What I've Been Reading: The death of Crowdtangle, lessons from Illawarra and going niche on WhatsApp channels
Plus some quick learnings on running a crowdfunding campaign for expanding local coverage
Good afternoon,
Hope you’ve had a good Wednesday as we hurtle towards Easter. Feels like there’s lots of frantic work going on at the moment as the realisation the school holidays are fast approaching kicks in (certainly was when I looked at our family planner!)
A few different things below for digesting that have popped up across my reading list and also some very quick learnings on running a crowdfunder as Blog Preston reached its total in a quick-fire crowdfunder to boost our arts, events and what’s on coverage.
Into the digest we go…
What's the impact when Meta turned off news for a regional publication in Australia? - Gayle Tomlinson - I used to work with Gayle and she upped sticks and headed for Australia in 2016 and her insights on becoming editor of the Illawarra Mercury are always worth reading. She's right on the sharp-end of their journey through digital there and has posted about how their newsroom has 'ended the drug' of Facebook-focused publishing as all news content was blocked on the platform. She's re-surfaced that post, from 2021, and her reflections are really interesting and links with my other post below - about Crowdtangle - what is your distribution strategy beyond just Facebook? Gayle's tale is heartening but also speaks to how they had clearly worked hard to build a direct relationship with readers and ensure their brand has the local resonance needed that when they asked for subscriptions, people felt the value exchange was fair.
Meta sets a date for killing off Crowdtangle - Amber Burgess - alongside real-time analytics tools then I would rate Crowdtangle as being one of the most important tools for newsrooms in the last ten years. Why? It quickly aggregated a variety of sources - not just on Facebook but also Instagram - and sifted it for what was performing well. It was an extremely powerful tool for newsgathering, acting as a kind of news wire with analytics built in, but also surfacing interesting discussions and content from Facebook groups as well. The fragmented nature of newsgathering and content distribution continues at pace. This piece from Casey Newton on 'How Crowdtangle predicted the future' is also well worth a read as he dives into the background. As a 'replacement' then Meta is directing people to its Meta Content Library but this appears to only be for researchers linked to academic institutions as opposed to newsrooms. But, I wonder if we'll see a new tool enter which actually makes sifting across more than just Facebook for what's trending across multiple platforms (X, LinkedIn, Facebook, Insta, TikTok) as the new go-to place for publishers and newsrooms. And the positives, it means it isn't just a Meta-skewed trends influencing the potential news agenda. And it's worth remembering Google Trends remains freely available too.
TARGET NICHE: The Daily Mail multi-channel approach could be the way forward for public sector WhatsApp Channels - Dan Slee - a good deep-dive from Dan into how the Mail is making use of WhatsApp, and there’s valuable learnings for all. While a ‘brand level’ WhatsApp is good - I’ve written previously about my learnings so far with the Blog Preston one - then it feels like for following a specific topic and going all-in on that is where the WhatsApp channels seem to be taking off. I guess that makes sense, it’s a ping and then you have your own network that you then want to amplify and share it with who may also be into that topic. I might start one for Harry Potter based on how into it my seven-year-old daughter is getting!
And I’ve mentioned it before but we’ve been running a crowdfunder on Blog Preston - the hyperlocal site I run in the city - to help bolster our coverage of arts, events and what’s on in the city.
This week we hit the overall target, which unlocks the match funding from the Lancashire Culture and Sport Fund, and we’ve had some fantastic endorsements and conversations during the last four weeks the campaign has been running. Some learnings from running a crowdfunder:
We really focused on what we’d like to do - I know that might sound obvious but it wasn’t a ‘just help us to stand still’ it’s about what we’re planning to do to build upon
It tackled an issue, the city is without its main venue, where people consume their news and info is fragmenting, we positioned ourselves as being able to tackle that problem and be a step towards solving it (we won’t be the only solution I’m sure)
We had conversations. With individuals, with organisations, with groups. We’ve covered so many in the past few years, we got in touch to let them know what we were doing and whether they would help - and boy did they respond.
Pledges all count, from £2 to £200, the nice thing about the Spacehive system is it allowed organisations and individual readers to get involved in helping us. I thought the rule for the match funding was you needed 20 pledges to be considered - you had to demonstrate there was a need/audience for your idea.
Now from April we get going on delivering on our promise to try and bolster - and there’s loads of interesting events coming up that we can put the spotlight on. Most of all, thank you to everyone who backed it - was really heartening to see.
If you’ve ever run a crowdfunding campaign I’d be interested to know your thoughts too.
Hope your week is going well and this digest has proved useful and insightful, if there’s something you think I should feature then feel free to ping it across to ed@almaonline.co.uk
Keep going.
Ed