Capturing the zeitgeist: The Washington Post on consumer priorities

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How do people see the world around them, and how do they respond to the challenges they face? These questions are at the heart of journalism and, since 1877, the Washington Post has been one of the most prominent newspapers in the US, chasing the news of the day and dissecting it for its readership.

With a media industry in flux, however, it has never been more important for the Washington Post to understand what its readers – businesses, politicians and the public – think about the key issues, and how that information can feed into the content it produces.

The Power Index, a study carried out annually alongside Kantar, is the Washington Post’s attempt to uncover which issues are pressing most on the minds of consumers and those in power, and how people believe they can affect or even solve the problems in today’s world. “The original research was born out of this need to understand powerful audiences,” says Amelia Simpson, the newspaper’s director of audience insights. “If you think of the Washington Post in the marketplace, that is our audience. We are not only speaking to, but being read by, the most powerful people in the world. What keeps them up at night, and why?”

The 2024 Power Index is based on the results of a 2023 survey of approximately 300 business leaders, 300 policymakers and interviews with 500 members of the public in the US, and a survey of 150 of both business leaders and policymakers in UK, alongside interviews with 500 consumers, to evaluate 29 issues affecting the UK and the US through the lens of importance, relevance and their ability to affect the issue. The issues covered five broad areas: economic, social, technological, personal/health, and environmental.

“Importance and relevance have a strong relationship, because if something is relevant to you, personally, it is probably important,” says Simpson. “There is a disconnect between those parameters and ability. Seeing where there is that alignment, where things are important and have high ability scores, that is interesting for us to educate our clients about. But more important is understanding where those gaps are, what is really important, and where leaders feel less confident in their ability to solve it – is that an opportunity for a brand; is that an opportunity for an organisation?”

The 2024 Power Index shows the differences in priorities between policy-makers, business leaders and the public. In the UK and the US, business leaders saw job creation and unemployment as the top issue, with inflation and reskilling rounding out the top three. Among policy influencers, human rights was the top issue in the US and third among UK respondents, while educating the next generation was number one in the UK and third in the US. Job creation and unemployment in the US, and diversity, equity and inclusion in the UK, were in second. In contrast, consumers in both countries saw inflation as the top issue, followed by human rights and barriers to healthcare, in the US, and barriers to healthcare and affordable housing in the UK.

From there, the researchers used an ‘impact matrix’ to determine which issues were ‘undervalued’, which had ‘momentum’, which were ‘stagnant’ and deemed of lower importance, and which were ‘vulnerable’, in that they were seen as important, but people in power lacked the ability to tackle them. There were some contrasts between how each group of respondents categorised each of the 29 issues; for example, inflation was a ‘momentum’ issue for consumers, but deemed ‘vulnerable’ for business leaders and policy influencers.

When compared with the 2021 research, one of the most interesting observations is what has stayed the same across three years of relative turbulence, says Simpson. “There are really significant gaps, across business and policy, between the issues they believe are important and the issues they believe they can take action on,” she says. “It is one in three issues that have this significant gap between importance and ability.”

For example, technology and innovation regularly crops up as one of the lowest-ranked issues measured in the Power Index. Even when asking about artificial intelligence (AI), which has received extensive media coverage, there was little improvement in its relevance to respondents or in policy-makers’ perceived ability to influence it.

That is a “wake-up call” for the tech sector, marketers and brands, says Simpson: “Your innovation message isn’t resonating because people are so focused on the here and now – how do I afford milk, my personal and physical safety, and my mental health. Those things are all going to be prioritised above this nebulous idea of technology that we don’t know will make our life better or worse.”

Even AI-led breakthroughs in areas such as healthcare are unlikely to improve its standing, according to Simpson. “If you want to tell an innovation story, don’t use the word ‘innovation’; don’t use the word ‘technology’ – talk about outcomes.”

The findings of the Power Index have helped inform editorial priorities, as well as commercial opportunities for the Washington Post.

“What has not been a surprise, but a delight, is the shared understanding that what is good for our readers is going to make us better commercial partners. We are all grounded in this idea of what our readers need,” says Simpson, who explains that there is a “healthy separation of church and state” between the company’s research function and editorial. There is, however, a willingness to share learning.

“It is collaborative, without either side directing the other,” she says.

“I view [the Power Index] as one of the tools in my insight toolbox. This study helps us answer the question of what is happening beyond the walls of the Post; how we take the signals of what matters – gleaned based on what people are engaging with, reading and watching on the site – and counterbalance externally.”

This article was first published in the July 2024 issue of Impact magazine.