Here’s an idea to steal and adapt: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel created — and continually updates — a list of newsroom activities that don’t contribute to its audience-centric strategy in an effort to find time and resources to devote to more meaningful tasks.
“We’re doing four times more in-depth investigative and explanatory reporting now than we did when our newsroom was three times larger than it is today. And I barely heard a peep from readers about most of the stuff we stopped doing.”
Making live events a potential revenue stream is a long-term strategy that requires careful and strategic planning and that should connect into the strengths of a news organization and the resonance it has in the lives of its audiences.
The phrase “Table Stakes” comes from poker – the amount required to have seat at the table. The Table Stakes manual is for newsrooms, identifying what’s required to play and win the game of news in the 21st century. Developed with major metropolitan daily news organizations, it is meant to accelerate journalism’s shift to digital from print, help newsrooms evolve their practices, reach new audiences and better engage their communities.
Email newsletters can serve more than one purpose. The first step is deciding which you want to pursue.