The battle for reach, revenue, relevance and respectability was highlighted by CEOs and news leaders at the 2024 Global News Forum, as well as the opportunity to capitalise on the trend towards the personalisation of news services.

Thai PBS Executive Advisor Thepchai Yong said one of the key challenges today was instilling confidence in the industry at a time when some newsrooms were being forced to cut jobs and reduce output due to falling audiences and revenue. “What is most worrying is the potential disappearance of a diversity of news sources. It means that the role of the media in reporting truth, in being a galleon of truth…will be really affected by the diminishing number of established media outlets. The role of the media as a watchdog in holding those in power accountable will also be affected.”

He said while we are probably only seeing the tip of the iceberg in terms of the impact of new technologies, such as Generative AI, there were opportunities too. “There will be a trend to more customization, localization, personalization of news. So that should provide a good opportunity for established media to meet that kind of need in the future.” He also encouraged news organisations to provide a forum for a diversity of views and opinions.

Francis Toral, Head of ABS-CBN News in the Philippines, said the future of news would be determined by “reach, revenue, relevance and respectability”. She explained: “Because less people are watching us and therefore our reach has become less, TV advertising revenue is going down.” She added: “There’s news avoidance, news fatigue, it cannot be denied. And audiences are now preferring content creators and influencers versus mainstream media. And that effects our respectability.”

She said ABS-CBN was responding by protecting and optimising its legacy, continuing to improve what it has, promoting a digital first strategy and telling stories in a way that “captures and captivates audiences”. She encouraged news editors and journalists to think like the audience, deliver unique content, and to explore opportunities to attract international audiences on digital platforms. “If we do the same thing, in the same way, we cannot expect different results.”

The Director-General at RTM Malaysia, Suhaimi Sulaiman, said RTM tested a hypothesis about reduced attention spans before reducing bulletin durations and changing their reporting style. “We felt that people’s attention span is getting shorter and shorter, and they don’t read any more. And they don’t like long nightly news. So, we experimented. We shortened our one-hour news…and we condensed everything into a 15-minute news but we had more stories in that news. The ratings, the viewership, for some of the news programs increased by 100 per cent, some 200 per cent, and some by 300 per cent. That’s a lot for us. That’s on the terrestrial side. And we are also building audiences on OTT, on digital.”

He said one of the key challenges was unlearning traditional approaches to journalism that focused on who, what, where, when, why and how to instead focus on what was engaging for audiences, including using animations and cartoon graphics to explain issues. “We realised we needed to unlearn some of the things that were taught in journalism schools.” He added: “Our reporters now are trained to think like marketeers – that is thinking about the needs and wants of your customers. And it has worked for us. Find the balance between nation building, doing your job as a true journalist and editor – and at the same time you must make sure you have the numbers. If not, you are not attractive to the advertisers.”

He added: “Moving forward, get AI, get the robots to do all the menial work for you…while you do higher level thinking – that’s the marketing part, the story-telling part – and most importantly, what is your unique selling proposition.”

The Head of Digital Growth at CNA Singapore, Lyn-Yi Chung, said one of the biggest issues was news fatigue, and editors should move away from always leading bulletins with sad and bad news based on the traditional approach of ‘íf it bleeds, it leads’. “Platforms are withdrawing from news – you see headlines like Facebook is no longer friends with news…TikTok suppresses certain topics on news…so you have all these platforms that are trying to package the news in a safe manner for their users, that might not come to their platforms specifically for news. And therefore, our reach has been curtailed, it limits our revenue opportunities overall as well. So this is an opportunity for us to reinvent ourselves.”

She said CNA was an audience-first organisation. “The viewer you are in the morning is not the same viewer at night. We have to prepare for asymmetric consumption of news. News should not be ephemeral; it should be searchable.” She said news content should be modular, meta-tagged properly and available on a range of platforms. Lyn-Yi added: “The one thing I would say to all broadcasters and publishers, is that yes – you are used to being that authoritative, credible source, but actually people just want to soothe their anxieties in a very fractured and difficult world. So how can you reinvent yourself as a smart, informed, trusted friend…The key thing is coming across as authentic and sincere. And that’s where I see a tremendous opportunity for broadcasters like us. Essentially, video is having its moment, because video transports you to a time and place, at that moment, and that authenticity you cannot recreate oftentimes with other kinds of media.”

Ömer Faruk Tanrıverdi, Deputy Director General and Head of International Broadcasts at TRT Türkiye, said news leaders should be open to innovation in the digital age and should not see AI or technological developments as a risk but as an opportunity. He said: “We need to prepare well, improve our quality, and be ready for our competitors. I am very positive about the future of news. We need to be optimistic, but it’s really about bringing stakeholders together. We must stand united and build the future together.” He said TRT would soon launch a super app, that would enable audiences to tailor and personalise news services.

He added: “I would like to say let us seize leadership in shaping the future of news through innovation. Commit to truth and transparency, ensuring journalism relies on a beacon of reliability. AI isn’t just changing journalism; it’s changing our mission as well from tailored content to global fact-checking. We are building a future where every story matters, every voice is heard, and truth prevails.  And we should create the future all together, not just as ABU, EBU, African union, the other unions as well, as public broadcasters all over the world.”