One of my less-popular views on the mess that newspapers are in today is that The Journalists are as much a part of the problem as the Evil Corporate Masters.
Exhibit: The hand-wringing over a high school journalism class requiring students to sell ads.
Instead of being pilloried, this teacher ought to be sent on a tour to other schools to evangelize the program.
See, I've been really focused on the future of the local news business these last few years. And I've been to countless conferences, confabs and crying circles where a bunch of Journalists gathered to solve all the problems. What generally comes out is a lot of fist-shaking about the mistakes of the business folk and a lot of discussion of the type of news that could turn things around.
Occasionally, people like me, who have feet in both advertising and news show up. But we're in the minority. And not once have I seen an advertising salesperson or a circulation executive. I don't know that they were invited, but I doubt they were.
Even if they were, if The Journalists are going to save local news, they'd best figure out how to sell.
Now I'm not suggesting that journalists get an ad quota on top of their beat, or that they compromise their reporting to sell an advertiser. But, in a distributed media world where more and more are writer, editor and publisher -- sales is a key skill required for survival. And I'd far rather see a writer being transparent about who his sponsors are covering a niche topic than no one at all. (Poster child for that model: Rafat Ali at PaidContent, who may have a sales team now, but started without them.)
At the last journo-hippie save-the-world conference I attended, I almost asked who in the room had ever sold an ad before. I didn't, because I was already well on my way to winning the contrarian award. Besides, I knew the answer.
I'd suggest that ad sales be a required course in every journalism program. Perhaps then the people designing the news products of tomorrow will actually have a clue as to what works as a business.
Comments
David Goodspeed Verified
Welllllllll.... I like the idea of walking a mile in someone else's shoes just to see how easy/difficult their job may be, and I believe it would be a good education for journalism students to have a real world idea of how the "other side" operates but- at the moment you begin having journalists - true journalists - selling ads at the same time, those journalists will lose credibility. I don't know the exact history of things but I feel if wearing multiple hats across those editorial/sales lines were a good idea we would all be doing that now - that would have been in my job description since day one. Now then- fast forward to 2007 and beyond and this new world of media... the windmill Mike tilts at might be the solution, we just have no metric to measure its success, and it goes so against the established lines in the newsroom that many think it herecy. What do I think? I think we all should learn to speak chinese and learn to live underneath huge glass domes. Learn to march in a line, head down, wearing gray smocks, and keep muttering "praise the leader..."
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
Mike Orren Staff
Related, albeit not as on the edge: http://blog.news-record.com/staff/jrb...
And David, I'm not saying that journos should carry an ad territory in general. Ours certainly don't. But they've lived on the edge of bankruptcy and immersed in the startup, so I know they know what makes our business tick or not. Most newspaper reporters I talk to don't even know what their paper's ad rates are, much less the selling proposition.
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
April Powell Staff
I'm a little surprised over this whole brouhaha. I went to a small, public high school in one of the poorest states in the union. I took "Journalism" in high school and worked on the school paper. It wasn't that our GRADE depended on whether we could sell ads or not . . . whether we HAD A PAPER AT ALL depended on whether we could sell ads.
The school didn't have a budget or facilities for us to print a paper to distribute. We had to go out and sell to local merchants in order to fund our four-times-a-year printing. We thought it was cool that we got to go off campus during the class period to try to sell ads to the businesses in the area.
We just wanted to learn how to run a newspaper. Nobody ever suggested that our journalistic integrity was being compromised or that we were "buying a grade." Of course, we weren't doing hard-hitting exposes, either.
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
Scott Doyle Verified
While I believe journalism programs should have a requisite course regarding advertising and the media through which one could utilize it, forcing kids to sell ads for a grade seems excessive...especially for a high school program. College is an entirely different story.
the show with zefrank comes to mind immediately. If you can't appreciate the marketing potential of our intertrons based upon some guy who goofed off for a year while drawing such a ridiculous fan-base (20,000+ members on zefrank.org), you shouldn't be a journalist. He told me he was thinking so I don't have to, and I appreciated pretty much every day's show that I watched (some more than others, obviously, but still...THINKING SO I DON'T HAVE TO!). I particularly enjoyed his blunt analysis on various political issues since I generally don't read about stuff going on legislatively outside of Texas.
And I guarantee the largest demographics in his fan-base are ones most journalists would be ecstatic to call their own - college students & young professionls.
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
Michael Anderson Verified
Journalist fight!!!
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
David Goodspeed Verified
... and speaking of copyright violation...
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
ch0 Anonymous
Yeah, it comes off as a little.. weird at first glance, but Mike has a valid point.
There is very little I actually carried away from high school that aided me in professional advancement, or even life management. From what I understand, computer & finance curriculums are stronger now (which is great), so to actually have some sales & front-end skills education to complement the already ubiquitous emphasis on being a production-oriented "worker bee" would be of great benefit to the trade and its consituents.
Otherwise, you only have the tall and pretty girls and the tan guys with perfect hair and teeth making all the commissions! Arrh!
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
David Goodspeed Verified
...Otherwise, you only have the tall and pretty girls and the tan guys with perfect hair and teeth making all the commissions! Arrh!... You obviously have not been visited by one of our sales staff members...
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
Catte_Nappe Anonymous
Oooooh my. In a totally different "industry" I have one of those "foot in both camps" roles. It's a delicate dance.
What is pretty sure in your, my, and any other arena, is that those who produce the product subtly adjust their priorities and approaches to cater to those who raise the money. This is underscored by off-the-record comments from content providers in your field sharing 'off-the-record' that while ad buys aren't supposed to affect news content, they do. Basically, my 'news' stands a better chance of being covered if I also have a known relationship with the advertising team.
Also, being in a very different field I can't be sure, but my experience says that this statement is questionable:"And not once have I seen an advertising salesperson or a circulation executive. I don't know that they were invited, but I doubt they were." My guess would be they were invited, but didn't see any value in showing up.
10 months, 1 week ago ( Link to this comment | Suggest removal )
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