By Marian Hens, MediaTrain Director
There is no sign that the appetite for well-told narrative stories has gone away. Take Serial, the wildly popular investigative American podcast launched in the US in October last year. Although podcast is not the most favoured channel among American listeners, Serial has managed to get over one million followers in just over a couple of months.
Serial’s executive producer and journalist, Sarah Koenig, investigates the evidence surrounding the 1999 murder of Hae Min Lee, an 18-year-old student from Baltimore. Currently, Lee’s ex-boyfriend is serving a life sentence for the crime in Maryland, but insists he had nothing to do with her death. The story is tangled, intense and captivating, and listeners just want more.
Some commentators label podcast, and hits such as Serial, as “the new ‘new’”. But according to Jill Abramson, former executive editor of The New York Times, this is not really new, it is, rather, “the old ‘old’”, because what Serial does is to take advantage of people`s hunger for well-reported stories. Charles Dickens and Fyodor Dostoyevsky used to serialise novels and today, the Serial podcast is proof of a basic, human need for compelling narrative, which – Abramson thinks – is greater now than has ever been.
During a speech in Madrid last week, Abramson noted that, while it is true that a new global reality is emerging in which people communicate with each other and with the technologies (smartphones, laptops or wearable devices), she disagrees with the ensuing theory that everyone wants communications short, and as short as possible. ¨Many digitally native organisations, such as the Huffington Post, are investing in long and investigative narrative stories”, she remarks.
So, in the thriving world of digital communication, effective story-telling seems to be as sought for as it has always been. And being a good storyteller, a clear writer, is a skill that is transcending all fields and professions, from Medicine to Advertising. In fact, the intersection between narrative and advertising appears to be on the up with the expansion of ´native advertising´ – the practice of using content to build trust and engagement with would-be customers – and the way brands now work with online media to reach people.
Those publications that are pioneering native ads are usually good at making sure the quality of the content is high. They won’t just commission content but work with individual writers or marketers so that it feeds an audience need. And it seems to be working.
2014 saw the launch of native programmes at places like The New York Times, The Washington Post and USA Today. The Wall Street Journal published its first native ads, under the rubric of “Narratives”. USA Today joined in May, the same month the non-profit Texas Tribune deputed paid placement for op-eds. Even the liberal Guardian is in the game. The trend is due to continue in 2015. Condé Nast – owners of Vogue, Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, among other popular publications – recently announced that they are setting up an in-house division of native advertising writers.
Admittedly, native advertising isn’t new, but the near-wholesale adoption of native at organisations with serious journalism credentials certainly is, and that´s a pretty big deal. As pointed out by Amanda Hale, vice president of advertising and creative solutions at Talking Points Memo, what’s most interesting about native is that it plays to the very heart of serious news organisations’ strengths. ¨Quite simply, native advertising is advertising for people who read things. And that’s totally pivotal for journalism¨, not least, because it helps pay for the news.