The Commercial Experience 21.11: Programming the news media.

COVID has been the mega hit that has driven news engagement for the past 2 years, what happens when it's no longer the big story?

Today I am writing this from Melbourne where we have hit 70% double dose vaccination.

What does that mean? Well, it means I can leave the house after 9pm. It also means I can visit people who live more than 15k from my house. It means my 8yo can go to in-person school soon. And it means soon I’ll be able to have a beer outside of the house, or maybe a meal. And it might even mean I can travel for work and play. After taking 100 plus flights a year, I haven’t flown anywhere in 11 months.

With Australia opening up, are we reaching a time where for the first time in a long time, we won’t have a huge, sustained news story hanging over our heads? Narratives that keep us checking the news not just daily, but hourly.

The past 3 years have been wall to wall with blockbuster news narratives.

Basically since 2019 we have had huge news stories that have become, for all intents and purposes, almost entertainment franchises.

We had Trumpworld. We had the fires. We had COVID. We had the US election. And we had a once in a lifetime event with the January 6 insurrection.

These 5 events have given the news media constant material and programming, programming which has basically defined the past 3 years.

These haven’t been stories - they’ve become series. They are programming we tune into every day. For instance, the vaccination race has become daily viewing for people. We follow the vaccination rate like we follow a sports team and their ladder position.

Daily cases. Daily press conferences. Daily vaccination rates. Lockdowns. Border closures. Border openings.

As we head towards 80-90%+ double dose, it doesn’t look like the public appetite for COVID content will sustain. And this means for the first time in 3 years, we won’t have a news story hanging over our heads for a sustained period.

So what does this mean for the news media?

What do you talk about when the thing you’ve talked about for the past 2 years isn’t as interesting as it once was?

What this reminds me of is when a TV network relies heavily on a piece of programming, but the audience moves on. And once they’ve moved on it’s impossible to get them back. The network has to think of another piece of programming to capture their attention.

Once COVID becomes less newsworthy and more ‘normal’, how will the news media adapt?

COVID as a piece of programming couldn’t be more perfect. The whole ecosystem has such a wide array of characters. Villains. Polarising figures. Drama. Death. Violence. Pundits. Experts. Celebrity. Absurdity. Humour. Suspense. It appeals to everyone. And even better - it’s become political and partisan.

A consumer may not care for the epidemiology of COVID, but they love Karen from Bunnings. And vice versa. COVID was the news show everyone could connect with.

COVID is for the news media what Squid Game has been for Netflix. It has brought new viewers and readers, and re-energised existing ones. The program is shared, spoken about, debated and engaged with.

In the instance of Netflix, these breakout programs are critical for new customer acquisition. I wrote about this for Mumbrella earlier this year.

This graph is from 2020 but shows search trends across key titles. What it basically shows is Netflix across 2020 had a series of ‘hit’ shows which captured attention. As you can see this attention peaks quickly and then drops quickly … but the idea is if you can have a hit every 3-4 weeks then you can demonstrate enough value and newness to acquire new customers and convince your existing ones they are getting enough depth and breadth of content to stay on platform.

So for a Netflix, it may drop 100-200 new programs a year … and ‘hit’ in a big way on 20 of them. The 20 are important for acquisition, but the 180 are also important as they add depth to the catalog. The difference between a Netflix and a TV network is a TV network generally lives and dies on 10 or so pieces of programming, whereas SVOD services live and die on 1000 or so pieces.

My view is news media was more like SVOD, but COVID has made it more like TV.

What do I mean here? Well … historically ‘news’ has relied on a lot of storylines/programming to engage users. Hundreds and even thousands of stories a day. All in different areas. It wasn’t vulnerable to a particular news narrative dropping off, as it wasn’t reliant on a particular area accounting for a material chunk of its audience. Like Netflix, it had consistent ‘hit’s every few weeks or so that would spark audience interest, and it had the depth of coverage across numerous areas that kept its core engaged.

COVID has made it more like a TV network. COVID has dominated the front page for 2 years. It dominates rolling coverage. It edges its way into every other topic. COVID has been the dominant news franchise and its kept audiences coming back. COVID drives engagement, it drives volume.

Which means once COVID becomes less interesting, its impact on traffic and engagement could be significant. Or, more to the point, COVID has been so big that a lot of news media will be wondering what will fill the hole when its gone.

The media have covered COVID so well, in such depth, with such speed and adaptability … that they have created a piece of programming that is bigger than anything that has come before it. They’ve got a hit, but that hit has become too big.

There’s two ways to look at a post COVID news world for the news media.

How you view the opportunity or challenge depends on your perspective.

One view is post COVID, post Trump news media interest will return to more normal levels. The daily news cycle will remain, but the lack of a sustained, universally relevant narrative will mean people are less engaged in the news than they have been for the last 3 years.

The other view is the news industry has demonstrated over the past 2-3 years a step change in how they engage readers, and this capability isn’t subject dependent … and it can be applied to any matter of interest. Think of the advances made in data journalism, live reporting, multimedia, cross platform content, collaboration, user testing and speed.

COVID, Trump, the fires, January 6 … these are have dramatically accelerated the news product both locally and internationally. In some ways they’re almost unrecognisable.

I subscribe to the optimists view, but do think there will be some sort of levelling out post COVID. An Australian summer, combined with more freedom will certainly curtail our interest in what is happening around us as we reacquaint ourselves with our immediate circle.

For me, COVID feels like the TV show that has gone on 2 seasons too long. I’m still watching but it’s more out of habit and less out of interest. So I can’t wait to see what’s in store for 2022.

Want more?

I have no recommendations for this week. My plan this weekend is to go for a walk after 9pm, have dinner with my friends at a restaurant and see my family.