The Challenge
As a niche nonprofit outlet, The 74 faced a common but formidable hurdle: expanding their reach beyond a loyal base of education-focused readers, all without the luxury of a large marketing budget. While their investigative work and education policy reporting were award-winning and well-respected, getting that content in front of broader and more diverse audiences was nearly impossible through traditional means, especially those in news deserts or local markets without full-time education reporters.
“Scale is one of the hardest things to get. It's really hard to get people to stumble upon us unless they're already paying attention to education.”
— Christian Skotte, Head of Audience & Partnerships, The 74
The team tried manual outreach to local media, but it was unsustainable. Emails to “info@” addresses often went unanswered, and the effort required many hours of work for uncertain returns.
The Solution
Stacker offered a turnkey solution: amplify The 74’s journalism via a vast, publisher-first network of trusted local newspapers, TV affiliates, and radio outlets across the country. This model aligned perfectly with The 74’s dual goals of achieving broader visibility for their work and supporting struggling local newsrooms.
“It’s such a win-win: we love getting picked up, and Stacker benefits from adding more quality journalism to the pipeline.”
—Steve Snyder, CEO, The 74
How It Works
Stacker combines an innovative earned distribution platform with human editorial expertise to enable the creation, optimization, and syndication of engaging stories to a network of over 3,900 local and national news outlets.
The 74 uses Stacker’s Connect product, which allows publishers to distribute their ready-to-publish journalism to thousands of trusted newsrooms via the Stacker Newswire. With Connect, Stacker’s editorial team reviews and optimizes each story to ensure it meets journalistic standards and is positioned for maximum visibility. Once a story is distributed, The 74 can track real-time performance through Stacker’s self-serve reporting dashboard, gaining insight into where stories land and how they resonate across the country.
Through Connect, The 74 has been able to scale the reach of stories like Banning smartphones at schools: Research points to higher test scores, less anxiety, more exercise, which earned 290 pickups across publishers on the Newswire
The Results
Since launching the partnership, The 74 has seen measurable impact:
✅ +5% Readership Growth
For a nonprofit newsroom, this uptick is a major win, helping justify donor support and expanding the impact of their journalism.
✅ Improved SEO:
In total, stories from The 74 were picked up close to 7,000 times, creating as many backlinks from authoritative national and local outlets. This boosted domain authority, which in turn amplified The 74’s discoverability online.
✅ Diversity of Reach:
The 74 is now reaching readers in underserved regions, including legacy Black newspapers and rural communities, previously out of reach. In total, stories by The 74 reached over 1.2 million readers across the country.
“It’s just such a powerful model for getting quality national stories into local markets—especially those without education reporters anymore. [...] The happiest time is when I send a reporter a list of 150 outlets where their story ran. It builds morale in a tough industry.”
— Christian Skotte
Why Stacker?
Stacker’s platform stood out not just for what it delivered, but how it operated.
- Publisher-First Platform: Compared to legacy distribution platforms like Apple News and Google News, Stacker’s dashboard is more intuitive, responsive, and transparent.
- Human Relationships: The 74 cited a consistently high level of professionalism, kindness, and shared mission from every Stacker team member—fostering trust and alignment.
- Mission Alignment: Both organizations share a commitment to revitalizing local journalism and informing underserved communities—not just chasing metrics.
“Every single human being I’ve worked with at Stacker has been phenomenal—good professionals and good people.”
— Christian Skotte
Future Outlook
Building on a successful foundation, The 74 is evolving its partnership with Stacker into a more dynamic and collaborative relationship. They are expanding their reach by syndicating more of their original stories through Stacker’s premium wire, while also curating select Newswire pieces from other publishers to republish on their own site. This approach reflects their confidence in the partnership and a shared commitment to delivering high-quality journalism to a broader and more diverse audience.
“We’re reaching new audiences, but also thinking about different kinds of stories—like service journalism and thought leadership—to help underserved communities take action.”
— Christian Skotte
This partnership demonstrates how nonprofit journalism can scale its mission-driven work by tapping into smart, empathetic infrastructure. For The 74, the result isn’t just more eyeballs—it’s more impact, more equity, and more hope for the future of education reporting.
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