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Best Practices: Editorial and Commentary Online

Best Practices: Editorial and
Commentary Online

KDMC Opinion Seminars | Opinion in Cyberspace Blog

Engaging Your Readers

Blogs | Forums | Interactives | Analytics | Networks | Visuals & Audio | Scenarios | Ahead

The greatest hope for the immediate future is making your publication necessary - again

A theme present in nearly every conversation about the future of media is how broad the range of information sources has become. Yet the most basic element of economics, "demand," is often a forgotten part of the conversation.

A primary theme of Best Practices will be to establish how to become a necessary part of the community conversation - be that conversation local, regional, national or beyond. The categories below identify several important areas of opportunity for online editorial and commentary sites and provide regularly updated links to resources in those categories.

Blogs

By any definition, a blog is the closest online relative to the traditional editorial or commentary found in any print media. Its online presence makes the blog a much more effective means of communicating with an audience. The blog's immediacy, flexibility and ability to link to related content gives the blog writer an easily focused outlet for opinion, ideas and concrete reporting.

The blog also opens lines of discussion through its response feature, giving the user an ability to react to the writer in ways that challenge the traditional editorialist, but also allow a dialog that usually improves the flow of information in a community.

Resources:

Forums

Often maligned as unmanageable and full of legal jeopardy, the online discussion forum remains an excellent opportunity for a newspaper to generate dialog on important topics in their community.

To be successful there must be careful consideration of the forum ground rules, including moderation, duration of discussion and consequences of poor citizenship among participants.

Resources:

Interactives

An area where most newspaper editorial/commentary sections might achieve the greatest impact with their readers may be the inclusion or increased use of interactive elements. My providing the reader with a "Hands-on" experience, the news, ideas and information being presented gains greater value.

Resources:

Analytics

Understanding the reader, and what he or she is reading, can play a significant role in adapting the site to meet their needs. A balance of  traditional news judgment and marketing prowess will make you site competitive in an increasingly crowed information environment.

Resources:

Networks

Social networks and their importance in the communication world of your readers (both young and old) is a perfect opportunity for traditional media to move into the emerging role of conversation catalyst.

Network analysis also gives editors insight into who connects with whom and how these connections lead to decision making at almost every level. Understanding this complex social construct can provide the editor unique ways to reach a diverse, and diversely connected audience.

Resources:

Visuals & Audio

As staffing continues to be reduced in newsrooms, the need for editors to understand the range of communication methods beyond words. The ability to produce complementary images or audio to accompany editorials or opinion pieces adds value and depth to the online report.

Resources: Audio Resources

Scenarios

The ability to quickly produce likely outcomes for a variety of scenarios gives the editorial writer the opportunity to logically discuss options and/or lead discussion about matters of public interest.

Resources:

Ahead

As topics of discussion present themselves in the Best Practices: Editorial and Commentary Online blog (coming soon) and as new ideas surface in the popular and trade press, links to information about these concepts will be presented here.

Resources:

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Comments & Questions

What do you think of this article, or our entire Best Practices: Editorial and Commentary Online learning module? Please submit your comment or question below, and we'll publish and respond to it on the BPECO blog.

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Best Practices: Editorial and Commentary Online

BPECO Blog

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About the Author

Photo of Michael WilliamsMichael Williams is an associate professor of interactive media and the chair of the News-Information track of the William Allen White School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Kansas. 

He has been a tenured faculty member at the University of Maryland at College Park, the School of Visual Communication at Ohio University, where he was also the director of graduate studies and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has also been a visiting professor at Marquette University in Milwaukee and Ural State University in Yekaterinburg, Russia.

Williams began his professional journalism career as a staff photographer for the Salem (Ore.) Statesman-Journal where he was later promoted to Photo Director. He has also been the Graphics Director at the Albuquerque Tribune, Assistant Managing Editor at The Clarion-Ledger and Jackson Daily News in Mississippi, and Director of Internet Development for Kalmbach Publishing Company, in Milwaukee, Wisc. There he was founding editor of Trains.com, publisher of Astronomy.com and oversaw the development of web sites for other Kalmbach publications.

In addition to his teaching responsibilities, Williams has done extensive visual communication work throughout the U.S., Europe and Russia.

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