Letter from our President and CEO
I don’t think there are many surprises left in the journalism profession these days, but you can never be too sure. Over the email transom last month came news – or at least it was news to me – that the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies was offering courses in “brand journalism.”
And I quote:
“Brand journalism applies the perspectives, skills and techniques of a reporter to the promotion of a brand. More and more organizations use journalistic techniques to tell their brand stories and engage larger audiences. In the second course of the Certificate in Brand Journalism & Multimedia Storytelling, you’ll learn the art and science of brand journalism….”
The pitch goes on to single out key skills the course can provide a student including “effective storytelling techniques” and learning to “recognize the strategic importance of digital brand journalism in marketing”.
If you thought this was an atomic upgrading of the old-fashioned, humble and often disputatious notion of “advertorial” journalism, you would get an A+. It is a sign, too, of some of the transitional game playing going on within the broadest concepts of journalism and journalism education. Simultaneously, the people deploying brands are going through transitions as well. One of the great taboos in virtually all advertising was to avoid political messages for fear of alienating the very people advertisers were trying to appeal to. In our new Trumpian era, many brands are taking to preaching about society and citizenship, both directly and indirectly (Coca Cola, for example, or Starbucks or Airbnb). All this would seem to present something of a challenge for an organization like the National NewsMedia Council, which tries to deal with dispute resolution and ethical standards in the straight-forward, non-advertorial media. But perhaps not, as I shall try to explain...
But first a digression. Your observer here knows “brand” journalism because it is as old as journalism. In my particular case, my introduction to it was somewhat covert. It was at the old Toronto Telegram (or 'Tely') in the early 1970s and largely confined to the real estate and travel sections, although not unknown in the entertainment pages. I will refrain from a broad brush here and just report my own experience with covert advertorial. I got an unwanted and irritating assignment, out of the blue, during my first full year of a professional life in journalism. The assignment was to go out to a new housing development in the outskirts of Toronto and write a story on a significant housing development. I was to interview the director of communications of the project and visit a model, decorated (but unoccupied) home. Although it wasn’t in the memo, I was told there was excitement in management because the company was taking two full pages of ads for three Saturday editions of the Telys in a row and, well…there was more than a wink-wink here.
I was 24, a child of Watergate reportage and utterly outraged and four months into the job. I went up to the duty editor, whose name was Tim Porter, and flung the assignment sheet back on his desk. “I don’t do crap like this,” I replied, head full of steam. He read the note, looked up at me, looked back at the note, and said: “Of course you don’t. I’ll take it back if you like and reassign it to a professional journalist. Sorry for making the mistake of thinking that’s what you were.” Then he proceeded to go back to the copy he was editing.
I stood motionless in front of his desk, a bit like a dumb ox. I actually couldn’t move I was so angry. Eventually, he looked up at me and said: “Is there anything else?” I asked what he meant by the dig at my professionalism. “Oh,” he said, “nothing in particular. I just know that a professional journalist knows that there is no assignment which can’t be handled professionally. This is obviously news to you.”
I must have stood there for another eternity, but eventually, as he continued to ignore me, I reached down, snatched the assignment paper and slunk back to my desk. I had a plan. I booked a visit to the development for myself and a Tely photographer, made arrangements for a tour and an interview and after I had done everything “professionally” I went back to some of the non-model homes that were already occupied and started asking the owners how they liked their new homes. It turned out there were problems. And such problems! Faulty wiring, leaks, badly poured concrete in the basement: there was a little list before I completed my “professional” inquiries. I put it all in my story, along with some choice quotes from people who were prepared to have their names used because they were so cheesed off at the shoddy work.
The story never ran, with or without a byline. No one ever got back to me to explain why, or castigate me, except Tim who sent me a note simply saying, as I recall: “nice to learn you are a professional journalist after all”. The Tely ran a page of display pictures with cutlines supplied, I assumed, by the developer.
An officially branded “Brand Journalist” will not, I suspect, get away with that approach today, but for the NNC this is not such a conundrum as it might seem. If there is an article or a special section of brand or advertorial journalism printed in a members’ newspaper or digital platform, and there are perceived errors of facts complained about by a member of the public, then we would certainly examine the complaint. Actually, if it’s a member’s paper or platform, we would have no choice. We would have to decide if it was worthy of the Council’s deliberations. We would not be able to engage the member’s editors about the complaint, however, because the editor would never have had any responsibility for the piece. But we would pass it along to the publisher, thereby putting the onus on answering the complaint on him or her.
If we can resolve the complaint appropriately, we won’t hesitate from taking it on. Of course, a certain kind of advertorial complaint may be more appropriately lodged with Advertising Standards Canada, which is what we might suggest to a complainant. Or maybe it is a simple misunderstanding of humour and we would try to explain it that way, respecting whatever it was that caused the complainant to complain. Whatever. If something is carried in a member’s outlet we will make a recommendation about its validity and direction for resolution, one way or another. That’s what we do here. You could say it’s our brand.
- John Fraser
