What’s our purpose? Why do we exist?
Those might seem like obvious questions on the surface, but in this hypercompetitive digital age, it’s easy to forget the role of local news organizations as we try to keep up with the latest trending stories.
Simply put, it’s to cover local news.
That sounds obvious until you look at many of the things that trend on social media: National political fights. Viral stories from other places. Pet pictures. National Ice Cream Sandwich Day.
As newsrooms try to keep up with what’s trending, it can be easy to forget why we’re here.
The audience is coming to us because we’re local. They expect local news organizations to provide local coverage that they can’t get from other sources.
I touched on the different levels of local news in an earlier post. As newsrooms, we must remember to give journalists time to work on enterprise and beat reporting so that we’re not just chasing press releases and the competition.
The ice cream sandwich can be part of our social media mix. But if that’s all we have to offer, we’re in trouble.