Blog News Watch

It seems you’re depending on the list you’re looking at; either Impact strikes at number one or number three on the News Values list.

When I was studying journalism, impact was the first on the list, but the list of news values that I used to plan this series had it down on number three. I wish I’d picked up on this before, but it is how it is.

In my opinion, Impact is the most important news value in the world.

Consider these two example story headlines:

Neighbors Fight Over Fencing

OR

Mother Kills Daughter During Fight About Preschool

Both headlines possess the news value of conflict (timeliness isn’t apparent but can be assumed), but which one has more sheer Impact?

Nobody cares about neighbors fighting over fencing, but when a mother kills her daughter because she doesn’t want to go to preschool, the reactions are certainly not so apathetic. Why? Because the story, and the events, made an impact.

When does impact occur?

According to a dictionary, when something has a strong effect on someone. That means when it offends their sensibilities, makes them emotional, or has to do with something the reader has a Strong Emotional Investment in.

The higher the Strong Emotional Investment, the higher the impact

Impact is all about emotions, so think about your readership and what the people in your niche are likely to be emotionally affected by. Remember, impact doesn’t always have to be negative, and I believe that we need more positivity in our information channels while the mainstream media does nothing but pump hate, war, violence and doom into our heads.

So do me a personal favor, and when you first try implementing Impact in your articles, try and make it a positive impact.

It’s a good idea to sit down and really analyze the type of readership you’re likely to attract. What creates Impact in a story depends on your niche and readership a lot more than most other news values.

Here’s what you do: define what your readers have a Strong Emotional Investment in, and what they have a Weak Emotional Investment in (what they don’t care about). You can leverage your list by writing stories with the following components:

• A criticism of something the readership has a Strong Emotional Investment in
• An article criticizing someone who has attacked or done something to damage the subject of your reader’s SEI (this will gain you favor with the audience as their “voice”)
• An article that connects a topic readers have a Weak Emotional Investment in with something an SEI, therefore making their emotional investment in it stronger and opening up further possibilities for future articles

How you use Impact is up to you, but learning to define it is the first step.