Newsrooms pride themselves on stories that make a difference.
Those stories can be good for business, too. Impact is a point of differentiation in a crowded marketplace for commercial news and a powerful motivator for philanthropists who support public media and non-profit journalism.
And yet the line from reporting to impact isn’t always clear.
This special series from MetricShift on measuring impact aims to help. Starting today, the series will explore how the field of journalism is measuring impact, as well as the tools and best practices you can use to get started right away. We’ll also have pieces that examine the purpose of impact assessment: To help investors make better investment decisions, such as a leadership team allocating resources in a newsroom, or institutional and individual donors supporting public interest journalism.
To follow along with the series, join our MetricShift Facebook group, sign up for our Media Metrics Roundup weekly newsletter, or follow MediaShift on Twitter. New stories will be added to the list below as they are published.
Series posts
CIR’s Impact Tracker: How to Use It and Why You Need It by Lindsay Green-Barber
#MetricShift Chat: The Metrics of Investigative Reporting by Tim Cigelske
A Quantitative Basis for Measuring Media Impact at the Media Consortium by Jo Ellen Kaisar
How We Measured Impact for a Solutions Journalism Story on Poverty by Talia Stroud and Shannon McGregor
How Documentary Filmmakers Plan Ahead for Impact by Patricia Aufderheide
How to Create Stakeholder Reports to Show Impact of Your Non-Profit Newsroom by Mara Jezior and Lauren Fuhrmann
MetricShift Stakeholder Report Worksheet for Nonprofit News by Jason Alcorn
Impact Tracking in Action: Build Your Own Impact Taxonomy With Chalkbeat’s MORI by Ryan Sholin
4 Things Newsrooms Can Learn from Nonprofits About Impact by Jason Tomassini
Twitter Chat & Training
Join us for our Twitter chat at the #MetricShift hashtag on Sept. 23 at 1pm ET.
DigitalEd Training: How to Measure Impact in Journalism
Other Coverage of Media Impact on MediaShift
The Power of Empathy, Personal Narrative and More Lessons from the Story Movements Conference
How Media Metrics Training Works In The Real World
Practicing What They Preach: J-School News Services Track Engagement and Impact
How the ‘Inverted Impact Pyramid’ Can Make a Hyperlocal Story Go International
How the Nonprofit Newsroom Behind the “Panama Papers” Investigation Measures Impact
3 Types of Impact You Can Visualize With StoryPilot
People Matter More Than Metrics at Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting
How CIR Measured Greater Awareness of Health Risks After Investigation
5 Metrics Takeaways for Non-Profit News from INN Day 2016
#MetricShift Chat: Measuring Impact
What’s Next for Media Impact? Lessons from CIR Dissection in Seattle
Jason Alcorn (@jasonalcorn) is the Metrics Editor for MediaShift. In addition to his work with MediaShift, he is an analyst with the Media Impact Project and works as a consultant with non-profits and newsrooms.