An online journalist's 10 resolutions for 2010

December 30, 2009 By Leave a Comment

We’ve talked often on this site over the past 12 months about what online journalists (and journalism entrepreneurs!) should be doing to both prepare themselves for the changes coming to our field, as well as to take advantage of the changes already here. Now, at year’s end, let’s remind ourselves of 10 things that we can do in 2010 to help keep journalism vital in our readers’ lives… and keep our careers in journalism alive at the same time.

1. Make your website more mobile-friendly

Everyone I’ve spoken with in the industry this year about this has reported the same thing: The percentage of readers accessing their websites on mobile devices is increasing. Significantly. I’m seeing high single-digit percentages on the sites I publish, up from the fraction-of-a-point share I saw last year.

You don’t have to build a smart phone app, or even a separate mobile version of your website, to serve the mobile audience. But if you don’t, you must, at the very least, offer clean code that performs gracefully on a mobile Web browser’s small screen. A basic three-column Web layout can perform well, especially when the content displays in a center column of between 250 and 500 pixels. I offered more tips on this topic last summer.

2. Don’t redirect mobile viewers requesting an article on your website to your mobile homepage

I couldn’t resist repeating this tip. Redirecting deep links requests to a mobile home page is my biggest annoyance with Web design in 2009. Give these readers either the mobile version of the page they requested, or the regular version of that page. But don’t break deep links to your website, for anyone.

Like the blink tag, framed navigations and scrolling tickers in the past, let’s ditch this lousy design idea in the new year.

3. Write better hypertext

The ability to write hyperlinks into copy distinguishes the best online journalists from print refugees. Hyperlinks enable writers to add depth and context to a narrative, without weighing it down with detail that some readers don’t need. It also offers huge search engine optimization advantages, not only to the writer’s website, but to the publisher of the valuable information to which you’re linking.

Hey, good writers and publishers have to look out for each other out there.

4. Don’t use Flash when an HTML page will do

Keeping with the hyperlink topic, information embedded with Flash presentations can’t be linked, as basic HTML pages can. My wife’s railed against publicists who commission fancy Flash sites, then encase all their press materials within them, making it impossible for her to link to individual profiles, album notes, photos, videos, etc. She’s right. Putting stuff inside a Flash presentation limits its usefulness within the Web community.

Flash can be a great tool. It’s the current best method for embedding video and animation, for example. But use Flash as an embeddable component within a page, rather than a method for constructing an entire page (or website). Whenever you do use Flash, always provide readers with a link that gives them code to embed that Flash element on their own blog or website. Give readers the tools they need to make your content viral.

5. Rethink vacation

In the 20th century, news organizations had large editorial staffs so individual reporters could take a week or two off while others on staff covered for them.

In the 21st century, news media is much more centered around individual reporters. Maybe a staff’s down to a single writer covering a particular beat. Or even if others remain to file for the paper, a writer individually maintains a blog and Twitter feed.

What happens to those when the writer goes on vacation? Too often, they go dark until the writer returns. No news organization can get away with that anymore, not in this hyper-competitive online news market.

Curt Cavin of the Indianapolis Star wrote a great piece for us last year about his blog, which draws tens of thousands of IndyCar fans to the Star’s website each week (including me). Curt also maintains a great Twitter feed, providing real-time updates during races, something that’s rarely available on bigger sports websites, such as ESPN.com.

Unfortunately for Cavin’s online fans, when he goes on vacation (as he is now), his blog and Twitter feed go dark. (It’s not Cavin’s fault – he tried in the past to update them on his own time, but Star management told him to stop, due to work rules.) It’s IndyCar’s off-season now, but the same thing happened in the middle of the season, when the Star was furloughing staffers.

Other IndyCar bloggers and forums aren’t going dark for two weeks around the holidays. Sure, traffic’s down this time of year, but why not invite one of the better independent IndyCar bloggers to “guest host” for Cavin during his vacation? It’d build huge goodwill within the larger Web community of IndyCar fans, and maybe bring some new eyeballs to the Star’s coverage, rather than driving it away for two weeks and breaking fans’ habit of checking the Star website.

I never go on vacation, even when I’m vacation. This summer, my family and I spent 33 days on a cross-country roadtrip, and I filed from the road for my websites (and for OJR) all along the way. Granted, I work for myself now, and am protecting my financial asset when I file for my website. But wage-earning employees compete with publishers like me now. If you go dark on vacation, you’re just losing market share to competitors.

Can you really afford that?

6. Take a reader (not a source) to lunch

Or to a concert, or to a theme park (actually, those are what we’ve done on my sites). Get in the habit of giving back to readers, and getting in contact with them offline.

Pick someone who’s submitted a particularly engaging comment, forum response or e-mail, then offer to buy ‘em lunch, or even coffee, in exchange or an offline, off-the-record chat. Sure some might turn out to be duds, but you’ll often get some great feedback, not to mention gratitude, loyalty, and valuable word-of-mouth promotion.

7. Cross the wall, before you’re out of the building

Don’t just reach outside of your organization. Reach out to people within the company as well. Chat up folks from the ad sales department. (Or, if you are outside already, try to make a connection, using networks such as LinkedIn. Just search for ad reps who used to work at the newspapers or stations you did.) Learn about the ad and business side of publishing. You’ll need that knowledge in the future, as journalism becomes more the domain of the entrepreneur.

If you’re thinking about a non-profit future, engage with folks on the development side of non-profits you cover, volunteer for or patronize. Reporting 101: Many people are happy to chat when you buy ‘em a meal.

8. Study up on new ways to make money from your work

Which brings me to this… keep your eyes open, always, to learn more about how to make money from producing news and information. When you are reading or watching a report, ask yourself: “How are they getting paid to do this?” Your curiosity – indeed, your reporting – on this question will prepare you to synthesize an answer for how you will get paid in the future, as well.

To get you started, here are three links from earlier this year where I lay out how a journalist can get going selling ads on his or her website: part one, part two and part three.

9. Know the difference between your audience and your customers

Knowing this will help you more effectively address the resolution above. Too many would-be publishers build large audiences, then fail to make any money from them because they never cultivated any customers who wanted to reach that audience.

Remember, an audience is who views your work. The customer is who writes you the check to produce it – an advertiser, a foundation, a interest group, a patron, etc. Try to identify the audience and the customer whenever you read or watch news reports this year. Then start connecting which customers seem to go with what audiences. You’ll find valuable insights from those observations.

10. Don’t be above running a photo of cute kids or animals every once in a while

Your predecessors in the news business did this all the time. Readers often need something to lighten their spirits, a reward for sticking with you and reading your work. Maybe it is literally a cute photo of a puppy in the local park. Or other fun photo, cartoon, wordplay or humor. Whatever you select, don’t ever forget that your readers, audience and customers alike, are people who need variety in their lives and sharp friend to provide it. Be that friend, and they’ll show you a friend’s loyalty in return.

Happy new year and best wishes for 2010.

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Developing an Effective User Experience

October 13, 2009 By 2 Comments

A few months ago, I wrote an article entitled “Making Media Social: News as User Experience”. I talked about the online trend, driven by social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, of users having the growing expectation of participation on the Web. Users want to be able to upload photos, comment on posts or videos and interact with graphics. They want to make connections with others who share the same interests. Some news organizations are experimenting in developing unique and meaningful user experiences that can satisfy these new user requirements, while others are just beginning to consider a foray into this area. While innovation is key, and there are no firm rules, I thought it might be helpful to discuss some considerations and questions that may help guide the process of developing user experiences that will be perceived as valuable by your users.

  • Know your audience. Gather data about online users, local issues and concerns, and pay attention to comments on articles or blogs. Is there an issue of local interest or of broader significance that has a specific local angle? Read other local online publications and pay attention to trends on social media sites. Engage your Twitter followers with questions about potential projects.
  • Play to your competencies/expertise. Focus on the types of projects in which your organization has excelled in the past. Do you have a reporting competency in local politics or crime? Are you in a geography in which entertainment or sports coverage (like Los Angeles or Las Vegas) has become part of your core operation. Do you have access to unique data sources or archived material, and do you have the resources to maintain and update that data, if necessary?
  • Leverage existing tools. Have other parts of your organization or external organizations developed a similar project? What can you learn, borrow or purchase from that organization? Can you leverage an external platform, like Twitter, and engage existing applications or develop new ones with their open-source application programming interface (API)? Or do you need to develop the platform in house?
  • Acquire or develop programming expertise. An organization must consider the skills necessary to accomplish an interactive project. Do those skills exist in-house? Can they be developed or will your organization need to hire or contract with new resources? Research in the types of technologies used to host will be necessary (for example, is there a platform like Pluck, used by USA Today that adds social media features to their publishing system, available for purchase?) Will employees need to be trained or hired in Web framework technologies like Django or Ruby on Rails in order to develop online interactives? What other perspectives will these employees need to understand in order to develop projects that are both compelling stories and technology tools?
  • Consider how will the user interact with the project. Navigation, design and usability will be key to the success of any online presentation. Will it be simple, like The New York Times WordTrain, that requires the user to input a limited number of items, or will it be more a immersive experience that might require more complex instructions, step-by-step guides or special media players? Are these requirements appropriate to your audience and topic? Use design techniques that will improve the use of the site, including meaningful layout, usage of white space, complementary and contrasting colors and branding, if appropriate. Finally, how will users with sense impairments have access to the materials? An appreciation of accessibility standards will be necessary in engaging as wide an audience as possible. Usability testing should be a standard part of any online project.
  • Be creative. Encourage creativity amongst your ranks. Have brainstorming sessions or allow employees to peruse the Web seeking ideas and inspiration. Look at competitors sites to see the types of projects they are developing, and broaden your definition of competitor to include relevant social media sites, blogs and other technology services. Consider projects that might not initially seem standard on a news Web site, like the Washington Post project “On Being”, a video project that provides a quirky, yet poignant take on the fascinating and diverse individuals in their market. Give employees the license to experiment but be ready to accept failure, as long as it is done quickly and cheaply. An experiment using Twitter to crowdsource a story that is unsuccessful may only cost the time of one or few employees, and the learning that comes from such an experience can easily offset the investment. But, a several thousand dollar expenditure in new equipment and resources that spans several months or years and ultimately fails is not acceptable or is rarely necessary, given the proliferation of free or relatively inexpensive tools and services available online.

    News organizations need to understand that an active user is a desirable user and can create significant value for the organization. Social networking trends not only create a sense of urgency for news media to adopt these features, but provides an indication of where competitive endeavors might be emerging. As the news industry struggles to remain relevant and profitable in an online society, it may find solutions and avoid pitfalls by looking at innovative social media companies and the activities of their users. At the heart is a user base that remains engaged and interested in participation. How news organizations interpret this phenomenon may be the salvation of the journalism.

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    Eight tips to keep your mobile website readers happy

    July 30, 2009 By 1 Comment

    The past few weeks have found me on the road quite a bit, as I visit theme parks around the country for my “day job” website. So I’ve been using my iPhone to keep in touch, via WiFi, AT&T’s 3G network or, when I’m really out in the sticks, the Edge network.

    Smart phones provide a great way for people to work productively during “down” moments throughout the day. And for road warriors to stay in touch, even when driving the nation’s Interstate highways. (Okay, when riding on the Interstate. I’m a stickler for not using the phone when in the driver’s seat.) Heck, earlier this week I set up and did two radio interviews while in the car.

    But as useful as smart phones can be, their effectiveness can be undermined by information providers whose sloppy or ill-advised design keeps phone readers from getting the information they want. Here’s what I wish Web publishers would do to make reading the Web by phone easier:

    Don’t redirect all requests from a mobile phone to your mobile version front page.

    Few things tick me off more than following a link to what I expect to be a great story, only to find myself instead on that site’s front page, with no direct link to the story I wanted to read.

    But that’s what happens when a website is configured to send all initial requests from a mobile device to the site’s mobile version homepage. Why on Earth do websites do this? Sending users something other than the content they requested breaks what ought to be the first law of usability – give people what they asked for.

    If you don’t want mobile users to use deep links to access your website, don’t send them deep links via popular mobile applications, such as Twitter.

    It’s one thing to get the nasty mobile redirect on a link sent to me from another reader. Hey, they don’t work for the site, how are they supposed to know that site doesn’t support mobile deep links?

    But it’s something else when I get the link from the people who run the site. Sending me a deep link via your Twitter feed, then redirecting me when I click on it, is simply bait and switch. Worse, it makes me feel like you’ve just flipped me off. Guess what? You do this to me, and I will “flip” you off in response – with an immediate “unfollow” for your feed.

    Mobile websites should include all the content available on your “normal” website.

    If you’ve created a mobile version of your website, great. But don’t force me through the front page and don’t leave me reading the “kiddie” version of the website, with only a limited number of stories and features and no way to access the rest of the content you have online.

    While I appreciate the ease of use on a mobile-specific website, I hate paying for that with an inability to get to the deep content I want on your site. Again, the point behind building an alternate version of your website ought to be to expand the audience, not to contract it by limiting what a growing percentage of your audience can read.

    On an ideal site, each story or item would have a unique URL, which would serve the appropriate version based on the device requesting it.

    Let’s face it, the real power online lies not with us (the content producers) but with the readers. They can do more to promote our work than we can do without them.

    So let’s make it easy for them to distribute the URLs of our best work. If you’ve got multiple versions of your website, set up your server to support those versions on the same URL. That way, mobile readers see the mobile version, even if a “traditional” reader sent them the URL, and vice versa. This also can help prevent search engine spider from indexing mobile pages you don’t want them to see. (Though you must take care to avoid doing anything that they might consider cloaking.)

    If you are not building different pages for different devices, cross-test so that they work on all major platforms.

    Devices like iPhones are plentiful. There’s no reason now not to look at your site redesign on one before launch. If you don’t like the way it functions, your readers won’t either.

    Keep column widths constant, and between 320-500 pixels wide for best mobile readability.
    The iPhone’s screen resolution is 320×480 pixels, but it will scale to fit the site on the screen. A double tap will expand the column tapped to full screen width. At up to about 500 pixels wide, the rescaling leaves the body type readable, on most sites. Go wider than that, and the type will be too small for most readers, forcing them to expand the page and scroll sideways.

    Which, most won’t bother doing on a regular basis. They’ll simply switch to a more mobile-friendly website instead.

    Kill mouseover effects and Flash on your website, unless you are redirecting mobile users to a different version of that page.

    Many, but not all smart phone, support inline Flash in their browsers, but mouseover effects remain a killer to effective mobile website navigation. Either use straight anchor tags for site navigation, or else redirect mobile readers to a mobile version of the page they requested, which using anchor tagging for navigation.

    Otherwise, you’re just making it more difficult for many mobile readers to make their way around your site. Which means, they won’t.

    Deliver your content via applications your mobile users already have before asking them to download another app.

    I’ve offered these suggestions under the assumption that readers are accessing your content via a mobile Web browser instead of via a dedicated mobile application, such as those USA Today, the AP and the New York Times offer on iPhone.

    Those apps can be very popular, but if you’re not one of those big names in the industry, you are better off meeting potential readers where they are, rather than asking them to come to you (or, your app).

    Start by building a great, mobile-friendly website, then promote it with mobile-friendly links on services like Twitter and e-mail. Once you’ve built a loyal audience of mobile users, then consider investing the time and programming power to build an application just for them. But if you can’t yet use existing mobile applications to serve your smart phone readers, you don’t have any business trying yet to build your own.

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