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Empowering the Community

In Blog by cramirezLeave a Comment

If there is something newspapers have learned in today’s digital age is that they can rise up to the challenge and work towards a better future. Newspapers are ready to establish priorities, dispel myths and tell the truth in order to reinforce their positions as strong media outlets. Pioneer Newspapers is a great example of a newspaper that has done exactly this.

Pioneer Newspapers is made up of 23 community newspapers mostly located in the Pacific Northwest. Pioneer has been working towards evolving into a true multimedia company offering an array of print and digital products through many forms of media. In efforts to change it’s public image, Pioneer Newspapers has re-educated its public on its identity; they have publicly rebranded themselves as a multimedia company. For this to happen change had to come within the company first.

Employees must understand the goal and must believe in the product in order to regain lost market share. A good salesperson knows that he or she must believe in a product in order to succeed; otherwise, how could he or she convince others? After all, the product is what helps a brand define its identity. One way of defining the value of products is through metrics. There are many metrics newspapers can use in order to see if a product works for their customers.

Pioneer Newspapers chose Flying Horse Communications, an advertising agency located in Bozeman, MT with offices in Portland, and Kalispell, to help with the rebrand. Their challenge was to persuade people that something they believed in was not true and that the newspapers in the Pioneer chain were both vital and actually gaining in readership. Furthermore, they sought to emphasize the fact that newspapers have always been a trusted and indispensable source to the communities they serve.

The first step in this process was to conduct market research. In order to do this, the paper chose 5 focus groups in 4 markets in the Pioneer chain: Bozeman, MT; Klamath Falls, OR; Pocatello, ID; and Nampa, ID. Flying Horse Communications findings were as follow:

  • People saw a bleak future for newspapers
  • Many thought newspapers might eventually go fully digital or move from daily to weekly
  • BUT, they thought local newspapers are more relevant and have a better chance of surviving in print
  • Many were aware that newspapers are multimedia companies, but still think of them as the physical paper
  • People read the paper for reasons other than news

As part of the research process, Flying Horse held ongoing sessions with Pioneer papers and established that newspapers feel that they are in the “connection business” and that their main product is information. Moreover, the research indicated that the very existence of newspapers is essential to the community and that one of their most attractive characteristics is empowerment of local communities through connecting people to each other and through providing information. This finding resulted in Pioneer choosing “Empowering the community” as their tagline.

The research done by Flying Horse lead to Pioneer’s successful brand optimization. A series of TV, print, and radio commercials were created and released to disprove myths and reshape the way people thought about newspapers. People could now see that newspapers had evolved and are adroitly utilizing newer forms of media. This campaign reinforced in the public the newspapers’ perspective about their important role: that they are essential and provide knowledge in many forms.

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