New Media Bytes | Online journalism, web production and promotion

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I often hear young print journalists lamenting the disconnect between their paper’s printed product and online presence. Sometimes I forget that not everyone is in love with the web like I am.

I admit too, about five years ago, I didn’t view the web with revelry. Print was where it was at. It had prestige, notoriety and I thought if I wasn’t in traditional media, well, I wasn’t a real journalist.

That’s changed. After some time on the web, I realized the print product and the online arm are two different entities and should be addressed in unique ways. Believe it or not, the two sides have different audiences and often different content. All that said, here’s the reasons why your website shouldn’t necessarily reflect the paper’s A1

1. Timeliness! What was written on deadline yesterday isn’t likely news anymore, especially if the nightly newscasts already broke the story. Put the story online immediately and create an analysis piece with a shorter version of the original story in the morning paper.

2. Your online audience has different interests. CNN.com teased a story on their front page with the headline “Worst things to say at work.” Why is this a great thing to have on the homepage? Because most news site viewers throughout the day are surfing from the workplace. Give them something that directly affects them!

3. Your audience wants to be seen and heard. Finding space on the front page for a reader’s quote may not be so easy, but some of a publication’s most important content comes from its users. Highlight it on your homepage through links to comments, featured comments, links to user blog posts and user photos. This will help build a stronger relationship with your audience, helping them feel a part of the product.

4. Print headlines don’t always make sense on the web. A real zinger in the paper is great for sending a quick message. The same can’t be said for online. Headlines must be clear, succinct and tell all the information the reader needs to know. If you pumping out the same headlines your printing in your paper, your stories will likely be lost on the web.

5. Story packages online should have supporting stories, links. There’s not enough paper to fit all the refers some stories have. There’s certainly not enough room to link to related YouTube videos and stories from other papers.

6. People digest information online differently. Readers often scan headlines in a newspaper, but the practice is even more prevalent on the web. You might hook a site user into reading a tease, but you won’t get a 100 percent click-through rate on all stories on your homepage. That said, it’s important to focus on creating quick, complete info teases that can draw the reader in.

The Editors Weblog notes that nearly everything “from headline, to body, to accompanying images” needs to be altered online:

Pressed for time, they scan the headlines and maybe a paragraph or two to get an idea of what’s happening in the world. If a subject interests them more, they don’t necessarily seek nitty-gritty details so much as analysis, the “why” and the “what does this mean”.

7. You have more content! You have access to videos, blogs, user-generated content and links to external sites. Tell me you can work those into the front page of your daily. Use your front page to its full capacity. Your news org is more than what it can put in print (at least you should be).

What do you think? Any other reasons the the print and online side shouldn’t be mirror images? Any reason A1 should be the same as the online homepage?