Does this signal the start of the end of clickbait journalism?

For well over a decade now we’ve seen many titles replace proper investigative journalism with churnalism. Dire articles that are designed to click, engage and enrage (think crime cases from 20 years ago brought up from the dead and written about as if they’d just happened). Journalists with a deep desire to hold institutions to account have instead been ordered to bang out click-based content that would leave past generations of journalists spinning in their graves.

But one of the leaders behind this strategy has said it’s changing tack. UK publisher Reach, which owns brands such as Mirror, The Express and a slew of local news sites such as the Manchester Evening News (and is widely known for its haemorrhaging of local news after replacing great journalism in favour of clickbait articles), has said it is moving away from volume after posting disappointing half year results. 

In an interview with Press Gazette, chief executive Piers North said the publisher’s “future will be less about volume and more about original content, distinctive brands and securing better returns”. Instead, its “near-term focus” will be centred on growth in digital subscriptions, quality video and AI licensing deals.

It’s a major U-turn for a publisher which has previously given reporters page view targets and urged them to file numerous stories per day.

Many of these local newspapers were known for their excellent journalism and original reporting and investigations. Instead they’ve become known for their listicles and content designed to bring in quick-hit traffic but in reality it's led to many readers turning away from the sites (don't get me started on the fact many are littered with clunky pop-ups and ads), and far away from the journalism they originally intended to produce.

North said there was a shift in focus: “We are moving forward with a renewed editorial brand focus, and our teams will be moving away from volume and instead focusing on producing original content, on topics distinctive to their brands. It is a more targeted approach and it is showing early promise with our subscriptions push. Additionally, we are supporting this brand focus with marketing investment.”

It’s obvious that the media landscape has shifted and with readers no longer paying for physical copies of the paper, publishers such as Reach need to make up the lost revenue somehow. Online advertising hasn’t stacked up for years for publishers and there’s been a dramatic shift in online traffic since the introduction of Google AI Overviews (as I reported here for the BBC). What Reach – and others - should have done instead of creating a model that undermines the fundamental principles of journalism, is invest in journalism and encourage people to pay for it. We only need to look at the local news players that have emerged in recent years such as The Mill, The Lead and The Londoner to see the appetitive is there (Reach also just said it is trialling paid community websites for small brands that traditionally only had a print presence).

Whether Reach actually changes direction remains to be seen but there does seem to be shift in the scale of online content with many publishers such as The Times focusing on ‘less is more’ ie producing a better but more limited amount of articles rather than content for the sake of it.

We have seen court reporting and local investigations fall in recent years. I hope this signals a move away from churnalism and instead heralds a return to journalism reporters can be proud of rather than bashing out story after story to hit an unrealistic target.