Writing for digital markets vs. print markets
Jason Steele has an excellent post on The Freelancer blog comparing the challenges and rewards of writing for digital markets as opposed to traditional print publications.
Here are some highlights of his thoughts:
Whenever someone checks out an article online, there are links to a dozen other pieces vying for attention just a click away. And as former Slate writer Farhad Manjoo explained in his popular 2012 article about reader habits, odds are most people won’t finish what they read on the Internet. Digital editors are well aware of this, and as a result, they insist on content that clearly informs the audience from the beginning.
In contrast, the reader of a magazine or newspaper has made a significantly larger investment of effort, time, and money to select an article. So even if a magazine article takes a few paragraphs before getting to the nut graph, the reader is less likely to just flip the page and move on the way we tend to do with online content.
While readers may stare at their computer monitors all day, they rarely focus on a single article for more than a minute or two. That’s why the vast majority of what’s written for the Internet is under 1,000 words. Reading multi-page articles online can be a frustrating challenge, but taking in longform content in print, or at least on an e-reader, tends to be much more enjoyable.
Great longform journalism still gets published on the web every day, but it often comes from outlets traditionally known for print. But considering what it takes to keep up with the speed of news, longer articles just aren’t cost effective for anymore for a lot of online outlets.
Online journalism has created an interesting relationship between sourcing and accountability. While digital writers are expected to be their own authority, their readers will take note of any errors in real time. Make a specious claim in print, and your editor will publish a reader’s letter rebutting it or print a retraction in the next edition. Try that online and, within minutes, you will be barraged in the comments sections by knowledgeable readers and trolls alike.
Readers still have the opportunity to engage with print writers over social media, but online readers can comment on the writer’s work just below the article itself, where their opinions are much harder to ignore. And for some digital publications, editors even demand that writers participate and respond to questions and constructive criticism.
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