Hi there!

For most American media, the month of October will revolve around the presidential elections. But it’s an international issue too. There will be ramifications for global politics, trade, economics and more whichever candidate wins - and these will play out in the geopolitical, economic and social landscape way beyond Washington.

So, whether you’re a broadsheet in New York or a community funded outlet in Helsinki, you’re likely thinking about how your website is addressing this topic for its visitors. Have editorial plans been made about how to cover the final stage of the campaign and explain the election results? What tone and sentiment will you use?

Journalists tend to respond instinctively, using the professional experience  gathered over the years. But there’s much to learn from the data available on previous elections too. What kind of information is your audience seeking? What tone resonates? Which user needs and topics are addressed?

We want to discuss this with you. We’re once again dubbing this month smartoctober, a month where we delve into what smart data analysis looks like in practice. If you’d like to join the conversation now, reply to this newsletter.

Research on foreign affairs

Our latest guest blog is a nice teaser for the upcoming month. Academic Bram Peeters asks this question: what do news consumers want from foreign news?
To map out the needs specifically regarding foreign news, qualitative research was conducted in the first half of 2024. This involved two-hour group discussions with fifty people aged between 20 and 72, all of whom indicated beforehand that they followed foreign news at least twice a week.
He shares some interesting insights:

  1. More in-depth reporting on geopolitics, shifting power relations, and the resulting conflicts
  2. More background and fewer short updates on wars
  3. More context on disasters, accidents, and incidents
  4. More reporting on countries from other parts of the world
  5. More analyses and explainers, fewer live blogs (for foreign news)
Read the blog

READING TIPS

  • As a sneak peek into Smartoctober, here’s a reading tip. In this article, writer Rick Perlstein clearly explains how polls in America often miss the mark. Yet, they remain the basis for many journalistic articles. Is that wise?
  • Interpreting the American elections isn’t the only thing occupying journalistic organisations’ minds. Niemanlab maps out what it could mean for journalism if the much-discussed ‘Project 2025,’ driven by conservative forces around Trump, is implemented.
  • We’re also closely monitoring developments around artificial intelligence. A new version of ChatGPT recently received significant attention. In this newsletter from Ethan Mollick, the changes in the language model are explained thoroughly.
  • X/Twitter has been blocked in Brazil. What does that mean for journalism? The Reuters Institute explores this, addressing the negative impact of leaving the platform.

Not sure what ‘smartoctober’ is?

Perhaps we haven’t been entirely clear about what Smartoctober entails. Simply put, it’s a deep dive into something we think all newsrooms will find relevant.
It will consist of:

  • four blogs
  • a webinar
  • a stream of social media posts that’ll deliver the insights in bite-sized chunks

We’re also working on an interactive quiz and a practical document to help journalists plan, particularly for the week before election day and the weeks following.
We promise to provide inspirational and insightful content to help improve your election coverage. And hopefully, these lessons can be applied to other elections as well. So, we’ll close with a cliché: stay tuned!

Talk to you later,

Stefan ten Teije

Content editor @ smartocto

Ask for a demo