This week’s action: Find the gaps between your coverage and your community’s information needs.
Try this
Start here
Review the list of six core needs from the Local News Network Study and consider how they align with your community’s needs. Take what you’ve learned from community feedback or listening sessions into consideration, as well as the role you play in your community’s information ecosystem.
Take action
Using your core needs list, review 10 recent pieces of content your organization published and make note of the following:
- Which core needs are met?
- If the content doesn’t meet a core need, is it because of the topic or the angle?
- Are there any core needs on your list that none of the articles meets?
Reflect
What did you learn about the information needs your newsroom is consistently covering and the ones you may be overlooking? Choose one upcoming story and identify how it could better address an underserved community need. What needs to be done differently in the reporting, framing or distribution?
Dig deeper
- How CalMatters measures what “jobs” its journalism accomplishes
- Planet Detroit tracks civic impact through its explainer boxes
Gratitude goes to Tom Rosenstiel for contributing to this series. Rosenstiel is the former executive director of the American Press Institute and currently serves as Professor of the Practice at the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism. He is the author of several books, including The Next Journalism: How the Press Must Change to Serve Democracy. Rosenstiel has no current affiliation with API.
