When crafting a news report, journalists follow a structured format to ensure clarity and impact. Though individual style of news presentation varies from organisation to organisation or individual to individual, all news reports contain a headline, a by-line or credit line, a dateline, a lead, a body, and a conclusion.
Headline
It is the most visible part of a news report and often is either the summary or the main point of the story. Usually headline is written in a font few sizes bigger than the rest of the news story. A reader decides to read the story after reading the headline. Sometimes headlines try to create curiosity through interesting use of language and prompt the reader to read the full story.
By-line / Credit line
This identifies the source of the story or the writer. It could be the name of the journalist who has filed the story or the agency from which the story has been sourced. When a person or journalist’s name is mentioned, it is called by-line and when there is no mention of the person’s name; it is called credit line. The credit line could be the agency from which news is taken or by our correspondent or our bureau or by our special correspondent etc.
Dateline
The name of a place and date is mentioned below the credit line or by-line and before beginning of the actual news. This is called dateline. This informs the date on which the reporter has filed the story and the place from where the reporter has filed the story.
Lead
This is the opening paragraph of a news story. This gives the most important information very briefly. It is always short and crisp and reflects the mood of the story. If the lead is not effective, the reader may skip the story. Generally, it answers 5W (Who, What, Where, When and Why) and I H (How).
Body
It gives the additional details or elaborates the event. In this part actual story is narrated. The body describes what the story is all about in order of importance of information, whereas the lead provides just the gist of the actual event. It is divided into several paragraphs and written in inverted pyramid style. We shall discuss about inverted pyramid style later.
