ONA15 take-aways and patterns

ONA15 take-aways and patterns


Here is a re-posting from my ONA15-specific blog of some of the common lessons and threads from that conference:crappy stuff

Thoughts:

  • “Have a style guide (for text, titles and graphics) and share it widely”
  • “Building that interest in the local elections. That’s a hurdle that needs to be overcome”
  • “Journalism needs the audience to survive but journalism ignores the audience”
  • Best live streams are those that have content that can’t be found anywhere else, but also have trustworthy professional quality.
  • “In order to do something new, you have to stop doing something else”
  • “(Online harassment against women) is a labor issue, it is about how editors are going to protect their people”
  • “Don’t get locked into an idea. If it doesn’t work in the first few tests, cut it”

 

Tools:

Frequent topics:

  • Analytics
    • A/B headline testing now offered by at least 3 competing tools, mostly as add-ons
    • National publishers say readers expect charts, and are becoming more statistic-literate
    • Several sessions focused on using analytics to inform which stories you do and where to put them on the site
  • Live streaming
    • Producers seemed to look down on TV they are finding it is best to follow some of our standards and “produce it up”
    • Many providers are in the game, but Facebook is making the most concerted effort to target us and get us to use their option. However, the favorite for “producing it up” seems to be Livestream.
  • Writing headlines and alerts for shorter and shorter screens