How Sqoop helps business journalists find news
Steven Goldsmith of the Puget Sound Business Journal interviewed Bill Hankes, the CEO of Seattle-based Sqoop, the service that helps business reporters find stories in public documents. Here is an excerpt: How will you scale? Our demand has been pretty brisk, with our base of reporters growing 40 percent month over month. Very soon, one in […]
The Ambrose Bierce of business journalism
Matt Phillips of Quartz interviewed Wall Street Journal personal finance columnist Jason Zweig about his new book, “The Devil’s Financial Dictionary,” and personal finance advice. Here is an excerpt: How much of [the proliferation of financial jargon] is our fault as financial journalists? We’ve got to have a quote that explains why the market is […]
Get your head in the game, business reporter
If you’re a business journalist, you have to have your head in the game the moment you walk through the office door. Earlier even. Like the movie says, money never sleeps. So your beat or assignment could have, quite literally, had a major change overnight. Sure, that can happen in any journalistic area. But for […]
Insight: Covering Black Friday — The new Olympics
We previously described earnings season as a business journalist’s version of Christmas. Well if it’s Christmas, then Black Friday is a business journalist’s Olympics. Black Friday and the days that follow force retail reporters to race around shopping centers searching for an interesting take on what is as nothing short of a marathon. The National Retail Federation, […]
Take Talking Biz News’ social media survey
Social media has become a part of our everyday lives, and reporters seem to be using it more than ever. We at Talking Biz News want to know how often you use social often and what you’re using it for. TAKE THE SURVEY HERE. In October, the Columbia Journalism Review detailed journalists use of social […]
FT reporter: Biz reporting is “people making mistakes and errors and strokes of genius”
Tyler Rothmar of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan profiles Leo Lewis, a Financial Times correspondent in Tokyo. Rothmar writes, “Although he writes on a variety of topics, financial journalism is closest to his heart. ‘When it’s done well,’ he says, ‘you overlay a narrative and treat it as any other kind of journalism, in that you’re […]
Dear beat reporters: You better know other sectors as well
There are lots of business sectors. And they are fun to cover. And not just as individual beats, but as a group. “Sectors? Careful, you’re dating yourself,” said an editor acquaintance during a recent meeting. She gestured out at the vast newsroom beyond her office. “Most of the kids out there wouldn’t know what you’re […]
When CEOs complain about negative business coverage
Olivia Barrow, a reporter for the Milwaukee Business Journal, writes about how chief executive officers and other business executives complain that they only receive negative coverage from the financial media. Barrow writes, “In my case, writing for a local business publication, I write stories that aim to help businesses grow by giving them leads they […]
How Barry Newman became the WSJ front-page king
Barry Newman spent 43 years at The Wall Street Journal with one goal in mind: Getting a broader readership for his front-page stories than just business executives and economists. “The real challenge was not whether to write business news or not,” said Newman on Monday. “The leap was to write for a general news audience […]
A monkey or a business reporter?
Olivia Barrow, a reporter for the Milwaukee Business Journal, writes on LinkedIn about how she tries to go beyond reporting stories that a monkey could do, such as rewriting news releases and earnings. Here are two of her suggestions: Know your value, and don’t get bogged down in anything that doesn’t provide value. I can write […]
