The modern day journalist is no longer the glamorous undercover detective which investigates and digs out information for its audience to read. Today, journalists are required to write a higher quantity of stories to fill the paper rather than take time to uncover detailed events. In the recent study completed by Cardiff University it found that almost a fifth of a newspaper originates from ‘PR material’. Therefore, with journalists in need of ‘pre-packaged’ stories to facilitate their jobs, and with the British national press still having the ability to dictate the news agenda across multiple platforms (as mentioned in my previous blog – Out with the old, in with the new … well, not quite) the PR practitioner needs to understand the concept of ‘news values’ to be successful in a media relations role.
So what are news values? Essentially they are characteristics which make stories newsworthy. These characteristics are not definitive, but are generally split into five main areas:
- Timing – is it new? Old stories are generally boring.
- Significance (magnitude) – the number of people affected/effected.
- Proximity – how close are the intended audience to the story? For example, the winners of the London amateur football leagues would not interest people living in Thailand.
- Prominence – how important is the person or subject of the story? For example, The Prime Minister is the leader of the country and celebrity, so stories concerning him would be of higher prominence to us.
- Human Interest – is it unusual? Does it evoke emotion?
Kraft Foods’ recent campaign which advertised their product Stove Top relied upon the application of these news values to gain editorial coverage of their brand and product. They created new heated bus shelters, which will warm a significant number of the general public, and it was a funny and unusual piece of news. This particular campaign received ‘37.2 million media impressions’ including The New York Times and Fox Business Network. Watch the following video to see the effectiveness of this campaign.
The PR practitioner needs to understand the way in which the media selects its news agenda; they need to know how to create a newsworthy story out of any given situation and grab the attention of the journalists or influential people. As Bailey points out, traditional news releases tend to be discarded by journalists, so grab their attention. On top of the five “Ws” (who, what, where, why and when) that should be included in all news releases ensure that the story adheres to the principles of news values to add interest. Watch this quick video which provides a quick overview of the application of news values to get your campaign newsworthy, however I recommend you urge some caution as the video conflicts with the CIPR’s code of conduct regarding issues of transparency.
