By Andrea Lee

In 2010, I was part of a relatively new Community Team at one of this country’s major news companies. It was the early days of sharing news content on social media, namely Facebook and Twitter. We were the toe-dippers, experimenting to see what worked and what didn’t. Ultimately, our job was to drive traffic to the company’s website, where readers could consume more news stories and, as a result, see more ads. 

As I remember it, the benefits of posting our content on these platforms were great; we could literally watch a story spread (go viral!) by tracking its reach using data and analytics software. There was an urgency to get the story up and out, based on the idea that the first outlet to post their link on social would take the lead in terms of shares, likes and comments, amplifying our story even more. 

Now the Online News Act (Bill C-18) threatens to compel large tech companies that share news to bargain with outlets over a “fair value” for news content on their platforms. Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has boldly refused to pay and declared last month that it would end news availability for all users in Canada before the Act takes effect later this year. On July 5, the editor in chief of CBC News said his company’s Instagram account had disappeared: more than 6,700 posts from the CBC News Instagram account, along with the many more thousands of corresponding likes, comments and thumbnails, were gone. That’s a lot of engagement. It’s also a lot of taxpayer-funded hours spent strategizing, writing captions, sizing images, moderating comments and monitoring data.

The most disturbing impact of this is not that an Instagram account with more than 600,000 followers has gone blank. It’s that the news, already an industry under fire and declining in consumption, has lost one more channel for reaching existing and potential audiences — in Instagram’s case, an audience that skews heavily to 18- to 24-year-olds. According to the 2023 Reuters Digital News Survey, released in June, the weekly reach – that is, the percent of weekly usage – of Canada’s three most-consumed outlets has declined since 2022. On TV and radio, CTV’s reach dropped from 33% to 27% year-over-year; Global News and CBC News each dropped from 31% to 26% and 22%, respectively. Online, reach also dipped for CBCNews.ca (23% to 19%) and CTVNews.ca (22% to 18%). GlobalNews.ca ticked upwards, but only slightly, from 17% to 18%. 

The connection between news consumption and brands may seem tenuous – but it’s not. According to the 2023 Proof Strategies CanTrust Index, news on traditional media (TV, radio, print) is the source Canadians trust most for reliable information; news on a news website is the fifth-most-trusted source. Furthermore, Canadians trust journalists more than they trust bankers, business executives, politicians or celebrities. When a business executive has an opportunity to connect with their target audience via the news, they’re more likely to be trusted. News earns trust, and statistics show that brands do better when they’re trusted. 

According to a January survey by Ipsos Reid, when price and quality are equal, 87% of consumers say they’ll more often choose products and services from the company they trust more. Eighty percent will stay loyal to that company. At a time when companies are fighting to attract and retain top talent, it’s also important to know that 86% of those surveyed are more likely to work for the company they trust more.

As some companies take a wait-and-see approach to Bill C-18 – will the federal government and the tech companies succeed in brokering a détente? – they should also consider new ways of bolstering trust with their audiences. 

It’s well-established that no brand should rely too heavily on a single channel if they want to maximize audience reach. Notwithstanding Bill C-18, earned media is and will continue to be a highly credible and trusted source of information for Canadians. When it is combined with owned and paid approaches, the value it delivers to clients is tremendous.  

For years, PR professionals have urged their clients to approve and create copy that’s written in a more journalistic way. Some do, but many conflate ad copy with brand journalism. As they shift their attention from earned media to owned, social and paid content, then, they should double down on thinking more like journalists. That means putting the audience first, and developing narratives that are relevant and deliver value to them. It means asking, “What will my audience benefit from knowing?” rather than “What do I want my audience to know?” It means embedding editorial thinking into the earliest stages of strategic and creative development to ensure relevance at every stage of the audience relationship. 

But commercial brands – and their senior marketers – can do more than this.

Declining news consumption is a problem – not just because it means lower revenues for news companies or social media networks but because news is fundamental to democracy. Being informed about our communities and the world around us keeps us engaged in them – and being engaged is what ensures we have some authority over how they operate. 

As our 2023 CanTrust Index found, a majority of Canadians say they’re more likely to trust brands that advocate for positive social change. So, as brands continue to invest in their ESG strategies and champion improvements to society, they must also acknowledge the important role that access to news plays in the successful functioning of that society. If news coverage earns trust and trust breeds loyalty, it’s clear that Canada’s business leaders must favour a society where news is easily available and accessible.

Andrea Lee is VP, earned media, at Proof Strategies.