NewsLaundry: Rethinking Independent News Platform

Part 1: The Challenge

Background: What is NewsLaundry?

NewsLaundry is an independent news media company based in India, known for its critical and investigative journalism. NewsLaundry aims to provide an alternative to mainstream media by focusing on in-depth reporting, analysis, and commentary.

Unlike many traditional media outlets that rely on advertising revenue, NewsLaundry operates on a subscription-based model. This helps minimise potential conflicts of interest and allows the organisation to maintain editorial independence.

They use the slogan “Sabki Dhulai,” which translates to “Washing everyone’s dirty linen.” This slogan reflects their commitment to scrutinising all power structures without fear or favour.

The Problem

The project inspired me when I became a subscriber of NewsLaundry. Unlike other news media companies, NewsLaundry offers content across different mediums, such as video ground reports, shows, podcasts, news articles, editorials, and collaborative content with other independent media companies in India.

When I subscribed and started exploring the site for news content, I was surprised to find that the site was not representative of the vast work carried out by a subscription-driven independent news outlet. That led me to investigate if there was more to learn from the competition and representative users.

Initial Scope

For this case study, I focused only on redesigning NewsLaundry’s homepage, but I rethought the information architecture to build an accessible website that represents NewsLaundry's work.

Roles

• Primary and Secondary Research
• Information Architecture
• Copywriting
• Content Strategy
• Visual Design

Tools

• Figma
• Papers
• Markers
• Miro

My goals for the redesign:

• To deliver a personalised experience and intuitive user interface
• Propose a more engaging and seamless reading experience so that users are comfortable accessing news and articles.

My personal goals:

• Take complete ownership of the various roles involved in designing a product, such as a User Researcher, User Experience Designer, and UI Designer.
• Enhancing my learning experience by challenging some design decisions and addressing their solutions.

Copyright

All photos included in my design are copyrights of NewsLaundry.

Part 2: Research and Analysis

I conducted a one-week design sprint based on the design thinking methodology, which includes five stages: empathise, define, ideate, prototype, and test. However, the process must be completed since I could not validate my solution through testing and revisions.

Site Visits

I conducted multiple site visits that involved representative users performing the following tasks:

1. Accessing podcasts on the platform
2. Access an exclusive series of ground reports on the platform.
3. Access subscriber-only content
4. Access video ground reports and shows on the platform.
5. Access editorial and analysis on the platform

Competitive Analysis

To understand NewsLaundry’s competition, I conducted a competitive analysis and audited websites of legacy media, digital platforms, and foreign media companies like the Times of India, Scroll.in, Caravan, The Wire, The News Minute, Forbes, and The Guardian. The aim was to learn what they were doing right, wrong and not doing.

The main insights that I could extrapolate from the analysis are as follows:

1. Forbes and The Guardian have updated well-designed websites that convey compelling narratives through visual hierarchy and structural chaos, reflecting the variety of news these platforms cover.
2. Indian digital platforms vary in quality, with The Caravan offering content on a well-designed platform with modern visuals and compelling copy that paints a professional brand image.
3. Other digital news media use a design language similar to NewsLaundry's, with similar visuals, copy, brand colours, and web design.
4. National Daily newspapers like The Times of India and The Indian Express rely on text and emphasise mirroring the design of a print newspaper.

NewsLaundry User Interface Analysis

After analysing the competitors and documenting my process of exploring the NewsLaundry platform, I analysed the user interface to gather the following points:

• The platform's outdated web design uses poor white space, copywriting, and card designs that do not communicate the scope of work conducted by the NewsLaundry team, creating an image that the company predominantly works on creating textual news content.
• The homepage must provide a sense of all the news and non-news content on the platform. It must also clarify whether NewsLaundry is a digital media company or a watchdog.
• For a first-time user, the website does not showcase the content created by NewsLaundry for its readers, such as podcasts, ground reports, special shows, media critiques, comics, or NL interviews.
• The platform’s information architecture does not do justice to the work, and it is tough to find older reports and shows on the website.
• The platform design conforms to a similar design language followed by other digital news platforms, hiding NewsLaundry’s unique selling point (USP).

Horizon Scanning and STEEPVL

I used the horizon scanning process to identify signals of change in India's digital news media industry. After gathering signals from different sources, I categorised the signals into trends based on similar implications. Using the STEEPVL model, trends were developed based on the signals.

Horizon scanning is a systematic process for gathering, analysing, and interpreting information about emerging trends, potential threats, opportunities, and likely future developments. It aims to identify early signs of essential changes in various fields, helping organisations and policymakers anticipate and prepare for future challenges and opportunities.

The STEEPVL framework is a comprehensive tool used in foresight and strategic planning to systematically analyse and consider various factors that could impact the future. The acronym STEEPVL stands for Social, Technological, Economic, Environmental, Political, Values, and Legal factors. Each category represents a domain of influences and drivers that can affect various scenarios and outcomes.

The trends are as follows:

TREND 01: AI-enabled content creation

STEEPVL: Social, Technological, Economic, Political, Values

Description: Generative intelligence increasingly supports content creation and augmenting research processes on many digital platforms. Companies are exploring the ethical use of AI with human oversight to produce content that does not affect the credibility of publishers.

Signals of Change:

• Rising Use Cases and Emerging Legal and Ethical Concerns with AI Bots and Personal Assistants: AI bots and personal assistants will see increased usage in 2024, primarily for delivering news and sports updates, raising significant intellectual property, legal, and ethical questions due to advancements in personality-driven and journalist-cloning technologies. (Link here)
• AI-Generated Content in Journalism with Human Oversight: Machines will rapidly generate routine content, which human editors will edit, while reporters will gather raw material from investigations and interviews for AI bots to transform into content based on the needed human touch. (Link Here)
• AI Credibility Issues for Publisher: A newspaper giant faced credibility issues after publishing error-laden AI-generated posts about high school sports and being accused of using AI-generated articles with fake bylines, allegations further supported by an investigation. (Link Here)

TREND 02: Technology-Media Industry Partnership

STEEPVL: Social, Technological, Economic

Description: Big Tech and Media companies are partnering to incorporate AI into the content creation process. These partnerships raise concerns about their impact on public trust, smaller compensation, and fair compensation.

Signals of Change:

• News Ltd’s Bold AI Partnership with OpenAI: News Ltd’s agreement with OpenAI’s ChatGPT to share content from its publications could shift AI-generated news content to the right, impacting the entire media landscape. (Link here)
• Concerns Over Unequal Benefits from AI Licensing Deals: Many publishers are sceptical about the benefits of licensing deals with AI platforms, with a significant portion believing that profits will predominantly favour larger publishers, leaving little for others. (Link Here)
• Google’s Secretive AI Platform for News Content: Google is discreetly paying select publishers to test an AI tool that generates news articles by aggregating and summarising content from other sources, raising concerns about its impact on smaller publishers and fair compensation. (Link Here)

TREND 03: Personalised Platform Interactions

STEEPVL: Social, Technological, Economic

Description: Digital platforms need to invest in building personalised experiences to cater to the differing needs of the readers and shift their business model to reduce news fatigue and generate revenue from sustainable sources.

Signals of Change:

• Addressing News Avoidance and Fatigue in Media: Media companies are combating selective news avoidance and fatigue by emphasising better explanations of complex stories (67%), solutions-oriented storytelling (44%), and inspirational human stories (43%), while less focus is given to positive or entertaining news. (Link here)
• Shift Towards Bundled Digital News Subscriptions: Large publishers are increasingly bundling digital news with games, podcasts, magazines, books, and other content to retain customers through comprehensive all-access subscriptions. (Link Here)
• AI-Driven Paywall Optimisation and Personalisation: AI enhances real-time paywall optimisation by using machine learning to personalise parameters like paywall type, timing, pricing, and discounts, tailored to user demographics and behaviour to maximise conversion rates. (Link Here)

TREND 04: Economic Pressures and Visibility Challenges

STEEPVL: Social, Technological, Economic

Description: Media companies face economic pressures due to the shrinking market and technological disruption from big tech companies. They are also becoming less relevant due to the advent of social media, generative intelligence, and changing readers' perceptions of news.

Signals of Change:

• The Collapse of the Media Market Threatens Independent Journalism: The global shift of advertising dollars to Big Tech is causing financial struggles for major publications and forcing media outlets to shut down, posing a significant threat to independent journalism. (Link here)
• Google’s Gemini AI Model Reduces Click-Through Rates for Primary Sources: Google’s new AI Overviews feature, which provides AI-generated summaries as top search results, will likely decrease user engagement with primary sources like newspapers and magazines. (Link Here)
• Disappearance of Google’s News Tab Adds to Journalism Industry Woes: The sudden removal of Google’s News tab, mass layoffs, and AI search integrations exacerbate the journalism industry’s anxieties about its future in a rapidly changing digital landscape. (Link Here)

Part 3: Define

I pulled salient details from the competitive analysis, site visits, interface analysis, and horizon scanning to simulate a real-world design thinking activity. I used the dot vote method to categorise pain points into three groups:

1. Urgent (3 Vote)
2. Important (2 Vote)
3. Relevant (1 Vote)

After completing the voting process, I categorised the stickies with similar pain points into groups. These groups of pain points will form the foundation of the user-centred design strategy.

After creating the list of pain points, I inverted it to form a list of goals to work toward, but I also made sure that these had a business perspective to balance user needs with business needs.

To create the metrics, I determined what success looked like for each goal and how I could measure it. I also identified the metrics for each goal and what success would look like for the platform.

For example, improving content quality can be measured with a return visitor rate. Then, I explored what percentage of YoY growth would enable a digital news platform to grow in India.

Hence, the research and analysis redefined the problem and project scope to incorporate user experience design with a more extensive strategic rethinking that would enable NewsLaundry to face known and unknown disruptions heading its way due to the changing media landscape.

Rethink NewsLaundry:

To improve visual impression on platform discoverers, sceptics and readers

Rethink content development strategy that differentiates news and news-adjacent content on the platform

Develop a content delivery mechanism to enhance the visibility of news coverage

Strengthen platform brand strategy to communicate core values and ethics

Prepare NL to face disruptions in the digital media industry

Part 4: Ideate

Initially, I had planned on redesigning the homepage. Still, to develop a larger strategic plan for NewsLaundry, it was essential to understand how users would access the inner pages from the main navigation, homepage, and footer.

To ensure I had adequately thought out the information architecture, I sketched the task flows for actions performed by the personas. These sketches helped me think about the tasks, reflect on the current web design and find opportunities to make the redesign more intuitive.

Following the development of task flows, I developed the wireframes to achieve the goals I had set for “Rethink NewsLaundry.” I decided to focus on designing a modular homepage responsive to changing content on the platform. Through paper prototyping and low-fidelity design, I finalised the structure of the design.

I created three sets of wireframes for each task and received user feedback. Based on the feedback, the second iteration of the wireframe was the most intuitive and straightforward to navigate.

The user feedback mainly focused on the following criteria:

• Reduce clutter without hiding contents in the main navigation bar.
• A balance between text and images that highlights what’s important.
• Reduce the number of clicks to reach an article.
• The structure should reflect a “professional media” image.

That helped me move on to prototyping in software.

Part 5: Prototype

I designed the information architecture on Figma and made some final changes before locking it in.

I reviewed the user goals, pain points, and low-fidelity prototype. I also reviewed the task flows and identified how many clicks it would take for the users to achieve their goals. Returning to task flows again clarified the user flow and made it clear that I was ready to design the high-fidelity prototype.

Before I moved on to high-fidelity design, I wanted to create a style guide to aid me during the design process. Since NewsLaundry doesn’t have a style guide that I can find online, I needed to create one myself.

I inspected colour use and developed a colour palette in the shades of red used by NewsLaundry. The aim was to create a red, black, and white palette. Using red in branding is also a powerful statement — it sparks emotions of urgency, energy, and passion.

I highlighted the text with a dark shade of blue to add a little variety without diverting attention. Dark blue symbolises stability and calmness. It invokes feelings of tranquillity and deep reflection and can also instil emotions of trust and reliability.

Overall, these colours also solved another pain point for users who found NewsLaundry's visual design mundane.

Also, I selected a combination of Baskerville and Montserrat font pairing. Baskerville typeface has obvious characteristics of confidence, elegance, and timelessness. Baskerville was chosen as the primary typeface for headings and body. The sophisticated serif typeface reflected the depth of work conducted by NewsLaundry. Montserrat is very versatile and can be used in multiple media. It is a typeface that can be used anywhere because of its geometric and elegant simplicity. Montserrat was used as a secondary typeface to add emphasis and make the design more attractive.

For high-fidelity design, I scoured the Newslaundry website for images and used them in my design. I also wrote copy that would not betray NewsLaundry's ethos and entice users to complete their goals.

Since the project does not include testing the design with an implementation plan, the design is unproven. I have designed the high-fidelity homepage. The design for the inner pages is missing from the final output.

To complete this project and achieve the goals, I would validate the initial personas I created with quantitative and qualitative data. If the data does not support my assumptions, I would redefine the personas. If the data confirms my beliefs, I would proceed with user testing, redefine or refine the problem as needed, brainstorm new ideas, create new prototypes, and conduct further user testing.

Part 6: Strategies

When I was working on redesigning the home page of NewsLaundry, I used my foresight skills to understand the industry trends and signals of change that may disrupt the independent journalism and subscription-driven news media in India. Hence, it was essential that NewsLaundry adopt novel strategic initiatives to future-proof their business and secure editorial freedom.

Differentiating NewsLaundry’s Content

NewsLaundry has a large content library of reports, ground reports, analyses, podcasts, YouTube shows, video reports, publications, and many more. It is important to separate the content into news and news-adjacent content.

News Content focuses on developing a content library of honest and independent news reportage covering issues of national importance. The content is available across different media for readers and viewers.

News-adjacent Content focuses on developing a content library that helps readers and viewers develop informed opinions based on analysis and critiques of Indian politics, culture, and media.

Having connected yet distinctly separate content on the platform can help NewsLaundry develop a brand image as an independent media platform based on honest news reportage, analysis, and critique of Indian politics, culture, and media.

Converting platform discoverers and sceptics into daily readers

• NewsLaundry must focus on developing content that spans different media streams, such as articles, podcasts, and videos, to target readers and viewers with differing news requirements and content consumption styles.
• NewsLaundry must develop a strong recommendation system that helps daily readers, first-time discovers, and sceptics find content that appeals to their consumption styles and personal choices.
• Develop a “News First” image to attract and convert sceptics who do not trust NewsLaundry's news reportage.
• Convert to daily readers by promoting news-adjacent content to repeat visitors and platform discoverers.

Prepare for disruptions in the digital media industry

• NewsLaundry should invest resources in publishing digital magazines to develop a journalistic and brand reputation rivalling that of big corporate-led media houses.
• NewsLaundry should adopt a dynamic subscription model based on readers’ and viewers’ preferences. Develop new subscription levels for only news content, access podcasts, and recommend subscription annual, quarterly, and monthly plans based on the subscriber’s engagement with the content.
• NewsLaundry must develop internal capabilities to track AI integration into content creation and delivery. The platform should report on new technological developments and adopt AI to augment low-level repetitive tasks.
• NewsLaundry should develop an organisational framework around the ethical use of AI in content creation and fair use. Developing an organisational understanding of automation technology can prepare NewsLaundry for the unknown future.
• Invest resources in direct subscriber acquisition without depending on social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram.

Part 7: Conclusion and Reflections

I set out to investigate redesigning NewsLaundry’s website because I felt it didn’t reflect the media company’s strong, honest, and free reportage. During this project, I discovered how to use the UX design process in tandem with foresight-infused strategy development.

Getting back into the UX game with an understanding of foresight design and systems thinking has transformed my approach to design and enabled my mind to think beyond the scope of developing simple user interfaces.