Factual Story Telling - Text

Lecture Week 3 - 12/3/12

Power of the Word

The written word is more important than one might realise when it comes to text in media. Especially when it comes to online text.

We all know what text is: fast, flexible, searchable and retrievable.
And by now we all are very familiar with the format of the 'inverted pyramid' 

A perfect example of the 'inverted pyramid' for news stories
http://www.writerspulse.org/2008/09/tackling-inverted-pyramid.html 

The importance of addressing who, what, where, when, why and how could be the difference between a successful story, and one that is a flop. In traditional newspaper, the Poynter eyetrack shows that headlines will most often draw the eye first, especially when is upper left, which further emphasises the importance of understanding the inverted pyramid. If your story is not applicable to the headline in the first sentence, you will lose you audience.

While researching other trends discovered through other studies conducted by Poynter, I found an article by Rick Edmonds, "6 trends for newspapers in 2012, from a Sunday boom to an executive bust".

The article outlines 2 major trends facing Newspapers today: 

1. " Through the first three quarters of 2011, print advertising losses outweighed digital ad gains by a ratio of 8 to 1. Then digital growth slowed in the last quarter of 2011, making the gap for the full year even worse, 10 to 1. Talk about trading print dollars for digital dimes."
2. "In an October earnings report, Google broke out for the first time, how much of its revenue came from mobile advertising: $2.5 billion worldwide in 2011. That caused e-Marketer to raise its previous estimate of the total U.S. mobile ad market by a factor of 50 percent. Analysts expect Google’s mobile revenue to rise to $4 to $6 billion this year."

Basically, newspapers are struggling more than ever, while Google is using the shift to online media skillfully and effectively to reap the benefits.

The power of the internet has already forced traditional newspapers to change their ways, investing in platforms for mobile phones, tablets, and searching for unaccustomed ways in which to regain lost profits. But it's not all necessarily a bad thing.

As outlined in our lecture, online media is incredibly progressive. Hypertext allows for the construction of non-linear narratives, the ability to explore different components of the same story and even follow your mind's stream of consciousness and discover other stories.

Having worked for an online marketing agency briefly in 2011, I can't help but think of SEO  (search engine optimisation) when it comes to the power of online text. Key words are important, as it all counts to your ranking on Google, and we all know the power that Google currently has (especially with revenue like last year!). 

Searching for revenue of Google the past year, I found this lovely image, followed by a wonderful  article outlining Google's 2010 revenue, found here.

For more information on SEO strategies, or digital marketing Advia, a Brisbane based online marketing agency has a great blog you can follow here.

- Emmerleener