Suggested Speakers
- Jennifer Brandel | JenniferBrandel
Hearken - Kate Lesniak | @kateotherkate
Bitch Media
You may think deep audience engagement is too expensive. But what if it was your biggest source of untapped revenue?
Session Description
Journalists are coming around to realize that listening to audiences doesn’t have to lead to cat videos. It can produce award-winning, *Important* journalism. But paying attention to the public takes time and resources. But what if it also led to honest to goodness revenue generation? This session will explore how meaningful engagement can help solve the problem of economic sustainability in the digital age.
We’ll dig into a variety of case studies from around the industry (De Correspondent, Hearken, Bitch Media) to uncover how involving the audience beyond asking them to subscribe, can actually inspire them to subscribe, and to also support your work in other exceedingly valuable ways. We’ll tie all of this up with a long view on the importance of engagement to the survival of the industry as a whole, as seen through the deep research and systems mapping by the Democracy Fund.
We have one of those money booths that blows dollar bills that people have to catch to keep people engaged. And to drive the point home that engagement = money. I might be kidding? Or not.
How does your submission contribute to the diversity of the conference?
We’ll have international and US-based efforts, for-profit and non-profit, funders, legacy newsrooms and startups represented. Also: at least half the panel will be women.