Read on Twitter
Afternoon. Seeing as it's Friday, I thought I'd share some of the articles which most engaged regional news readers around the UK last month. We don't just look at page views (the currency which pays our wages), but also the amount of time people spend on an article (1)
All of the articles I'll link to here were read by at least 5,000 people who spent, each, at least 60 seconds actively engaging with the article - that's different to dwell time in that you have to be moving around the page, or doing something on the page (eg an interactive) (2)
What the list will show (as it does every month) is that this idea that we somehow can divide journalism between 'worthy' (deep, meaningful, important) and 'clicky' (shallow, done just for page views) is bonkers. Here goes.... (3)
First up, and well documented, @bristollive taking on the trolls who were pretty grim about Greta Thunberg when she came to Bristol recently. http://bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/abuse-threats-made-greta-thunberg-3897936. In total, readers spent more than one million minutes on this article (4)
Next, at @Sotlive, readers spent 851k minutes with a story about what is inside the Morrisons foodbox, which was launched in response to Covid-19: http://stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/bought-morrisons-food-box-and-4001117 (5)
We get a fair amount of 'call this news' about supermarket stories (maybe because Greggs is shut at the mo?), but this story with the latest opening hours and rules at Tesco and Aldi, kept readers for a combined 1.3m minutes, including on @WalesOnline: http://walesonline.co.uk/news/uk-news/latest-hours-rules-tesco-aldi-18005162 (6)
Another @Sotlive story, which also really engaged readers on @MENnewsdesk website (and was well read by Greater Manchester readers) was this one: http://manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/nhs-nurses-cutting-response-nasty-18011905 - 1.1m active engaged minutes (7)
This story, also on @MENnewsdesk, about Britain's most dangerous prisoner, from the MEN's national news section, clocked up 651k engaged minutes on site: http://manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/britains-most-dangerous-prisoner-hannibal-17754991 (8)
In a month with little sport, strong sports journalism stood out. Which is great news for @WalesOnline. 651k engaged minutes on this one: http://walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/beautiful-unseen-gesture-owen-farrell-17702027
And another fascinating rugby one from @WalesOnline - 602k engaged minutes: http://walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/new-life-gavin-henson-drugs-17847965
Still at @WalesOnline, but this time in news, a powerful court case about a murder. 586k engaged minutes http://walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/harry-baker-murder-trial-barry-17850184 (10)
Powerful stories, carefully told are always well received, such as this one from @MENnewsdesk, which attracted readers for a total of 498k minutes: http://manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/girl-secretly-filmed-herself-getting-17865521
Coronavirus symptoms were big news last month, and continue to be. This article, and ones similar to it, engaged readers for 1.3m minutes: http://somersetlive.co.uk/news/somerset-news/coronavirus-symptoms-news-uk-cases-3959338
Last but one (could go on forever), from @birminghamlive - a guide to the benefit changes which were due to kick in at the end of March: http://birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/universal-credit-benefits-pension-changes-17970316 (405k engaged minutes). Helping people live their lives....
And one final one, from @livelancs: http://lancs.live/whats-on/food-drink-news/ate-filthy-chinese-buffet-blackpool-17709774 Take time to tell a story, etc etc. 250k engaged minutes, to a story on a site which didn't exist a year ago.
Anyway: Local journalism is many things to many people. We should use data to understand what engages people. In my opinion, local journalism's future depends on how much we pay attention to how readers engage with stories. Not rocket science, but worth repeating sometimes....
And one last one from me, honest, this was our most engaging story coronavirus last month. 1.3m page views, average time spent each person: 131 seconds. http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/one-mans-diary-living-coronavirus-17920983 S. .
