Tran Ha - Editor, RedEye
1/8/2009
By Sarah Hetland
Tran Ha knows her newspaper’s readers, which is important to keeping a paper like the RedEye successful in a business that’s getting increasingly tougher by the day. Ha was promoted to editor of RedEye, a free daily newspaper providing news, sports and entertainment coverage to young, urban commuters, back in late September 2008. She has since been settling in and adjusting to her new role, excited to be a continued part of a newspaper that dares to be something just a little more trendy and different.
“I think that is one of the great things about working at RedEye, is that the demographic that we’re trying to hit is also the demographic that I’m a part of,” she said. “As with any paper it’s important to have people on the staff who reflect your demographic.”
The relatively small RedEye staff pride themselves on being close to their readers and catering to their interests. According to Ha it’s what helps make coming to work every day fun, and keeps them successful in this ever changing media environment. With this fast paced, quick news society we live in now, its no wonder newspapers like the RedEye are finding so much success.
Ha’s path into journalism started out pretty simple, having always enjoyed English and writing in school, she obtained a degree in journalism from the University of Minnesota. She originally planned to go into magazine journalism and even dabbled in work for a trade magazine. When she was offered a fellowship working for poynter.org as a web producer and reporter, an interest in newspapers was sparked. Despite the news of a troubled newspaper business on the horizon, her interest was still peaked when she heard rumblings about the RedEye concept.
Ha first came to the RedEye as a copy editor not long after the launching phase of the paper. She then went on to spend some time as an assistant editor in features for the Chicago Tribune, before finally settling in as weekend editor back at RedEye, helping to launch that section. Before her current promotion, Ha also helped launch a spin off of the RedEye geared towards high school students, called The Mash.
Ha admits that there can be obstacles with this new position. “I think the challenge always is to, with such a small staff, kind of give our readers what they need while still doing it with the resources that we have,” she said.
Ha looks forward to dealing with any changes to come by continuing to focus on how to grow readership and connect with the readers without losing any of its uniqueness. Also, by incorporating social media aspects like Twitter for feedback, which takes on a letter to the editor format, and with the web site soon to be revamped, they hope to keep the RedEye as cutting edge as possible.
“The main goal always is to be relevant to the readers, and continue to be a paper that people want to pick up and read and engage with,” she said.
Pitching Tips
Ha prefers that any pitching or inquiries be sent by email. “Email is always good because you have all of the information you need right there in front of you and you can just forward that on to another editor if that’s something that you don’t handle,” she said. And since most pitches come through her first, it makes it even easier for the next step.
As for the types of topics they are interested in receiving, usually anything dealing with local events, new trends, especially in Chicago, topics involving pop culture and celebrities, and local news or happenings. Though they cover some store openings, they tend to focus those types of stories within the city limits. She said they just don’t have the manpower to cover stories like that in the suburbs, unless it was some huge event.
She knows that a lot of people are told to follow up via phone, but they get a lot of calls every day and a ton of press releases. So even though it’s ok to follow up, it’s important to realize that because of the volume of information they receive, it’s not possible to respond to all of it. The rule of thumb is that if they are really interested, they generally will find a way to get back to the person in a reasonable amount of time.
Ha also stressed that, “The best way to connect with us and to have a successful pitch is to know the paper really well, and to anticipate the kind of stories that would work well for RedEye.”