It’s time to challenge some advertisers’ and agencies’ under-investment in the hottest property in media, write The News Alliance’s Sarah Jones and Rupert Smith for Campaign. The pair also ask agency and advertiser employees to take a short survey on their views of news as an advertising environment
With the news cycle as busy as ever to keep readers informed and the powerful scrutinised, the Alliance’s chair and vice-chair invite us to imagine what a world without journalism would look like.
“Instead [of journalism,] dubious and sometimes harmful content masquerading as news is served up to you by an algorithm”, they write. “Without context and with no editorial filter.”
While pointing to a glimpse of this world offered by social media, they remind us of several studies showing 69% of UK adults consume trusted online news on average every day, nine in 10 young people read from news organisations online every month and that 96% of the UK adult population engage with news “in some form”.
The News Alliance also conducted its own consumer research into audience engagement around news, with the full results to be released during Journalism Matters Week next month.
A preview to the findings shows established news sources are seen as the most trusted versus social media, which is not trusted at all, while a majority of respondents across all age groups check up to two to three trusted news sources a day. It also shows news consumers have no problem with advertising appearing alongside hard or soft news stories.
Despite this, advertisers and agencies continue to shy away. The pair write: “Advertisers are missing out on the massive benefits of being around news, and journalism is missing out on much needed advertising investment.”
“This week… [The News Alliance] is sending short surveys to marketers and agency leaders (see separate links) to understand what’s driving advertiser behaviour across different media channels and what might change it.”
See Sarah Jones and Rupert Smith’s column on Campaign’s website.
