Who’s Covering your News? We Hope it’s You

 Tell your own story.

That’s the simple idea behind brand journalism. No one is in a better position than you to report  news about your organization directly to your audiences.

And many companies are doing just that. Brand journalists have discarded the press release in favor of actual news. They’re identifying trends that matter to their audiences and interviewing their own experts to offer commentary and analysis on important industry topics.

Public relations and internal communications team that are accustomed to traditional tactics often look for examples of brand journalism. Here’s our latest look at some fine reporting and writing across the brand-jo-verse:

Covering the Fed
News is all about timeliness: covering events that just happened, are about to happen, or are happening in front of your eyes.

That’s how the writers and editors at The Statement, the news platform for bank holding company BOK Financial, covered the most important economics story of August and September: the decision by the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates for the first time in more than four years.

The Statement’s news team didn’t try to compete with every major news outlet covering the Fed’s much-anticipated rate cut. Instead, in the two weeks leading up to the Fed’s decision, they explained what the story meant to BOK’s customers, from first-time home buyers to retirees managing their savings in a time of high inflation:

• On Sept. 9, 2024, Byron Ginsburg wrote about how retirees should adapt to the anticipated interest rate cut, with tips on locking in higher savings rates and reducing debt.
• BOK Financial experts weighed in on the likely impact of the rate cut in a Sept. 11 story by Danielle Sottosanti. The piece included a memorable quote about the Fed from Chief Investment Officer Brian Henderson.

“I think it haunts them that historically the Fed doesn’t have a great track record with cutting rates soon enough,” Henderson said. “They know that when the unemployment rate starts to go up, it tends to stay up and feed on itself.”

• On Sept. 18, the day the Fed announced its half-point rate cut, The Statement published a 2-minute video appropriately titled, “What do Fed rate cuts mean for me?”

Myth busters
Moffitt Cancer Center’s brand journalism site, Endeavor, covers the latest developments in cancer research and treatment. But they’ve also carved out a great feature story niche: correcting long-held misperceptions about cancer.

Endeavor’s Sept. 23 story, by writer Steve Blanchard, is a case in point. Here’s how it starts:

Please Stop Calling Thyroid Cancer the ‘Good’ Cancer
When Emma Stevens learned she had thyroid cancer at 19, she heard the same statements of support repeatedly.

“At least it’s only thyroid cancer.”

“It’s the good cancer, and easy to deal with.”

“These are such weird things to say to me,” said Stevens, now 26. “I know they didn’t have any ill will and they couldn’t see how such statements could be upsetting. It’s been my goal to shed some light on how what they see as encouraging thoughts can upset someone like me.”

The success rate for treating thyroid cancer patients is high, Blanchard writes, “but that doesn’t mean their lives aren’t altered.”

He relates Stevens’ long cancer journey, which included two surgeries, follow-up blood work and imaging, and hormone replacement treatment.

“Taking that is part of my routine now, but it’s something I’ll have to do for the rest of my life,” Stevens said.

What’s trending?
Covering a trend―and localizing it for your audience―is a staple of good journalism. RED, the news platform of Metropolitan State University of Denver, does a great job identifying trends in the news and their impact on the university and campus life.

A recent story by Lynne Winter executes this perfectly with a story than begins with an anecdote:

As food insecurity on campus grows, students are Cooking with a Purpose.
More than a dozen students and volunteers gathered around a prep station to watch a demonstration of what they’ll be making during the first Cooking With Purpose class of the semester: pizza.

“I wanted to start with a simple recipe to ease them in,” said Natalie Nowak, a registered dietitian at the Health Center at Auraria.

After providing a few more details, Winter reveals the trend behind the story with a strong nut graph:

The program launched as an alarming number of MSU Denver students reported struggling with food insecurity. A University survey conducted last spring showed that almost 60% of MSU Denver students reported experiencing food insecurity and 70% reported not having a convenient way to prepare meals.

Meanwhile, food prices have risen by 25% between 2019 and 2023, and nearly three-quarters of a million Coloradans report experiencing food insecurity. The U.S. Department of Agriculture defines food insecurity as having “limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods or limited or uncertain ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways.”

The news behind the news
Airports and aviation generate a ton of news, and the brand journalists at Blue Sky News are on top of it.

They break stories on new developments at the airport, new routes and carriers. Their stories often get picked up by the mainstream and trade press.

Over the summer, Blue Sky News covered the record surge in air traffic at Pittsburgh International Airport and across the nation. But there was another story lurking behind that one. The low-cost airlines, such as Spirit and Frontier, which cater to vacation travelers, were trying to take advantage of record air travel by moving into less traditional leisure markets.

Blue Sky’s Evan Dougherty takes care of business with a lede, or first sentence, that covers both topics:

Ultra-low-cost carriers (ULCCs) are offering a record number of seats at Pittsburgh International Airport this summer, in part because of their new focus on locations beyond traditional vacation destinations.

Dougherty then details the efforts of the low-cost carriers to branch out from the leisure markets and compete with the legacy airlines, such as American and United, on flights to Boston, Houston and New York, among other cities.

The reason: Travel to vacation destinations has become saturated, as all carriers try to grab a slice of the leisure market.

The story was prompted by a quote from Frontier Airlines CEO Barry Biffle, who described the Florida leisure market to a Reuters reporter this way: “What happened last year in Florida was the equivalent of Costco, Sam’s Club, Walmart, and Target all opening up on the same block.”

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