6 ways to make your FOIA or public records request more effective 10/16/17

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

With the aid of three FOIA veterans, GateHouse Media's professional development series recently revealed six things journalists should keep in mind when requesting public records in order to make their requests more effective and less likely to be held up or denied.

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Four ways the Columbia Missourian is using Facebook Live to engage with community 7/24/17


By Matt Dulin, director of community outreach, Columbia Missourian
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

Lessons learned include planning ahead, early promotion and keeping batteries charged.

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Open the Room project helps journalists and citizens broadcast on Facebook Live 7/18/17

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

This emerging technology will allow newspapers to cover more local meetings and events – even local sports – with better than acceptable video and audio quality at a much lower cost.

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Hope Star recognizes '20 under 50' who go above and beyond 6/6/17

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

"People are the life, the driving force of every community," says Rick Kennedy, regional editor of The Hope (Ark.) Star. The paper highlighted 20 individuals who are moving their community forward and making improvements in the lives of others in a special "20 under 50" section published Saturday, June 3.

Hope Star readers were asked to participate by nominating people under the age of 50 who are making big contributions in Hempstead County.

Click the link below to view the special section.

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Opt In allows newsrooms to improve newsletters or create one from scratch 6/6/17

By Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

This free, easy-to-use tool was built for newsrooms and freelancers to begin addressing the challenges of newsletter curation. As it stands, newsrooms no longer have the time nor the resources to maintain unfocused newsletter programs that don’t achieve their goals. Opt In is an online tool that gives news organizations, freelancers and regular people the ability to build an e-newsletter strategy from scratch, or create a plan to improve upon an existing one.

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Top 5 best newsletter pop-ups 5/16/17

By Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

When it comes to newsletters, the meat of your product should be the content of the email. However, after launching a brand-new letter or reviving an old one, it's critical that newsrooms make a concentrated push for sign-ups. Many newsrooms use ads in house and on other websites, or opt for an embedded sign-up box in the body of an article or on their landing page. But some are still using the good old pop-up form.

But there's a catch: The pop-up form can be tricky. Sites can be dinged by Google for interrupting or obscuring the reader's experience. So why bother? At nearly 2 percent, the conversion rate for pop-ups is remarkably high, and while using them may interrupt usability, gaining immediate access to a reader's inbox is a powerful tool for newsrooms.

Pop-up forms get a bad rap, but for those sites that are willing to take the risk by using ads to garner subscribers, they make it worth their while.

We've listed five of our favorite, most eye-catching pop-up forms from across the web. Not only are these forms interesting, they actually convince us to sign up for a newsletter we otherwise may have overlooked.

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New York Times and The Times-Picayune form coastal reporting partnership 5/2/17

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

The Times-Picayune and The New York Times have begun a partnership that will explore the causes and potentially catastrophic effects of coastal erosion and sea level rise along the Louisiana coast.

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Relaunching a newsletter: Failures, successes and what we learned 4/17/17

By Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz and Cambria Roth
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

Newsrooms can no longer afford to distribute poorly curated newsletters. Yet executives from many modern newsrooms say they lack the financial and staff capacity to do otherwise. Crosscut Public Media, in partnership with the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute, will soon be releasing a new, free tool for newsrooms and newsletter curators to begin addressing this challenge.

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What are your newsletter analytics trying to tell you? Are you listening? 2/21/17

By Tamara Power-Drutis and Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz, Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

Your newsletter subscribers are trying to tell you something, but are you tracking the right metrics to hear them?

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Ideas worth stealing: These strategies will help journalists earn news consumers' trust 2/13/17

By Joy Mayer, Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  

Read the key findings, go deep on which strategies worked and search a database of almost 500 Facebook posts at TrustingNews.org.

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