It’s a reality: not many news outlets see teenagers as their target audience.
In fact, they don’t even think teenagers will get near their products. When we in the newsroom discuss “attracting the young”, we usually are happy to see 25 to 35 year olds coming to sample what we have to offer in the way of news and information.
Not so fast, however. Teens apparently are interested in news and current events. However, according to research:
Young adults are more likely to consume news through social media sites than they are traditional news organizations, online or in print, but that isn’t necessarily a negative when it comes to news. Teens who use social media are more likely to be civically engaged, and smartphone users who engage with social media report they’re more regularly exposed to people who have different backgrounds, and feel like they have more diverse networks.
Apparently teens have realized that they are not front and center as a potential target audience for many news pubilshers, so a young person has taken things into her own hands, creating theCramm.
Already in 6 continents and 47 countries, theCramm has these two mottos: We Cramm the news so you don’t have to and Giving you the cheatsheet to the world.
So, how do they do the “cheatsheet” part of the promise? Ironically, it is not too different from what we see in so many newsletters these days: snippets, listings, good use of subheads to guide the reader. Let’s take at this example of a lead story on the site: about the Amazon fires.
Follow their treatment of the Amazon story here:
http://www.thecramm.com/news.html
As we can see, what theCramm does is to break down big stories into witty, snackable facts that can be consumed quickly. Remember, theCramm can come to users via text—which makes sense, considering how much teens are engaged with texting.
I have subscribed to theCramm, as I think I can learn about the choice of stories and the treatment that are displayed in the site, and get some insight information as to what appeals to one of the toughest and most elusive of audiences.
Here are key findings from research devoted to teenagers and how they consume news:
50% of U.S. Teens Are Getting Their News From YouTube, But Not From News Organizations
Common Sense and SurveyMonkey found that celebrities, influencers and personalities were their sources more often
I was a guest in the program Encuentro, hosted by Guillermo Arduino daily at CNN en Español. The interview was about how we read on mobile devices and my introduction of my new mobile storytelling book, The Story, to a Spanish-language audience.
Keynote Luncheon Speech: Ad Club of Toronto, Newspaper Day
October 25, 2019
Keynote presentation: Business Information & Media Summit (BIMS).
November 12, 2019
You can order the print edition of my new mobile storytelling book, The Story, from Amazon already here:
The newspaper remains the most powerful source of storytelling on the planet. But technology threatens its very existence. To survive, the Editor must transform, adapt, and manage the newsroom in a new way. Find out how, pre-orderThe Story by Mario Garcia, chief strategist for the redesign of over 700 newspapers around the world.
Order here:
https://thaneandprose.com/shop-the-bookstore?olsPage=products%2Fthe-story
I am happy to announce that we will, indeed, have a print edition of my mobile storytelling book, The Story. I thank you for expressing your interest to our publisher, Thane Boulton, of Thane & Prose. Now the print edition will be a reality, and you can already see the cover and back cover here:
http://www.itertranslations.com/blog/2019/3/11/fd60ybflpvlqrgrpdp5ida5rq0c3sp
TheMarioBlog post # 3106