NewsTrain instructor Meg Downey helps journalists plan and coach news content across platforms: print, mobile, online, social. She discusses how to develop best practices for all platforms and to rethink the news-budgeting and -meeting process for the multimedia world. Downey, a two-time Pulitzer finalist, is the former managing editor of The Tennessean in Nashville. She gave this presentation as part of the NewsTrain workshop in Austin, Texas, on Aug. 22-23, 2014. Please see associated handouts. For more information about NewsTrain, a traveling workshop for journalists sponsored by Associated Press Media Editors, please visit http://www.apme.com/?AboutNewsTrain.

1. Planning & Coaching!
Content across Platforms
Or catching your breath while running as fast as you can
Meg Downey

2. Simona

3. Today’s goals
• How to develop best practices for
all platforms. !
!
• How to rethink the news process to
make it work in a multimedia world.

4. 60% …
!
… of U.S. online activity
now happens via mobile
devices. !
!
• Up 20% from last year!
• Mobile apps rule!
!
Credit: Comscore
Photo credit: Dru Bloomfield

6. 50% !
of news page
views via
mobile.!
Frédéric Filloux

7. Grist Haiku
A frog in water!
doesn’t feel it
boil in time. !
Dude, we are
that frog.
Purple Slog

8. Develop Best Practices

9. Set Standards, then follow up
• Determine best practices for all platforms.!
• Train and coach staff in core skills. Give them the right
tools.!
• Encourage experimentation.!
• Set metrics for engagement.!
• Highlight what works. Learn from what doesn’t.!
• Evaluate feedback, performance.!
• Communicate, communicate, communicate.

10. Quartz
• Understands its audience:
young entrepreneurs, career-focused,
global!
• Smart headlines: brief, clever, to
the point!
• Tightly written stories!
• Strong in-line links to other
coverage — past stories,
graphics, Q&As, slideshows,
other sites!
• Easy to share: story link at
bottom of story, plus social sites

11. FADE TO BLACK!
There are barely any drive-in
movie theaters left in the US
GREAT EXPECTATIONS!
MBAs are totally misguided
about how much they’re worth
!
This viral smartphone ad
about clueless dads stinks
worse than a dirty diaper

13. Harnessing mobile
• Crowdsourcing investigative work!
• Effectively promoting projects through the use of audio
and slideshows that tell a story!
• Texts and tweets that give headlines and summaries,
with links to deeper content!
• Mobile-friendly databases that allow users to learn how
an issue may affect them.!
• Video geared to a small screen: close-ups, word slides
Steve Buttry, Meg Downey

14. Tablets & Web
Increasing interactivity

15. Visual storytelling
• Slideshows: Easy to
do, keep people on
site. Should tell a
story.
• Audio slideshows:
the best kind of video,
natural sound, music
sets mood, let people
tell their story.
• Graphics:
explanatory,
interactive, must have
good navigation
Photo credit: Barry Butler, Your Take, USA Today

18. Video
• Grab attention with strong visual lead-in.!
• One thought per sentence. Write like you talk.!
• Place people on the scene; b-roll can help.!
• Use natural sound.!
• Keep it short — 30 seconds to 1:30.!
• Don’t repeat what is in a slideshow or print.
Poynter, Downey

19. Capture the moment
Edit later
Lucky break? !
Florida sports
reporter Dave
Dorsey saw news
break while he was
a spectator at a
minor league
baseball game.
youtu.be/b0lAaZqK4kM

20. Documentaries
Not worth the time invested unless…
!
vimeo.com/24238262

21. Snowfall
Immersion in an experience!
!
http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2012/snow-fall/#/?part=tunnel-creek

23. Integrating Content
Rochester Democrat & Chronicle
www.democratandchronicle.com/longform/news/2014/07/11/
boys-neglected-life-abandoned-death/12501141/

24. archive.tennessean.com/section/projects74/

25. Interactivity
• Databases, be sure they allow users to
search on their own .!
• Games, quizzes all keep people on site.!
• More depth: Links to previous coverage and
outside sources.!
• Online forums, public events.!
!

26. Expand ways to tell the story
Be creative on the visuals
global-warning.org/main/

27. Story forms
Narrative — compelling lede, nut graph of context
up high, think playwright, may be broken into
chapters!
Lists — useful information, may show where to get
more information or offer solutions!
Breakouts — quotes, numbers, glossaries, quizzes!
Blog items — personal, a voice of expertise!
Chunklets — informative tightly written graphs with
a strong lead-in phrase, good for budget stories,
complex subjects, a Q&A on a trending topic

28. Capture the reader
On April 19, 1995, terrorists bombed a federal
building in Oklahoma City that would kill 168 people,
including 19 children under age 6. More than 680
people were injured. Hundreds of buildings were
destroyed or damaged. Hundreds more had
shattered glass. It would be the most destructive act
on American soil until Sept. 11, 2001.!
!
When Timothy McVeigh was convicted two years
later, what should have been in that lede?

29. After the explosion, people learned to
write left-handed, to tie just one shoe.
They learned to endure the pieces of
metal and glass embedded in their
flesh, to smile with faces that made
them want to cry. They learned, in
homes where children had played, to
stand the quiet. They learned to sleep
with pills, to sleep alone.

30. Drop in with Social Media

32. Alpha & Omega of Social Media
• At the start: Use Facebook, Twitter or Google+ to
brainstorm coverage with people or obtain sources.!
• During: Use Twitter to cover. Use Storify to
aggregate images and comments on the issue. Use
Instagram to create flip images in real time of an
event.!
• Just before and after publication: Promote,
engage, follow up. Create a YouTube trailer. Set up
forums, tweet-ups.

36. Nailing it
• Make a formal commitment — Social Tuesdays at
USA Today!
• Learn from Metrics — Create a dashboard tailored
to each journalist. Show them on the big screen.!
• Communicate — Praise what works and share it
with everyone. Critique what doesn’t work to make it
better next time. !
• Hold accountable — Engagement performance
should be part of formal beat mapping and reviews.

37. Let’s try coaching
• Team leader pitches a story idea: 1-2 minutes!
• The coach asks questions and helps the team
leader develop a plan for a multimedia presentation:
5 minutes !
• Reverse roles, pitching (2 minutes) and coaching (5
minutes) !
• Then we’ll discuss how the coaching worked.

38. How to rethink the news process

39. Rethink the process
• How are you programming the day digitally on
mobile, tablet and the web?!
!
• How does your digital content flow into print?!
!
• Are you taking into account target audiences and
when and how they look for news and information?!
!
• Are you integrating your programming with your
social media promotions?

40. Rethink the process
• Are you creating different experiences, depending
on the time of day -- early morning, around
lunchtime, early evening?!
!
• How do you integrate newsletters into this
programming? A business newsletter may need
different timing from other newsletters.!
!
• How do your meetings and news budgets fit into this
flow?

43. Share ideas, gripes
• Pair up again with someone else you don’t know.!
• Debrief each other on how your news meetings and
budgets work or fail to work.!
• As you each talk, the other person will be your highly
paid consultant and suggest what could work better.!
• Consider: !
1. Meeting structure and format: Formal, informal, a
huddle? Who is there? What is covered?!
2. Meeting times: How many times a day? When?!
3. Planning for different platforms!
4. Budgets: What is on them and how are they
shared?!
• 7.5 minutes total. Then we’ll talk.

44. One Big Thing
What will you do Monday morning?

45. John Seigenthaler (1927-2014) on the First Amendment: “I only ask however
you can, whenever you can, please stand up for what Ben Franklin called a
precious gift, worth preserving and protecting.”