Paul Rowland, Reach editorial director, at the Future of Media Technology Conference on 12 September 2024. Picture: ASV Photography for Press Gazette
The editorial director of Reach’s Live network of websites has described page views as “the best thing we’ve got right now” amid a drive to increase the number of stories they publish.
Paul Rowland wrote in an email to staff on 27 September that article volumes were being talked about “a lot in newsrooms at the moment” and blamed, in part, the volatility from previously huge traffic referrers like Google and Facebook.
A separate email, sent by Birmingham Live editor Graeme Brown last month, suggested journalists should file at least eight stories per day unless they were newsgathering outside of the office.
As first quoted by Hold The Front Page, Brown said: “We need to make more of shifts where people are not going out as drivers of volume. In practice, if you’re on a general shift and you’re not on a job, it should be at least eight stories a shift.”
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Press Gazette understands this can vary hugely depend on whether the role is court reporter or affiliate writer, for example.
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However Brown has since revised the target to around five stories “on a normal reporting shift” with up to eight on a “live or weekend shift” in response to feedback from the newsroom, Press Gazette can reveal.
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Brown wrote in a follow-up email on 2 October that he understood the concerns but “this is about better connecting you all with the issue. Page views are our currency and there was a time we were getting 50% of our traffic from Facebook – now it is more like 5%. We get a fraction of the PVs we used to from, say, a local murder and this is the most plausible way I can see to address that.”
He continued: “We’ll be expecting more volume and are more likely to be focusing on a higher number of quick turnaround stories. On a live or weekend shift we might expect a reporter to produce closer to eight stories, whereas on a normal reporting shift it might be closer to five.
“It’s not an absolute – if you want to write something you think is brilliant and demands a whole day, talk to your manager who can adjudicate. In general, we need to be managing time efficiently.”
Reach editorial director’s email to staff about importance of page views
Rowland’s email sought to explain why page views are still key to Reach even as other publishers focus more on loyalty and engagement metrics.
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Rowland said: “Ultimately, this is all about building sustainable newsrooms, and in the here and now that means making sure we’re driving enough page views to fund our journalism.
“Going forward, there’s a lot of working happening to diversify our revenue streams – be it through affiliates, social video, podcasts, e-commerce or other routes that haven’t even emerged yet – but in the meantime we need to make sure we’re bringing in the funds that will support the business to continue developing and transforming the way we engage readers as the digital media landscape changes.
“The way we do that right now is through page views. It may not be a perfect metric, but as a directly monetisable digital unit, it’s the best thing we’ve got right now. And at the risk of reducing journalism to pure maths, the page views we generate are a compound of the number of articles we produce, and the number of times that each one is read.
“That might seem like a complete statement of the obvious, but it’s an important thing to confront when we think about the things that we need to do to fund our journalism. To increase page views, we need to increase either the number of articles we produce, or the number of people who read each one (or both).
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“Given the volatility we’ve seen in recent months (and years) with the big referrers, it’s hard to put any certainty around our ability to consistently increase the average number of page views each article gets.
“That’s not to say there aren’t actions we can take to influence this positively – choosing topics and formats that are optimised for a specific referrer is one route. Fostering communities of readers around events and issues so that we’ve got a captive audience hanging on our updates is another. But the constant jeopardy of the environment we operate in is that the benefit of that good work can potentially be overwhelmed by a sudden and violent downturn on one or more referrer.
“We talk about volume a lot because it’s the one variable that’s entirely within our control. But please don’t misunderstand that as me implying that it’s easy to control. It’s not. I know how much hard work is going into increasing our volume levels to where they are at the moment.
“But here’s the even harder bit – volume for volume’s sake will get us nowhere. We need to find the ways to create more opportunities for audiences to discover our content in areas where we can compete and win, and we need to do it without sacrificing the reasons our local brands exist. It’s really tough. But it’s not impossible.”
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Rowland added that Reach sites frequently cover major breaking news events in which “every possible crumb of audience interest has been spun out into a breakout that finds readers by doing every angle, for every platform. That’s not about us ticking a volume box; it’s about providing the most comprehensive service to readers coming directly to us, and giving ourselves the best chance of more casual readers browsing for information landing with us (and hopefully returning).
“So yes, we need to publish at scale on the populist topics that can help us bring in the big numbers from Discover – the things you’ll routinely see topping Chartbeat – but we also need to generate that scale around the topics that our most loyal readers turn to us repeatedly for.”
In its half-year results published in July, Reach revealed page views were down 25% compared to H1 2023 due to the “ongoing impact of 2023’s referrer deprioritisation of news”. But it added: “Trends are improving and open market prices for mass scale programmatic advertising have stabilised.”
Data-driven revenues, which are based around Reach’s own audience data, affiliates, partnerships and e-commerce rather than programmatic advertising, now make up 45% of all digital revenues. However in the first half of 2024, print still made up 77% of the company’s total revenues.
In response to a Press Gazette post on X about the article target, many users shared concerns for the journalists involved.
Journalist Olivia Devereux-Evans said: “As someone who has done this… a 7-3pm shift means writing at least a story an hour, sometimes more. Sometimes I didn’t take a proper lunch break as I felt pressure to hit 8 stories and was consistently stressed about page views…”
Similarly Louis Staples said: “As someone who used to work in clickbait content farming: this puts reporters at professional and personal risk. It burns them out and leads to mistakes and a loss confidence, not to mention questionable ethical judgements in pursuit of traffic. End this model!”
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Many of the comments also focused on the user experience on Reach’s websites which can be slow to load and hard to read due to ad clutter.
Sharing a screenshot of the Cambridgeshire Live website featuring a pop-up asking for permission to send notifications alongside advertising, journalist Alex Goy said: “And this is how those stories will be presented. The problem ain’t the volume, chums, it’s that you can barely read them.”
Another X user said: “It’s 2024. First of all Reach need to design basic news sites that work then we might actually use them. The awfulness of regional news sites means people ignore them. End of chat.”
Mullen said these financial obligations have meant “we need to put a certain amount of ads on our pages.
“All that money is paid off in 2028 so we should see a gradual reduction. We’ve already launched a new platform which has managed the latency of it, which is on some of the regional titles, the Liverpool Echo, you will notice a difference, but over the last couple of years, it was pretty packed, and that is gradually getting better now…”
Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our “Letters Page” blog
Donald Trump played a strange video at his rally Wednesday meant to criticize Kamala Harris’s plan to increase taxes for the middle class. But a closer look at the video finds that none of the clips included advocated for increasing taxes on the middle class.
“She’s the taxing queen. She’s going to raise your taxes, where you’re going to be at least paying at least three thousand dollars a year more. Take a look,” Trump said before referring to the screen behind him.
Behind him, Trump played a video that edited together different times Harris had announced her plan to “get rid of that tax bill” and “get rid of that tax cut,” referring to the corporate tax rate cuts Trump had installed during his time in office. In fact, two of the included clips are of Harris explicitly talking about corporate tax rates.
Originally, the Trump administration had claimed that the corporate tax rate cuts at the center of his 2017 tax bill would boost household income by a “very conservative” estimate of $4,000 per household, according to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.
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In reality, workers who earned below an average of $114,000 saw no change in their earnings as a result of the corporate tax rate cut, while wealthy business owners and top executives reaped the benefits. Harris plans to increase the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 28 percent.
The video also contained footage of Harris saying that estate taxes “are going to have to go up.” Harris has proposed a plan to lower housing costs that would be funded primarily through changes to the federal estate tax law and an increase to the corporate tax rate.
Harris has yet to publish a proposal for increasing the yield from estate taxes, whether it would mean upping the rate or lowering the exemptions. Currently, only 0.2 percent of U.S. adults are subject to the federal estate tax, according to IRS data.
The video also contained footage of Harris’s campaign co-chair, Chris Coons, defending her plan for a 25 percent tax on unrealized capital gains. It contains another clip of Bharat Ramamurti, President Joe Biden’s former National Economic Council deputy director, explaining that the plan would only affect those with a net worth of more than $100 million, or less than 1 percent of taxpayers—a fact that Trump’s video carefully elides.
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The video also contained footage of Harris advocating for a carbon tax, which would penalize big polluters. While this could potentially increase energy costs for consumers, it is not a tax on the middle class.
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The stories that matter on money and politics in the race for the White House
Joe Biden on Wednesday pressed Benjamin Netanyahu to find a diplomatic solution to the conflict in Lebanon and minimise civilian casualties in Israel’s strikes against Hizbollah, even though previous calls for restraint from the US have fallen flat.
The US president and the Israeli prime minister spoke by phone for the first time in two months after a new flare-up in tensions between the two allies compounded by miscommunication over Israel’s approach to expanding conflict in the Middle East.
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The conversation, which was described as “direct” and “productive” by the White House, came as US officials try to limit Israel’s response to last week’s Iranian missile attack on the country and rein in its ground offensive in the south of Lebanon.
However, there are widespread doubts over Biden’s influence over Netanyahu after the Israeli prime minister has time and again ignored Washington’s pleas for more limited military operations and increased diplomatic engagement since the war in Gaza broke out in October 2023.
Those concerns have grown more acute in recent weeks, as Israel’s military has sharply increased its attacks on Hizbollah, the Iranian proxy group operating in Lebanon, directly defying Biden’s calls for a ceasefire in the region at the UN General Assembly in New York last month.
According to the White House, Biden did not call for Israel to stop all military operations in Lebanon in his conversation with Netanyahu on Wednesday.
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But he did tell the prime minister that a “diplomatic arrangement” was needed for Lebanese and Israeli civilians to return to their homes on both sides of the “blue line” — the de facto border between the countries. He also called for Israel “to minimise harm to civilians” in Lebanon, especially in the capital, Beirut.
The White House did not say whether the two leaders discussed Israel’s looming response to Iran, though the US president has warned the Israelis away from striking nuclear facilities and energy infrastructure.
But while Biden and other top US officials have repeatedly been irked and even angered by Netanyahu’s unwillingness to heed their advice, they have been unwilling to make any big changes in US policy to raise the pressure on Israel — such as an arms embargo.
“Biden has been unwilling to use his leverage over Netanyahu because of the president’s persona, policy and domestic politics, especially so close to one of the most consequential elections in modern American history,” said Aaron David Miller, an analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
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“Biden’s margin for pressuring Netanyahu contracted, [while] Netanyahu’s margin for resisting that pressure expanded,” he added.
In recent weeks, US officials have acknowledged that Israel has made what they see as tactical gains against Hizbollah in Lebanon after it killed Hassan Nasrallah, its leader, and damaged much of the group’s capacity to strike at Israel.
But Washington has also warned Israel against overplaying its hand, insisting there should be a path back to a truce.
When Netanyahu on Tuesday warned the Lebanese people in a video address to root out Hizbollah or face similar destruction to what Israel inflicted on Gaza, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, responded: “We cannot and will not see Lebanon turn into Gaza — into another Gaza.”
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Other US officials have said Israel needs to develop a better long-term vision for its place in the Middle East.
“The challenge going forward is to turn tactical wins in battle into a strategy that secures Israel’s people and its future,” Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, said at an event at the Israeli embassy in Washington this week.
“That takes real discipline, it takes courage, it takes foresight to match the conduct of war to a clear and sustainable set of objectives. That is never easy, but it’s imperative,” he added.
But many in Washington say US diplomacy towards Israel has floundered. “US policy has been trying to both deter and de-escalate at the same time, and realistically speaking, you can most effectively do one or the other, but trying to do both seems to have limited effects in both directions,” said Jonathan Lord, an analyst at the Center for a New American Security.
Craig Spokes is rebuilding his life in Northampton and has a new job after losing almost £20,000
A man said he felt “embarrassed and ashamed” after losing almost £20,000 of his inheritance in a rental scam and being evicted from his flat three weeks after he moved in.
Craig Spokes, 36, from Northampton, paid a year’s rent upfront for a flat in London to Samy Daim, who he believed was the landlord. Yet less than a month after moving in, Mr Spokes was told to leave and all his possessions were left on the street.
Mr Daim, 27, has since not responded to Mr Spokes or to the BBC’s requests for comment.
Action Fraud, the police reporting body for scams, said it was not recommending an investigation into the case.
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Social media accounts of Samy Daim show pictures of him in luxurious locations around the world
In October 2023, Mr Spokes was looking to move to London after leaving a career as a cruise ship entertainer.
He said Mr Daim had told him he was the landlord of a flat in Bloomsbury, which could be secured for a £500 a month discount if a year’s rent was paid upfront.
Mr Daim was in fact a tenant himself, renting the flat from the real landlord, but he gave Mr Spokes the keys to the property and allowed him to move in.
The BBC has seen court documents that show Mr Daim owed more than £14,000 in rent to the real landlord and this had led to bailiffs being sent to the property.
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Samy Daim’s social media profiles show him on trips to places such as Thailand, where he is pictured with elephants
The flat was listed on a letting agency website, but rather than using the company’s payment system Mr Spokes transferred £19,500 directly to Mr Daim to cover a year’s rent and deposit.
The money had come from his inheritance after his father Barry died of cancer.
Yet as he got ready for work one morning three weeks after moving, Mr Spokes was evicted by bailiffs instructed by the real landlord.
“By 08:30 everything was out on the streets,” he said. “It was a whirlwind and I was in such a state of distress. I was made to feel like a criminal.”
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‘Embarrassed and ashamed’
The experience has had a lasting impact on Mr Spokes who said he “felt so embarrassed and ashamed that I had fallen for this scam”.
He said for a period “days would go by and I couldn’t even go out”.
Mr Daim has not responded to Mr Spokes since the eviction. His social media profiles appear to show a jet-set lifestyle.
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He has not responded to BBC attempts to contact him.
instagram
Samy Daim is listed as the sole director of Cobblestone Realty Group Ltd and shown beside the beach at Key West in Florida
‘Let down’
Mr Spokes was told by the Metropolitan Police to report what had happened to Action Fraud, the national reporting centre.
Action Fraud does not have investigative powers, but assesses which cases to pass on to police forces for investigation.
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This case was not passed on and Mr Spokes said he felt “let down” by police and that it had been treated as if it was “not that serious of a crime”.
Action Fraud said reports were assessed against criteria including “the vulnerability of the victim”.
It added that it prioritised “reports most likely to present an investigative opportunity for local police forces, those where a crime is ongoing and those that present the greatest threat and harm to the victim or victims concerned”.
In 2023 Action Fraud classified 5,093 reports as rental fraud.
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‘Controls in place’
Mr Spokes said he also felt “let down” by his bank, Kroo, which said it will not repay the money.
Kroo said it has “a number of controls in place to manage financial crime and protect customer funds”.
Sam Read/BBC
Pat Coomber-Wood from Citizens Advice said people should “slow down” the process of signing a contract
‘Don’t be rushed’
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Mr Spokes said he felt like he had “double-checked” everything before transferring the money, but all the information he had been provided “was part of the scam”.
Pat Coomber-Wood, the chief executive officer of Citizens Advice West Northamptonshire and Cherwell, said anyone feeling under pressure to sign a contract should “put the brakes on – it is better to miss out than be scammed”.
She said a land registry search, which costs £3, could determine whether the person you were dealing with owned the property.
Good morning and welcome to our coverage of Hurricane Milton, the category-three storm which has hit Florida this morning.
Millions were urged to evacuate their homes in Florida as the hurricane threatens the US state’s battered Gulf Coast, with President Joe Biden warning it is a “matter of life and death”.
The storm made landfall Wednesday along Florida’s Gulf Coast, bringing powerful winds, deadly storm surge and potential flooding to much of the state.
The cyclone had maximum sustained winds of 120 mph (205 kph) as it roared ashore near Siesta Key in Sarasota County, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said.
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The storm was bringing deadly storm surge to much of Florida’s Gulf Coast, including densely populated areas such as Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Fort Myers.
Residents have been forced to flee from the area faced massive traffic jams on motorways and fuel shortages.
Milton threatens a stretch of the densely populated west coast still reeling from the impact of Hurricane Helene, which flooded homes and streets in western Florida and left at least 230 dead in September.
Tampa Mayor Jane Castor said the storm surge forecast for her city of up to 15 feet (4.5 metres) would be deep enough to swallow an entire house.
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She added: “So if you’re in it, basically that’s the coffin that you’re in.”
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