Journalists are constantly inundated with information on potential stories. So how do they decide which story to report on? PR Daily has provided the answer by revealing the top five factors that drive news decisions in newsrooms all over the world. They are time, speed, space, profit and bias.
Time:
Journalists have never before faced such short deadlines. Many newsrooms are understaffed and journalists feel pressured to produce constant news stories for a variety of news outlets. Therefore if a reporter is required to conduct an extensive amount of research to cover your story, they probably won’t cover it.
Speed:
Traditional media now has to compete with the faster-moving new media by rushing deadlines, abandoning rigorous fact checking and releasing their stories quicker than ever. If your story is long or complicated then it’s more likely that journalists will get some aspect of it wrong.
Space:
Journalists are frequently required to cut down your stories to a very strict word limit or minutes of air time. This means that your long or complicated stories will be incomplete or lacking in detail.
Profit:
Most news outlets are designed to generate a profit. They achieve this by covering stories that will attract the widest-possible audience such as sensationalistic or conflicting events. Media outlets are then able to raise their advertising rates and increase their revenue.
Bias:
Media outlet’s today can be biased towards cheap, easy, and visually intriguing stories. For example stories that are closer to the news outlet’s headquarters or have more compelling visuals are more likely to be covered.
With these top five factors in mind, you can now increase your chances of pitching a successful story to a journalist.
Read the full article here.
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