By Ashante-Ra, BlackVoice USA
Multinational professional services company Deloitte has joined forces with a consortium of Black-owned newspapers to launch a pilot project called The Exchange. Together, they will create and distribute business content tailored for diverse audiences.
News media diversity is still a work in progress, especially at the national level. According to a 2019 survey by the American Society of News Editors, people of color represent less than 22% of the workforce in US newsrooms. The Exchange aims to support local, diverse-owned publishers financially, bring specialized business content to their audiences, and establish a new model of collaboration among the participants.
“As the name implies, this project is a true exchange,” said Kwasi Mitchell, chief purpose officer at Deloitte. “We are providing support to amplify diverse voices, which can help drive equity in the media landscape in these communities. In doing so, we are also learning from our publishing collaborators what issues are most critical to their readers, expanding our connection to those communities, and growing awareness of our business.”
“There are literally hundreds of micro and small businesses in our local markets that will benefit greatly from the stories created through and by this collaboration.”
Five publishers from the Word In Black collaborative – The Atlanta Voice, New York Amsterdam News, Houston Defender Network, AFRO-American Newspapers (Baltimore and D.C.), and The Seattle Medium – will work directly with Deloitte on the content during the six-month pilot project.
Additional Black-owned media companies, including Black Voice News, will distribute the content to audiences. The Michigan Chronicle, The New Pittsburgh Courier, The Chicago Defender, The Charlotte Post, The Sacramento Observer, The Washington Informer, The Dallas Weekly, The St. Louis American, and The Precinct Reporter will also contribute to extending the reach of the project through the Local Media Association (LMA) and the Local Media Consortium (LMC).
Financial and Business Impact
The Exchange is being managed by LMA and LMC and will be supported by advertising and syndicated to a wider audience through this network of Black-owned media companies. The project will focus on the financial and business impact on economic opportunity, exploring such topics as health equity, the impact of technology on business, environmental sustainability, financial literacy, and the future of work. The first in an ongoing series of articles is expected to focus on the impact of home ownership on the wealth gap, and will be included at theexchangelocal.com and on all the 15 participating diverse audience-serving publisher sites, all of which will be part of a larger ad buy to support the project.
Dr. Frances Toni Draper, CEO and publisher of The AFRO in Baltimore and DC, said the project would be especially beneficial to small businesses in The AFRO’s community that often don’t have access to this kind of information. “There are literally hundreds of micro and small businesses in our local markets that will benefit greatly from the stories created through and by this collaboration,” she said.
Software and consulting company Knotch is providing the LMA and LMC with the technology to measure the content’s effectiveness. Participating publishers can further benefit from branded content media buys. LMA and LMC will conduct audience research, including focus groups and surveys, in local markets to help determine article topics for business-focused content. They will also provide participating local news organizations with analytics tools to better understand who is reading their content and to track audience engagement.
“The project works on several levels,” said Julia Campbell, chief business transformation officer of LMA and general manager of a branded content collaboration between the two organizations. “It offers support to local media and serves readers who often don’t have access to this kind of business content.”
