Brand journalism

Brand journalism, or content that is created, sponsored, or curated by a company or organization, is a style of marketing that focuses on creating a superior experience for the customer through targeted interactions with the brand. Through content marketing strategies, brands increase the awareness and trust in their brands, engage with customers in an ultra-focused manner that directly meets the customers’ needs, and unequivocally demonstrate the industry-expert status of the brand itself. Opponents of the method believe it blurs the lines of straightforward, unbiased journalism and compromises the integrity of that field. Proponents argue that it is the best way to meet the needs of modern-day consumers in ways those consumers prefer to be approached. Either way, brand journalism is one of the most commonly used and successful modern advertising methods.

Background

In the book, Brand Journalism, author Andy Bull defines this concept as “journalism produced on behalf of a brand.” He notes that it is a mix of traditional journalism, marketing, and public relations. At its core, brand journalism is branded content marketing, or content created by a brand to increase general knowledge of the brand, the product, the industry, or the customer base. It is used for advertising or customer information purposes.

Brand journalism has evolved ever since it was created and first used successfully in the early twenty-first century by Larry Light, then Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for the McDonald’s restaurant chain. McDonald’s had long been a global brand by 2003, but at that time, sales were slowing considerably. Feedback from customers, franchise owners, and food industry experts proved that the brand was not meeting expectations and needed to change. Instead of applying the feedback toward success, McDonald’s believed they did not need to change, just grow. With their intent of being a restaurant that serves burgers and fries to a worldwide market, they determined expansion—to meet more people’s needs—was the best plan. Instead, the plan was met with increased criticism that the company was outdated and too large to make the needed adjustments toward meeting customer and franchise needs.

By 2004, Light’s modifications to the company’s structure, methods of operations, focus, and marketing strategies had turned the company back toward success. Experts agreed it was an amazing demonstration of realignment for a big brand. Light’s transformations included redesigning and refurbishing all the brand’s restaurants, retraining staff to be focused on meeting customer needs, updating the menu to offer a wider variety, and repackaging the food and presenting it in a different way. He also refocused the company’s marketing strategies toward a new approach that he called “brand journalism.”

Light’s new approach moved away from the popular marketing mindset of brand positioning, wherein a brand highlights its unique selling proposition—or what makes it the best choice for customers. Light saw this as too broad, and engineered his approach toward appealing to each different market segment in a unique way that best represented what they wanted from the brand. In the pursuit of making the McDonald’s brand demand-driven rather than supply-driven, Light focused the company specifically toward providing each customer with the perfect brand experience.

Traditional journalism and marketing are designed to appeal to the masses. Light narrowed down the focus of the brand’s message to meeting the specific needs of key audience segments, and identified the contexts in which the brand could meet those needs. He created a whole new approach to serving customers—and increasing brand loyalty—that changed the entire marketing industry for the modern brand and consumers forever.

Overview

The Content Marketing Institute defines brand journalism, which is also called content marketing, as “a marketing technique of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience—with the objective of driving profitable customer action.” In short, it is the process communicating with customers without including a sales pitch. Brand journalism has significant similarities and differences between it and the two markets into which it crosses over: journalism and marketing. Additionally, while some experts think it is the most successful marketing method ever created, especially for today’s modern consumers, other experts believe it has reduced the credibility of true journalism and blurred the lines of truthful marketing.

Comparison to traditional journalism

Although brand journalism may not sound much different than traditional journalism, there are distinct differences. These differences include the approach of the work, as well as the intent behind it and purpose for presenting it.

Primarily, true journalism takes an unbiased report-the-facts approach. It provides data and timelines, along with an independent analysis of what is presented, toward the purpose of educating the audience. Branded content uses a similar approach as it presents the facts in an informative way. However, with branded content, the information presented may be done so in a way that is biased toward the brand sponsoring the work, and therefore, steps outside a true journalistic approach. In creating the content to meet a brand or customer base need, the brand itself is providing what it sees as the best answer—and which always includes the brand’s products or services as the recommended solutions. In this way, the branded content represents only one specific method to meet the need, which is not necessarily the research-backed, proven way it should be met.

Secondarily, the intent of journalistic writing is to inform, and in some cases, entertain or gain the interest of the audience to keep them coming back for more. The intent of brand journalism is also to keep customers coming back for more, but the true purpose of the work is to drive customers to the brand itself, helping them feel like they are making strong consumer decisions in the process. With respect to entertaining the audience, brand journalism is not much different than traditional marketing in that way.

Lastly, in the past, to be a true journalist, an individual benefitted from having a college degree or experience in investigating and reporting skills. With the advent of brand journalism, any person with basic writing skills, cursory knowledge of marketing practices, and the drive to see the brand succeed could be considered a brand journalist.

Comparison to traditional marketing

Brand journalism differs from traditional marketing in that it is not focused on a sales hook, but rather, in meeting an identified need within the customer base or industry. Whereas marketing’s major focus is to sell products or services to customers, brand journalism is different in that the approach is not geared toward convincing the customer to buy. Instead, it is geared toward helping them understand the product better so they can make an informed decision that it is the best option on the market to meet their needs.

Additionally, whereas traditional marketing focuses on the product, content marketing focuses on the customer. This includes what the customer needs, questions or concerns the customer might have, and comparisons among brands the customer might be researching, and means giving them the answers to all their questions without them realizing you were doing it, and in doing so, making the brand look like experts.

Although the primary goals of increasing the brand’s customer base and increasing brand loyalty are always at the forefront of both traditional marketing and brand journalism, in the latter, the approach is geared toward reaching customers through their own interests, rather than presenting only the interests of the company.

Arguments about brand journalism

Andy Bull states that opponents of brand journalism believe the practice undermines journalistic integrity, and creates a reality wherein unbiased accounts or information are no longer shared freely and without underlying intent. These individuals believe that journalistic writing should rely on accurate, unbiased information and be used primarily as a forum for holding those in power accountable to the common people. They feel that intermixing marketing with this type of work only will serve to turn journalism into an offshoot branch of marketing and advertising, rather than keeping it a separate entity.

Conversely, Bull argues that brand-sponsored journalism has been around since the dawn of the first newspaper, and this is just the newest iteration in that trajectory of growth. He argues that newspapers, radio stations, and TV stations are all owned by brands that monitor and curate the content shown to the public, and brand-based bias is nothing new to the field of journalism. Additionally, with the advent of social media and brands’ realizations of how these platforms could be used to interact with customers, Bull argues the market itself has fundamentally changed, and there is no going back to the old separation of journalism and marketing.

Best practices for successful brand journalism approaches

Successful brand journalists, or content marketers, understand that it’s not just about creating relevant, value-driven content that engages the target audience. They recognize that delivering trustworthy, informed, engaging content will produce stronger levels of trust in the brand, and will ultimately lead to larger pools of consumers with deeper brand loyalty. Best practices for brand journalists include producing and curating a wide range of content types and delivering them through a selection of methods, being diligent in their adherence to journalistic standards and transparent when those standards have been compromised, and utilizing technologies for efficiency.

• Expand reach through variety. Extending the reach, and therefore the impact, of branded content is key to success. Brands that engage audiences across multiple platforms and via a variety of methods, are more likely to reach the greatest number of potential customers the highest number of times with the greatest impact. Producing a variety of content through blogs, storytelling videos, ebooks, printed media, marketing emails, and partnered advertising pieces, allows brands to engage the largest segment of available audience possible. Additionally, utilizing content that emphasizes or encourages audience engagement will create a dialogue with customers, and keep the content from feeling one-sided.
• Be diligent, authentic, and transparent. Branded newsrooms should seek to be diligent in ensuring they are providing not just relevant content, but also accurate content with reliable statistics. Created and curated content marketing stories should be representative of the integrity expected from true journalistic articles, and be transparent in admitting when they’ve gone off-track in meeting this expectation. This creates a higher level of trust in the content, and with the brand itself, which is the ultimate goal of brand content. The content should be presented in a style intriguing to the target audience, and the content must read like it is authentic in its message rather than like ad-copy. Instead of a call-to-action like is used in advertising, brand journalism articles encourage interaction on a different level or of a different type.
• Utilize technologies. There are dozens of platforms on the market that allow the average person to create and distribute meaningful content. Taking advantage of these tools and new ones that come into play allow content marketers to stay ahead of the curve by conducting their work most efficiently. In 2006, Henry Jenkins published Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. In the book, he discussed how these platforms have blurred the lines between producer and consumer and between, between professional and the amateur. The most successful brand publishers are those that utilize the technologies most efficient for the task.

Studies in success

There are four basic models for successfully utilizing a brand journalism approach: Focusing on brand awareness, focusing on sharing industry news, focusing on creating or sponsoring content, and focusing on content as a way to generate customer leads. Ziprecruiter's blog, which features career advice, employer advice, company news, labor market insights, and links to the company's podcast and Breakroom, a job comparison site, is a hub for the company's multifaceted capabilities and reach. The utilization of polls, visuals, statistics, and personal testimonies has helped build the company's brand journalism and credibility. Another example is Marriott Bonvoy Traveler, a website published by the hotel and travel company Marriott International. The website features travel quizzes, testimonials, content about food, style, activities, sports, and wellness, and options for finding the ideal Marriott property for business or leisure.

Bibliography

Bull, Andy. Brand Journalism. Amazon Publishing, 2013.

“Employment Tips, Tricks, & Trends.” ZipRecruiter, www.ziprecruiter.com/blog/?ref=blog.stacker.com. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

Gilbert, Darren. “A Close Look at Brand Journalism.” Media Update, 3 Dec. 2015, www.mediaupdate.co.za/marketing/85589/a-close-look-at-brand-journalism. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

Lyons, Dan. “The CMO’s Guide to Brand Journalism.” Hubspot, 2015, www.hubspot.com/cmos-guide-to-brand-journalism/four-models. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

Marriott Bonvoy Traveler: Travel Tips, traveler.marriott.com/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

May, Tom. “7 Great Examples of Branded Content.” CreativeBloq, 22 June 2018, www.creativebloq.com/branding/7-great-examples-branded-content-61620674. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

Newman, Daniel. “The State of Brand Journalism: Are Brands Becoming the Media?” Forbes, 8 Dec. 2015, www.forbes.com/sites/danielnewman/2015/12/08/the-state-of-brand-journalism-are-brands-becoming-the-media/#e9bafc91fba9. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.

“What Is Brand Journalism — and Why It Matters.” NYT Licensing, nytlicensing.com/latest/marketing/brand-journalism-and-why-it-matters/. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.