After decades as a business reporter and shopping correspondent John Cokley has turned his attention to the news business in the book Shopping News. In a special guest post for the Online Journalism Blog he lists ’16 models for journalistic action’ and details ways that publishers could think about range, price and labelling their products better.

In 2004 I began to develop the theory that shopping showed us three things that journalists and news publishers could really use in our business every day to prevent our businesses from going broke. If only we could work out:

• “What people want”
• “What they’re willing to pay money for”, and
• “How much they’re willing to pay”

Surely making a living in journalism means enticing people to buy your product, or at least to invest time in it?

Perhaps it would be a good idea to find out what people were already buying and investing their time in. Continue reading →