types of stories, from long form to short news items, as these are different types of stories so should be displayed accordingly.

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It should include:

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• visual elements, such as boxes, quotes, number of photos in a long-form article; whether they should all be captioned (yes they should!)

• when to use timelines and maps
• where to embed videos or audio
• where to position recommended link boxes
• when to start a live blog and when to stop it
• what elements are needed for Day Two of the story.

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Live blogs are an effective way to showcase big breaking news that moves on significantly throughout the day such as a major national election or a terrorism attack.

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But it should not drift on aimlessly once the story is fading and the audience is losing interest.

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A playbook can lay out these types of guidelines and help better decision-making in a fast-paced 24-hour news cycle as well as improve workflows with a more standardised and consistent approach.

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Where do video and audio fit in?

Today’s consumers increasingly prefer to watch and listen to content, as opposed to read it. Video in particular is becoming a more important source of online news, especially with younger groups, Reuters Digital News Report 2024 says. Short news videos were accessed by two-thirds of its sample each week, with longer formats attracting around 51%.

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What is more, users tend to consume news video via online platforms (72%) rather than publisher websites (22%), increasing the challenges around monetisation and connection.

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The global over-the-top (OTT) services market, which delivers content directly to users via the internet, is projected to reach $86.6billion by 2026, according to an article published by Brightspot.com. As a result, publishers know OTT audio and video content is critical to keep consumers engaged with their brands, the article says.

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According to an article in Forbes, these formats should fit into a content strategy and include:

• Audience needs - Start with how your users consume your content
• Have clear goals - what do you want video and audio to do?
• Channel design - create content for specific channel, factoring in sound, style and length to immerse audiences and potential content sharing.
• Display the length of the video or audio. Short videos and podcasts for news in depths can runs for around 2 to 3 mins, depending on your audience needs.
• Longer films - or podcasts - tend to run up to 30 minutes for more in-depth analysis or context.
• Concept - you need a strong idea, probably evergreen content.

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Why publishing schedules are key

Publishing schedules are essential to coordinate when to publish your best, high quality content targeted to peak audience times. This audience-centric approach can help build traffic and was used by the Financial Times to increase subscriptions.

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Here are four key reasons why publishing schedules work better than an ad hoc, ‘publish when story’s ready’ approach:

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1. A structured, deadline-driven approach to online � publishing to improve copy and data flows
2. Presents the best of what a news group does to the � largest possible audience
3. Displays less time-sensitive scoops and reporting � efforts more strategically
4. Avoids the risk of lurching from copyflow feast� to famine

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The Big Read at the FT was given a 5am or 11am publication time every day to target specific audiences

How publishing schedules work

A publishing schedule is a transparent list of stories across all sections/departments, including all content - whether that is daily newspapers, weekly or monthly magazines, special reports, weekend newspapers.

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It also includes all visual desks, from pictures and interactive graphics to video as well as audio and social media, which is becoming a news desk in its own right.

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A schedule includes the following:

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1. Information such as the story stage. Eg commissioned; filed, in editing, revise and published. What the story is about
2. Proposed publication date and time and whether it is a pitch for the homepage
3. News/commissioning desk and reporter
4. Advanced usage: photos and graphics can be attached to story
5. Whether the story is going on the homepage.

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How publishing schedules work

The FT started its schedule by targeting two key audience times:

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• 5am for UK and the rest of Europe
• 11am for the New York traders market.

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Typically planned content was displayed prominently in the top homepage slots to ensure maximum exposure for several hours.

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The Times in the UK took a different approach with set key publishing times throughout the day. This method can help to manage tight resources and also build habit with users knowing when the site is updated.

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Others take a more ad hoc approach and publish when a�story is ready. This works well with breaking news.

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But with analysis and backgrounders a schedule can�increase the scope to be strategic with a targeted approach�to key audiences.

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Stop & Think

Let’s stop and think for a moment:

• Does your newsroom have a publishing schedule? If not, why not? And if it does, how does it work? Could it be improved?
• When are your peak audiences online and where are they? What are they interested in reading?

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Social media - the new news desk

Once you have a publishing strategy in place, you can align your social media promotion with it to grow your audience reach and align with the business’s goals.

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You will need to do your audience research to know which platforms your users are on and target those platforms. A YouTube audience is very different from Instagram and different again from Facebook or Twitter.

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You will also need to consider whether:

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• you are trying to increase your reach
• or develop more active commenting and sharing of your content.

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Also consider the writing style: asking questions can generate more user interest. Headlines should aim to connect emotionally with users. Involve your journalists to share content online.

Social media can help to grow the news business by:

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• Increasing brand awareness: this means getting your name out there, according to Sprout Social. Focus on content that promotes your business’s values and your personality as a journalist. This will help to increase the reach to new users.

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• Building community engagement: You can appeal to users to contact your news group to tell you how a story is affecting them. This should give you material for follow-up stories. We will look in more detail at this in D3: Audience acquisition and retention.

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• Driving traffic to the site: How much of your social media traffic comes to your website? Your analytics should be able to give you this data. And don’t try to cover every platform. Target those that drive the highest numbers to your news organisation.

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Facebook Live case study: AlMasry AlYoum, Egypt

News organisations in Egypt aim to harness the popularity of Facebook Live debates and coverage because of the potential to generate revenue from advertising.

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AlMasry AlYoum, which has nearly 13 million followers on its Facebook Live page, has a dedicated team for FB Live, with a head coordinator planning live daily broadcasts.

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They use a live broadcast feature in Facebook so that their journalists can report on a variety of topics ranging from daily life activities to court cases, from wherever they are in the country.

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AlMasry AlYoum’s Facebook Live page

Image source: AlMasry AlYoum

Facebook Live case study: AlMasry AlYoum, Egypt

All they need to do, says Ehab Zelaky, executive editor in chief, is have a reporter be in the place of the event, and have access from Social Media admin to livestream to their FB page, and “the viewers come”.

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In some cases they broadcast some pre-recorded videos through the livestream feature.

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There is one word of caution: take care of the standard of your videos and content, as low quality work can have a negative effect to your brand.

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AlMasry AlYoum’s Facebook Live page

Image source: AlMasry AlYoum

Case study: Duma FM, Botswana

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Duma FM has seen its Facebook community grow from 60,000 in 2019 to over 670,000 in 2025

Duma FM connects emotionally with its users on social media

How to drive traffic post-publication

Once a story is published online, that is not the end of the process in terms of driving traffic to the content.

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Steps that editors can take to improve traffic post-publication include:

Monitor the story performance.

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Is it overperforming for the position it has on the homepage? Or is it not doing as well as expected?

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Promote stories.

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Check you have promoted the story�on all relevant social media platforms,�with an angle that connects emotionally and will entice users �to click through to�the site.

Change or test headlines.

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Is it entertaining, attention grabbing, and has an active verb that emotionally connects with the reader?

Insert SEO words�into the headline.

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The headline may be entertaining but does not include search engine optimized words, such as the full name of the place or person the story is about. Put them in.

Rotate content regularly.

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Change the story placement on the homepage to gain maximum exposure to all your content. How high up the homepage a story is can affect how many people see it.

Case study: Financial Times, UK

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Look how many times the Financial Times mentions Twitter and Elon Musk’s full name in headlines.

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This tactic is used to increase reach through search engine optimisation.

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The analytics team would provide data on whether Musk’s name is more searched on that Tesla, which would drive the decision in headline writing.

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Case study: Financial Times, UK

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This is an example of how the FT treated the same story differently for its social media and website.

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On the right, the story appeared with a more traditional photo and headline and standfirst, telling the story as it is.

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On the left, the Facebook post uses a more casual photo of the chief executive. The hook is chatty, witty and even references millennials - a target audience.

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Case study: Financial Times, UK

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This is an example of how the FT changed headlines post-publication its drive to attract women.

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By using the word “men” in the top headline, it was thought that few women would read the story.

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We changed the headline to the one below. It did pick up morea readers generally - and the same headline even went into print. While the word “women” attracted the target audience it also grabbed men’s attention too.

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Quiz Assignment

• Please complete the short online quiz to test what you have learnt.

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• You must score at least 80% in order to progress to the next module.

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Content Strategy

End of Lesson Two