Photographers advised to present
only ‘the good stuff,’ ‘tell the story’

By Leila Habib
Bulletin Correspondent

“Who are y’all?”

Within moments of entering the room, those attending Robert Holt III’s workshop titled “You’re only as good as your last photo” were prompted to move to the front of the room and share who they were.

“Bad news is, folks, I left my hearing aids at home, so you can say all sorts of nasty stuff,” Holt, the former director of photography at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, said during the workshop at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention.

Holt began by sharing anecdotes from the beginning of his career. From his career beginning as a photo lab technician because “all the photographers were too good to do copy work,” to playing cards with President Jimmy Carter, leading to a position covering Carter in the White House, Holt’s stories all emphasized the need to seize opportunities as they come.

“I covered Carter because I played cards with him,” Holt said. “I got to know the man just by coincidence and that made me a better photographer in Washington than a lot of other people.”

Holt then displayed and commented on photos from NENPA’s New England Better Newspaper Competition. He was a judge for the photo contest.

One of the photographers who earned Holt’s praise was Peter Pereira of The Standard-Times of New Bedford, Mass.

“I bet he knows every photograph that could be shot around the area The Standard-Times covers. He hasn’t shot it yet but he knows every angle that exists,” Holt said. “He’s always watching for the right angle. So if someone needs a picture and something’s happening in the area, he’ll go and put himself in the right position to shoot that picture.”

As Holt scrolled through the photographs, some of his comments during the workshop were limited to “nice, cute, very nice,” but a few photographs sparked anecdotes and pieces of advice.

‘Give them the good stuff’

Throughout the workshop, Holt discussed the necessity for a photojournalist to edit his or her work first before anyone else sees it.

“If it’s not sharp, well-exposed, and well-composed, it’s trash,” Holt said. “Don’t turn it in … You’re the image mechanic; (the editor is) the word mechanic. Give them the best image you got, and they might just use it.”

Space is valuable in print publications, leaving writers and photographers fighting for space for their work to be included and further necessitating the submission of only photos that would be worth that space.

“If your photograph isn’t worth 460 words, it shouldn’t be published,” Holt said, referring to the typical amount of words replaced by a standard photo in a print publication.

The necessity to publish only “the good stuff” extends to online work, where the unlimited available space can be attractive.

“If you come home and choose one or two photos, put it in the paper, and put everything else you shot on the Web, you’re an idiot,” Holt said. “When people go online to look at your pictures, they have to edit your junk. Give them the good stuff. Don’t give them a lot of pictures just because you were there. Don’t waste their time.”

‘Tell the story’

A photograph of a truck hanging off a bridge provoked Holt to tell an anecdote about a mistake he made as an editor. Holt had two photos to choose from: a headshot of the entire scene and a close-up of the rescue, which Holt referred to as “art.”

“I was so excited about the art that I put the art on the front page, and on the jump I put the literal picture,” he said. “I forgot my job. I got wrapped up in being an artist, and I forgot to cover the news to tell the people what happened.”

In times of tragedy, it can be hard for a photographer to tell the story without feelings of exploiting the subjects, Holt said.

“Was I taking advantage of the people looking back at me saying in their minds ‘ … Why is he here when I’m in my worst situation, sticking a camera in my face?’” Hold asked.

After photographing Charles Manson while he was in prison, Holt realized the necessity of photographing the good, the bad, and everything in between.

“When I photograph things, as ugly as they might be, at least I was helping inform people in the real world what was real and what was not,” Holt said.

Holt also discussed the danger of getting emotionally attached to a subject.

“Don’t feel sorry for them. Do your job. The minute you feel sorry for somebody, you forget what your job is. Shoot on the street, cry in the dark,” he said.

Holt also gave technical advice to help photojournalists tell their stories more effectively, from not underestimating an iPhone camera to making sure that the image is square.

“Remember, your job is to tell the story. Tell the story,” Holt said.

Podcasts can – and should –
enhance newspaper content  

By Rebekah Patton
Bulletin Correspondent

In the push to expand storytelling beyond print, podcasting has become increasingly more popular, and small newspaper businesses struggle with allocating time and money toward it.

Christopher Goffard, a staff writer and podcast host at The Los Angeles Times; Sean Corcoran, news director and senior reporter at WCAI-FM of Woods Hole, Mass.; and Alex Braunstein, community manager of Podcast Garage of Allston, Mass., sat on a panel about introducing podcasting at newspaper companies. Al Getler, division sales manager at Advantage Newspaper Consultants in Burlington, Vt., and a former publisher, moderated the session.

More than 40 guests attended the session, titled “Podcasting 101: How to add it to your news strategy,” at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention.

Getler initiated the discussion by answering the question: How can small newspaper companies afford to direct limited resources toward podcasting?

“Sometimes the bush has to be pruned for it to grow new branches,” Getler said.

He suggested a book, “Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give up in Order to Move Forward” by Henry Cloud, that discusses the art of reducing some facets of businesses to grow others that are more promising.

Getler spoke directly to the editors in the audience: “If you think you don’t have time to get something like podcasting done in your newsroom, then stop doing something else that no one cares about.

“Put your resources towards something that people do care about,” he said.

Corcoran said he had been a newspaperman for years. He moved into audio after he used a cassette recorder to interview a victim after The Station nightclub fire in Warwick, R.I., in 2003 that killed 100 people and injured 230.

Corcoran said he was fine during the interview, but that when he returned to his office to transcribe the recording, he was overcome with emotion.

“The one thing I’ve always been really good at is writing, and I sat there and thought, ‘I cannot convey this to my audience the way it should be understood’,” he said.

After that, he ventured into the public radio business, and eventually arrived at his current job with WCAI.

‘We still need journalism; it should not be neglected. Podcasting should be supplementing the reporting, not supplanting it.’
— Christopher Goffard,
Staff writer, podcast host,
Los Angeles Times

Getler then steered the discussion into a question-and-answer format.

One reporter asked the panel how she could pitch her podcast idea to her editors to make it appealing, because she knew it would take a lot of time and resources.

Goffard answered: “Frame the story so that the editor understands why you need audio.”

He said the reporter should present an audio sample to her editors, and ask them how she could present it in any other medium with the same impact.

“There’s certain things that just don’t come through the same in writing,” Goffard said. “I’ve been trying for 20 years to write a description of people crying that is 1/1000th as powerful as watching somebody cry in front of you. With audio, you can do that.”

Another questioner asked: How do you obtain revenue from a podcast?

Braunstein recommended partnerships. She said Podcast Garage has sponsorships that generate revenue for a lot of podcasts, because sponsors are specifically interested in podcast audiences.

She said live shows are becoming a big source of revenue, from ads and sponsorships.

Someone else asked how a reporter should transition from writing for the page to writing for the ear.

Goffard noted that while he is a fan of long, pretty sentences, with dashes and clauses, he had to curb that style of writing for podcasting.

“The mind tends to wander when listening,” he said. “There’s only so much the ear can process.”

Corcoran suggested thinking about the rhythm of sentences. Reading out loud can help decide between a good or bad sentence for audio, he said.

“’Name, age, of town, state,’ might read well, but read aloud, it doesn’t sound well,” he said.

Goffard said he is not an advocate of supplanting nuts and bolts journalism with podcasting.

“We still need journalism; it should not be neglected,” he said. “Podcasting should be supplementing the reporting, not supplanting it.”

The session took place Saturday, Feb. 24, in the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel in South Boston.

At NESNE awards, speaker
lauds watchdog role of press

By Alastair Pike
Bulletin Correspondent

Scott Allen, assistant managing editor for projects at The Boston Globe, said Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the Pulitzer Prize winners known for their Watergate reporting, spawned a whole generation of journalists just like him who “wanted to meet their own Deep Throat in a parking garage and expose secret truths to the world.”

Investigative reporting is one of the most expensive, but also one of the most important, and certainly one of the most celebrated parts of journalism, Allen said.

Allen spoke at the New England Society of News Editors awards ceremony, held at the Globe in downtown Boston April 19.

“It’s great to be here on the front lines of defending the First Amendment,” Allen said. “Journalism has had some tough years, and it is more important than ever to celebrate our successes and keep our heads up and trying things until something works.”

Allen said the reason investigative reporting is crucial, especially in New England, is that people can’t count on political parties or interest groups to hold each other accountable.

“They’re too tribal,” Allen said. “They’re too invested in the status quo.

“In states like Massachusetts, where Democrats heavily dominate, the opposition party is just too weak to act as a check on the other. If we the press don’t do the work to hold the powerful accountable, it’s not going to get done, period,” he said.

Allen named a few outlets doing great investigative work, including the Sun Journal of Lewiston, Maine — whose executive editor, Judith Meyer, won a leadership award at the ceremony, in part for keeping a check on Maine’s government and striving to uphold the public’s right to know. He also named the Vermont Digger of Montpelier, New York City-based ProPublica, and Boston-based WBUR-FM.

Allen then discussed work at the Globe, where he oversees the Spotlight Team and other investigative and long-form reports. He said the Oscar-winning movie “Spotlight” about the Globe’s Pulitzer-winning investigation in 2001-2002 of sexual abuse of children by clergy in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston was brilliant, realistic and had a positive impact.

“The movie really caught the spirit of what investigative reporters do, including things that are tedious, like going through dusty old church logs to find the names of abusive priests, and things that are inspiring, like listening to victims patiently as they tell their story,” Allen said. “And it reminded us that on our best days, journalists really are a force for good in the world … The path to justice really does begin with a simple spreadsheet.”

More recently, the Globe’s Spotlight Team has tripled in members from three to nine, with one reporter’s primary job collecting data.

The team did a seven-part series on racism in Boston published in December. Last week, the series, titled “Boston. Racism. Image. Reality,” was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for local reporting.

“It really represents a new kind of investigation. We applied analytical tools to get beyond people’s conflicting opinions,” Allen said. “We just wanted to get down to: What are the real facts; can we make a contribution that’s not just a feeling or opinion. And the answer is yes.”

With statistics, the Globe found that in Boston, the average net worth of African-Americans and whites are $8 and $247,500 respectively. The team also researched census tracts for college degrees and median household income and found that there were four middle- to upper-class black enclaves in Boston; there were 150 in New York City and 110 in Atlanta.

“We also looked most depressingly at the Seaport, which is like the hottest new neighborhood in Boston. It was built from nothing, it was just car lots and dive bars like 20 years ago, and now it’s the hottest neighborhood in Boston in terms of real estate value,” Allen said. “When we looked at who’s there, it has now become like the whitest neighborhood in the city. In 660 mortgages, we found three that have been signed by African-American families.”

Allen explained, through the series, the value of thorough analysis and investigative reporting that prompts engagement and discussion.

“By using this straight numerical analysis, using spreadsheets, databases, lots of numbers, we were actually able to make a very meaningful contribution,” Allen said.

“We do have a lot to be proud of, not just in investigative reporting, but in our very perseverance as journalists,” Allen said. “And celebrating the best of New England journalism, as you guys are doing this evening, is a terrific way to show our pride in what we do every day.”

Podcasting can leverage
traditional print storytelling

By Jess DeWitt
Bulletin Staff

Christopher Goffard has spent the better part of his 22-year career as a print reporter and staff writer, primarily for The Los Angeles Times. In 2018, he has found himself giving talks on how to create a successful podcast.

Goffard was the opening session speaker for the New England Newspaper and Press Association’s recent winter convention.

In 2017, Goffard began his podcast, “Dirty John,” as part of a five-part print piece on a domestic abuser. “Dirty John” became popular, and by the end of the year was one of the most downloaded podcasts of 2017.

Goffard spent most of his talk at the convention giving advice to the audience on how to create a good podcast. He outlined 10 things he learned from his first podcast.

Some of what he learned was basic, such as the equipment needed for podcasting. For example, he recommended the Rode NTG2 Shotgun Condenser Microphone for podcasters. He also advised learning not to say “uh-huh” during interviews.

But some of the advice connected more to skills he developed from working as a journalist, such as filing public records requests, speaking respectfully to a grieving family, and getting complete strangers to trust you.

“What’s different about ‘Dirty John’ is it’s a reported podcast,” Goffard said. “It’s built on reporting skills, fact-checking skills, interviewing and digging skills that took me 22 years to acquire, and that I know many of you are already experts at. Do not underestimate this advantage.”

Goffard said a podcast can reach a lot more people than print stories will, and that listeners might be drawn too to the newspaper, and see the other work the paper does, and might eventually become subscribers. That was his mindset when deciding to release “Dirty John” simultaneously with a written series on the same topic.

“The idea was the … podcast would drive more people to the website, and maybe introduce them to some of the other journalism we do,” Goffard said. “And if lucky, (they) would subscribe and start getting their news from more reliable sources than Facebook, or Reddit, or the Kremlin. And that would promote positive news literacy, which is something this country, of course, is in dire need of.”

Goffard also told the audience not to forget the main elements of telling a good story, despite having new ways to do so.

“Find a good story, report the hell out of it, and the audience will come,” Goddard said.

“(‘Dirty John’) is a fully reported story. It involves about a year of reporting, and it’s constructed as a story in the classic sense that it has a beginning, middle, and an end. It has characters facing choices and conflicts and danger. And because it takes you into the lives of sympathetic human beings who are grappling with a crisis that a lot of people can identify with.”

Before giving the audience time to ask questions, Goffard ended with a final piece of advice for aspiring podcasters to consider.

“You are not going to be murdered if you fail.”

Goffard gave his speech Saturday, Feb. 24.

Uncomfortable ideas sought at session designed to develop new products for newspapers

Rebekah Patton
Bulletin Correspondent

Continuing a theme from his earlier keynote speech, Jason Feifer, editor in chief of Entrepreneur magazine, encouraged his audience at another session at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention to get uncomfortable in their ways of thinking and storytelling.

The session featured an interactive, team-building component, during which three groups of 10 to 15 people collaborated to pitch an idea to Mark French and George Arwady of The Republican of Springfield, Mass.

French, the Republican’s advertising director, and Arwady, its publisher and chief executive officer, stressed the need for members of the audience to pitch innovative and practical ideas, because the two of them would seriously consider using the new ideas at the Republican.

“We are in an industry where traditional revenue is in decline, so how will we more than replace that?” Arwady asked.

Arwady said a lot of the Republican’s own entrepreneurial ideas have focused on brand extension. Newspapers are the most powerful brand in the market, and there is an amazing ability to extend the brand in multiple directions, he said.

French discussed previously uncomfortable ideas that are now used at the Republican.

“We are absurdly entrepreneurial,” Arwady joked.

One of French’s examples: The potential for revenue growth from obituaries by maximizing the experience for readers and for funeral directors, because obits are the most-read feature of the paper.

To take advantage of that potential, French introduced what he called the funeral director spotlight.

The spotlight provides a funeral director with a plaque memorializing the Republican obituary placed by the funeral director.

Families of the deceased complain about the cost of obituaries, and often these complaints fall first on the funeral director, French said. The obituary plaque can help mitigate the pain of losing a loved one and provide tangible memorabilia from the obituary. That satisfies the families and the funeral directors, French said.

“For every single obit we (publish), we have a wooden plaque made with the obituary and photo mounted on it,” French said. The plaques are then delivered to the families of the deceased, he said.

French said Republican staff members showed the plaques in visits to funeral home directors. They told the directors: Next time a family complains or has concerns about the cost of an obituary — the average cost is $350 for a relatively small obit, French said — show the family the plaque as a way to enhance the value of the cost of the obituary and to help the family cope with the loss of a loved one.

He said the Republican has received more thank-you notes about the plaques than imaginable. The funeral directors get accolades too because sometimes they get the credit for the plaques, French said.

Since instituting the funeral director spotlight and other changes, there has been a six-figure increase in revenue from obituaries, Arwady said.

Arwady and French encouraged members of the audience to brainstorm about innovative ways to increase their newspapers’ revenue,

The three groups created to pitch ideas considered ideas for about 40 minutes before Feifer asked each to pitch their thoughts to Arwady and French.

The first group offered an idea of uniting the community of Springfield, and all of the different cultures that embody it.

“You have always been the center of Springfield; be the community center of Springfield,” said Jennifer Zarate, a multimedia journalist with The Wellesley (Mass.) Townsman.

That group suggested that the Republican could host language classes, offer child care, or bring the community together online. The revenue would come from paid sponsorships by sports leagues, business developers and others.

“It’s a way to make the newspaper a thought leader and something the community wants to be involved in. It might not be something you can put a dollar amount on immediately, but it’s something that builds trust,” said a member of the group.

The second team, represented by freelancer Carolyn Shapiro of Burlington, Vt., said the Republican should allow companies to pay to “take over” the newspaper’s social media feed. The payment would be based on how long the company takes over the feed, she said.

Shapiro proposed other obituary-related innovations for the Republican beyond what it has already added, and discussed how her group brainstormed the idea of rebuttal obits, in which people could write brutally honest and vulgar pieces about themselves that will not be published until they are dead.

The panel and members of the audience shared a laugh, but Shapiro was serious, and Arwady and French noted that there was a lot of merit to the idea.

“The column should be called ‘Peace Out’,” Feifer joked.

“I’m feeling really uncomfortable, like I’m wearing burlap underwear,” French said.

The final group suggested turning the newsroom into a multi-disciplinary makerspace where people with common interests could come together to explore ideas or work on projects together. The makerspace could include options to rent conference rooms and pay fees to use equipment. The space could be a startup incubator, where new companies could establish themselves and rent the space until they have enough revenue to expand independently or own their own space.

The final group also recommended that the newspaper host events, similar to the first group’s community center proposal. Examples given included bridal expos and workshops for high school and college students. Guests would pay fees to attend.

Feifer asked the panelists which idea was the most feasible.

French said that although all of the ideas were great and definitely entrepreneurial, the one that was most feasible was a community-centered makerspace and event hosting. Arwady said he especially would want to cater to the Spanish-speaking community.

Arwady also said he loves the idea of rebuttal obits, and could even transform it to apply to companies going out of business, where they could feel as though they could tell the whole world why it isn’t fair that they had to shut down.

All of the ideas offered multiple ways to engage the community and to show that newspapers are inseparable from the community, French said.

“Having that kind of core value is priceless; there’s no way you could put a monetary value on that,” French said.

The session, titled “LIVE: Creating a New Product,” was held Friday, Feb. 23, at the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel.

Math can be as powerful
in journalism as grammar

By Jess DeWitt
Bulletin Staff

Grammar is underrated, and is the road map to writing, according to John Ruddy, copy desk chief of The Day of New London, Conn.

He was on a panel that discussed “How to be your own copy editor” at the New England Newspaper and Press Association’s recent winter convention. Grammar was one of the main topics. So was mathematic

The panelists were Ruddy; Tom Zuppa, managing editor of The Sun of Lowell, Mass., Emily Sweeney, a reporter for The Boston Globe; and Charles St. Amand, a journalism teacher at Suffolk University and secretary of the New England Society of News Editors.

St. Amand quizzed the more than 30 people who attended on the Associated Press Stylebook, which is the book he recommends for all grammar questions, mainly because he has found it helpful for the topics he covered, including capitalization, indefinite pronouns, and words that sound the same, such as “there, their, and they’re.”

But St. Amand’s favorite feature in the AP Stylebook is one of which he said many people are unaware.

“There’s this great feature, Ask the Editor, that has never failed me,” St. Amand said. “I get pretty deep into whether this is correct, or that is correct. The editor sometimes contradicts (himself or herself), and someone will say, ‘You said three years ago that it was this, and now you’re saying it’s that. And the editor will say, ‘My bad, I’ve done that and fixed it.’ ” 

On the Ask the Editor feature on the AP Stylebook’s website, questions, corrections and other communications can be sent to the Stylebook editor.

That is not the only feature of the AP Stylebook that St. Amand applauded.

“Style changes every year,” St. Amand said. “The nice thing is, if you have a 2017 Stylebook and they come out with a new one this year, the new one has, at the very beginning of it, the changes or the additions that they’ve made.”

St. Amand tells his journalism students at Suffolk that there is no need to buy a new AP Stylebook every year because of that feature. It allows them to see all of the updates as long as they know another student with the newest edition.

Zuppa took the discussion in a different direction and quizzed the audience on mathematics. He explained the power that math can have in certain forms of journalism, particularly when reporting on taxes.

“Tax rates have two components: the change in the tax rate and the change in home valuation,” Zuppa said. “You’re sitting in that city council meeting, and they announce the tax rate is going down. And the city council applauds the manager, and the manager applauds the assessors, and the assessors take a bow and everyone did a great job. And then, quarter three bills come out and your phone starts ringing because you reported on the tax rate going down (when taxes actually went up).”

Zuppa said the tax rate is only one part of the tax equation. If your home valuation goes up and your tax rate goes down, then taxes can go up, because it’s possible for the rate to go down but for valuations to go up enough that the taxes go up.

“Math can be really challenging, and if you learn some really rudimentary things and do small things to start off, you can get into projects like (the explanation about taxes) eventually, and get the kinds of stories that will really explain things for your community,” Zuppa said.

The session was held Saturday, Feb. 24, at the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel in South Boston.

How journalists can cover
the disability beat more ably

By Julia Hutchins
Bulletin Correspondent

Race and gender issues might be the more hot-button topics, but disabled people are one of the largest minority groups that face discrimination, according to a panel at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention.

The “Covering the disability beat” panel featured Lauren Appelbaum, communications director at RespectAbility, a nonprofit based in Rockville, Md., that counters disability stigmas; David D’Arcangelo, director of the Massachusetts Office on Disability; and Wendy Lu, a freelance reporter who focuses on health disparities and social issues in disability communities.

“This is a topic that is often ignored,” Appelbaum said. “Not deliberately, but because of lack of thought.”

Appelbaum provided a number of tips to be followed in covering people with disabilities. Asking people how they prefer to be described is one of them, because some people with disabilities do not wish for their disability to be a main form of identification.

“As journalists, we’re asked to be objective,” Lu said. “This includes asking people how they identify.”

Reporters should also be careful how they portray disability, Lu said. Stories often “portray people with disabilities as inspirations or heroes” simply for doing regular tasks. That genre of reporting was coined “inspiration porn” by disability activist Stella Young in 2014.

“The idea with inspiration porn is that we are ignoring the disability-focused stories,” Appelbaum said. “It detracts from real issues.”

One of those “real issues” on which the panel agreed is that people with disabilities are grossly underrepresented. A U.S. Census Bureau study from 2010 found that one in five Americans had some form of disability, but it is rare that a person with a disability makes the news other than in crime statistics.

D’Arcangelo asked the audience to keep the underrepresentation in mind and “consider if it was any other minority, … it would be front page news of every outlet.”

Reporters should keep an open mind when finding sources, panelists advised. People with disabilities cross every minority group, and it is the only minority group someone can join anytime, usually through aging, accident or illness. Most disabilities do not inhibit people’s ability to contribute to a story, even if many journalists assume that people with disabilities cannot speak.

“Just walk up to the person with the disability and talk to them,” Lu said. “People with disabilities are still people.”

Even though journalists might encounter “gatekeepers,” such as concerned family members or protective friends, there is no need to detour for permission to speak to a disabled person unless the person with a disability is a child, which is a common protocol regardless.

Mincing around disability or avoiding the topic entirely does a disservice to the community, panelists said.

Misrepresentation and underrepresentation can hurt the disabled community.

“It’s not going to help us move forward as a society,” D’Arcangelo said. “And it’s not going to help your story.”

The panel discussion was held Saturday, Feb. 24. About 15 people attended.

A slick way to add revenue at
newspapers: Add glossy mags 

By Nadine El-Bawab
Bulletin Correspondent

Al Getler, division sales manager at Advantage Newspaper Consultants in Burlington, Vt., began his talk by telling people that he is a very digital person and isn’t asking people to abandon digital media, but that he is “talking about pushing the envelope a bit and challenging the newsroom folks to do things a little differently to maximize their print revenue.”

Getler asked his audience a question: “Where do you make the most amount of your money?”

The answer was print.

Getler’s talk, titled “Maximizing your print products,” was held at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention.

Getler referred the audience to “Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give up in Order to Move Forward” by Henry Cloud, a psychologist and author, for guidance on working together in their businesses — a book that Getler has personally recommended to those with whom he works.

Getler talked from experience about the glossy magazines and updated forms of television books that he introduced at newspapers where he was publisher, including the Eagle-Tribune of North Andover, Mass. Getler said he wouldn’t have introduced those products unless they made profit margins of 50 percent or more, and they began bringing in a lot of money for the businesses.

Those new glossy magazines that were produced at the Eagle-Tribune didn’t require the hiring of any new staff. Getler and his staff brought in writers from numerous departments to do stories and profiles for the new magazines.

Because of the glossy paper that was chosen for the publications, the Eagle-Tribune began getting ads from more high-end businesses, including jewelers, that didn’t usually place ads with the Eagle-Tribune’s publications, Getler said. That gave the company an opportunity to be selective when it came to choosing what ads to publish, he said.

Getler also discussed replacing traditional TV books, which contained times and dates of programs that will air on TV, with versions that had glossy pages. The new versions added puzzles and other catchy features besides just the TV grids. Getler said those new TV books added “$2 million in revenue to Ohio publications” where he introduced them.

Those publications tailored the new TV books to a readership above age 50.

Although TV books and glossy lifestyle magazines were the examples he talked the most about, Getler also suggested other magazines, such as ones on social life and pets. He discovered from his experience producing magazines at newspapers that “people genuinely enjoy writing features for these magazines.”

Getler said the number of copies of those magazines was limited to only what was needed to deliver the magazines to households, and that the magazines were of high quality. Getler said advertisers didn’t mind the number of copies printed being limited because those printed were sent directly to their target demographic.

Getler gave this final advice to the audience: “You are leaving money on the table if you don’t add some kind of (magazine) to your publication … (but) if it doesn’t work, cut it off and move on.”

His session was held Saturday, Feb. 24, in the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel in South Boston.

Digital marketing services can help
newspapers help their advertising clients

By Alastair Pike
Bulletin Correspondent

Facebook and Google are projected to have captured more than 60 percent of all U.S. digital advertising spending in 2017, according to eMarketer. But the digital marketing professionals who were panelists at a discussion at the recent New England Newspaper and Press Association winter convention think that there are still opportunities for marketing agencies to help businesses generate more revenue with advertising and marketing.

“There’s a lot of dollars going to digital; that’s no surprise. One of the things that we keep hearing from our friends at Google and Facebook is the share that they’re getting of those dollars,” said Daryl Hively, founder and chief executive officer of a Hartland, Wisc.-based digital marketing agency, Guarantee Digital. “And the good news is, we can get our piece of that action. We can help our advertisers facilitate how they’re spending their money on Google and Facebook.”

The advice was given at a panel discussion moderated by Tim Brady, director of advertising at the Concord (N.H.) Monitor. The discussion was titled “Digital marketing services – are you offering them to your clients?”

The goal of the discussion was to help newspaper advertising departments to establish digital marketing services as part of their offerings to advertising clients, or to improve such services if they’re already established. Those services include helping clients build websites, post on social media, and market on Google or Facebook.

Google and Facebook have gained their large shares of digital ads by Google’s targeting of ads to readers based on their search history and Facebook’s tailoring of relevant ads to users based on demographics, from job title to relationship status.

One challenge with their dominance is that when “Facebook says this, Google says this. And then you have to change the entire way you sell,” said Greg Ryan, another panelist and senior vice president of a Quincy, Mass.-based digital marketing agency, ThriveHive.

Despite that dominance, the panelists advised how to take advantage of the very tools that Google and Facebook provide.

“It’s all free stuff. There’s so much free data out there,” Ryan said about Google Trends, a tool that shows what search terms are entered and the relevant statistics that enable businesses to market their brand and products better.

Another tool is Google’s listings, where businesses can have their information posted so that their restaurant or store would show up in a Google search or on Google maps.

“Job one is making sure they’re making a good impression, and they’re getting found online,” Hively said about the businesses that marketing agencies serve. “So we talk about those mobile-friendly websites, and making sure their Google business listings are taken care of.”

Hively added a tip: “Avoid penalties from Google. These days if these businesses don’t have a mobile-friendly site, they’re going to get pushed farther back in search.”

He said digital marketing agencies should help businesses “tell their story” with content and have a consistent message across all platforms. That could mean placing a sponsored article in a print newspaper or a video ad on a news outlet’s home page, all with a clear, cohesive message about the business.

Ryan, whose agency he helped establish and which now has five locations in the United States, advised that digital marketing agencies should focus on their customer service and not price when attracting new clients and brands.

“Sell them on service. Some of you are probably staying in a hotel here. Why aren’t you staying at the $49 economy lodge down the street? Because of service,” Ryan said. “This hotel’s like Four Seasons, this hotel’s like this. It’s about service. I want to feel good. I want to be asked how my morning went. Think about that; it’s not price.”

Hively also shared hiring tips on hiring for an effective digital marketing agency.

“You don’t need to hire the smartest person who knows social media backwards and forwards but can’t actually go out and talk to a shop owner in terms that they understand,” Hively said. “Hire for attitude. Hire for hustle. Those are the ones that are going to end up working for you for the long term.”

The panel discussion, took place Friday, Feb. 23, at the Renaissance Boston Waterfront Hotel in Boston.

‘You don’t need to hire the smartest person who knows social media backwards and forwards but can’t actually go out and talk to a shop owner in terms that they understand. Hire for attitude. Hire for hustle. Those are the ones that are going to end up working for you for the long term.’
— Daryl Hively