Engaging our audience

1. Engaging our audience Angela Clark Deputy editor, creative media

2. Why interactivity? • Tell me, and I will forget • Show me, and I may remember • Involve me, and I will understand -- Confucius

3. Key attributes • Control • Depth • Introspection/Interaction • Community • Comprehension

4. Control • Clear, exposed navigation divides the content into smaller topics • Viewers can skip to portions of interest and/or replay parts • Tips • Use as a standard feature of any interactive story • Try text that looks clickable (underlined) • Add recognizable visual cues; some people remember icons or images better than words • Examples • Big Picture left-side rundown • Darkest Day

5. Depth • Saves presentation space • Puts context directly where it is most relevant • Tips • Opt-out – where the presentation stops until the user makes a choice • Exposes additional information • Disrupts story line • Opt-in – asking follow-up questions or pausing to launch a slideshow • Provides a smooth transition to more information • Easily missed • Supplemental– such as factoids appearing in sequence with video • Provides clarification • Can be distracting • Examples: • Video product • Big Picture

6. Introspection • Directly challenge the audience to think about an issue • Voting/polling prompts people to express themselves • Tips • Placement driven by purpose • Consider the facts first? Put it at the end. • Disprove the viewer’s notions? Put it at the beginning. • Taking the audience’s pulse? It becomes the segment. • Dissect an issue into many smaller points requiring ‘yes’, ‘no’, and ‘unsure’ • Broad vote topics illicit more gut reaction • Decide whether to show the results before, during or after a vote • Consider the impact results will have on the viewer • Examples • The Week in Pictures • NBA Legends

7. Community • Connects viewers with the story • Audience is part of the presentation by leaving their mark or interacting with each other • Tips • Include a ‘write-us’ and ‘e-mail this’ button somewhere that’s clearly visible during the entire presentation • Read viewer e-mail • Consider soliciting viewer opinions and then using them in the piece • Examples • StrikeOut! • The Year in Pictures

8. Comprehension • The active, involved viewer is more likely to retain information than the passive viewer • Active = listening, reading and making connections • Tips • With complicated issues, emphasize key phrases with text in synch with audio • Add third-party analysis where appropriate to give the viewer perspective • Break up audio tracks with short pauses, sound bites or sound effects • Ask viewers to perform tasks that teach • Examples • Baggage screener • Enron 101

9. Uniqueness • Some things the Internet can do that other media just can’t • When done well, is memorable and brings viewers back for more

10. How do we know we’re effective? • Immediate response: • Page views • Unique users • Clickthrough • E-mail • ‘Behavioral’ analysis

11. Longer-term • Lessons we learn: • Engage people longer, encourage greater % participation • Better decisions on best content for interactivity • Technology to make production faster