Business Insider hires Gell as its long-form editor

Aaron Gell, former interim editor at The New York Observer and editorial director at The Upswing, has been hired at Business Insider to lead an effort to bring magazine-style features to the site, reports Johana Bhuiyan of Capital New York.

He will start Nov. 18.

Bhuiyan writes, “‘He is a highly experienced editor with great ideas, and the writers he has worked with rave about him,’ founder Henry Blodget told Capital. ‘Aaron’s mission will be to help us produce in-depth features that our readers love, and we can’t wait for him to start.’

“Following Capital’s report on Business Insider’s six-figure investment in a features department, Blodget published this job listing soliciting applications from ‘All Excellent Magazine Editors.’

“‘I’ve been a loyal reader since the SAI (Silicon Alley Insider) days, and I’ve been incredibly impressed with BI’s recent long-form pieces, especially Nicholas Carlson’s Marissa Mayer profile,’ Gell said. ‘When I heard the site was making a commitment to publishing more in-depth reported stories like that, I jumped at the chance to be involved. BI is an incredibly powerful platform, with north of 30 million monthly uniques. Henry and his team have done an amazing job building a truly sustainable journalistic enterprise, and they’ve got an extremely well-sourced and talented group of reporters. It’s a pretty phenomenal opportunity.’

“Upon starting at Business Insider, Gell said readers can expect a regular schedule of long-form features that amount to anywhere between 2,000 to 15,000 words.

“‘I’m attracted to great storytelling that enhances our understanding of what’s happening in the worlds of tech, media, the financial markets, retail, politics, science or essentially any other business-related
enterprise,’ he said. ‘The territory is wide open, but the basic goal is to find great narratives and tell them with real style and intelligence.'”

Read more here.