Infographics work. They make content more attractive, increase readership and the time spent on a page. A two-person data journalism team produces them for E15 and 11AM, while also training other newsrooms to use the format. We automate production, manage the archive and set procedures for correct use.
Stock prices, inflation trends or the shifting front line in Ukraine: infographics can clearly explain all of these topics. Simple infographics can explain complicated data, illustrate a situation, help the author show context and tell a better story. They improve the uniqueness and quality of content, increase readership and extend the time spent on a page. Infographics pay off, which is why we have a two-person data journalism team.
You do not need graphic designers for infographics
We are not graphic designers. We are part of the BI department, and our work is data. We have therefore built the infrastructure that makes infographics simple, and therefore cheap, to produce. We create infographics ourselves, mainly for E15 and 11AM, but we also try to get all newsrooms to use this format.
We are building a database, and we have also created an entire infrastructure of automated infographics, which saves us time and lets us focus on more sophisticated assignments. We have automated overviews of prices of shares, cryptocurrencies and commodities, exchange rates, energy mixes by country, unemployment, GDP, interest rate trends, government bond yields, as well as infographics on housing, mortgages and many other topics.
A simple stack
We are part of BI and therefore have access to data tools and to the infrastructure of the analytics teams. We obtain new data from various APIs or through scraping, process it with our own Python scripts in Keboola, and finally send it into visualisations using the API tools Infogram and Datawrapper.
This automated process lets two people handle many times more requests, while also taking on advanced projects, such as coverage of the US presidential election, when the infographics were updated automatically every five minutes.
Charts and applications
Apart from charts and maps, we also build data applications, for example an inflation loss calculator, or an interactive project in which readers could “draw” their estimate of economic development under the government of Petr Fiala and compare it with reality.
Although we mostly cover economic and business topics, we also help other newsrooms, for example during floods or other crises, when a quick and clear map is needed. We have built a system that generates infographics ranging from cryptocurrency prices to economic overviews of countries.
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