Situation Analysis...2! SWOT Analysis. 3! Industry Trends. 4! Competing Organizations.. 4! Target Audiences.. 4! Goals, Objectives, Strategies 5!

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1 Table of Contents Situation Analysis....2 SWOT Analysis. 3 Industry Trends. 4 Competing Organizations.. 4 Target Audiences.. 4 Goals, Objectives, Strategies 5 Timetable & Budget.. 7 Implementation..8 Evaluation...8 Appendix Research Advertisement Photo Contest Fact Sheets Social Media

2 Situation Analysis The Georgia Press Association was established in 1887 with the goal of protecting, promoting, fostering and advancing the interests of the newspaper industry in Georgia. Since then, the organization has grown and evolved, all the while staying true to its original vision. The association s 143 active members cover the spectrum of newspaper types from major, daily publications, to weekly papers in local communities. GPA gives all its members various educational and networking opportunities, and also offers advertising assistance through an affiliation with the Georgia Newspaper Service. An 18-member board of directors leads the Georgia Press Association with the help of a number of permanent and special committees. These members strive to offer the best opportunities to the newspapers that belong to the association, as well as the communities they represent. GPA also holds events for its members such as a 125th Anniversary Celebration and several seminars throughout the year. However, they wonder if these opportunities are being fully communicated and taken advantage of. The organization has a website and a Facebook page to keep the members and the community involved and up-to-date, but both of these outreach efforts have proven unsuccessful due to poor upkeep. We sent an informal, based survey to a number of Georgia residents inquiring about their awareness, interest and habits regarding the Georgia Press Association and their community newspaper in general. Since our team did not have access to a larger database of Georgia residents, this survey was distributed using the snowball effect, meaning we forwarded the survey to our friends and family and asked them to send it forward as well. Our team has also analyzed previous efforts by the association and used this information to increase overall awareness. We hope to use the information obtained to assess the current popularity of newspapers throughout the state and to help the Georgia Press Association with their ultimate goal of promoting local newspapers. Our conclusion is to create a plan to rebrand the association and reposition local newspapers in the eyes of the general public. The Georgia Press Association already has a strong membership base and wants to help its members increase their readership. Our goal by the end of our campaign is to revamp the association s online presence and promote the importance of local newspapers around the state. 2

3 SWOT Analysis Strengths: The wide range of members gives the association a solid foundation and multiple connections throughout the entire state of Georgia. The Georgia Press Association offers a number of services to its members in order to better individual, local newspapers such as seminars, the Georgia newspaper service, press release services, annual conferences, job bank and public notices. It also has internal/external services for the public. Weaknesses: The association has a very small digital presence. A Facebook page is available, but the social media traffic is very low. Also the GPA s website does not reflect the positive qualities of this strong association. The website is hard to navigate and find information on the multiple services offered. Newspapers are strong, locally based businesses and are vital components of healthy communities. Despite messages from other media sources, they are still important. The common depiction of local newspapers as a dying news form often leads the public to see them as outdated. Most importantly, the GPA s goal is to protect, promote, foster and advance the interests of the newspaper industry in Georgia. There appears to be a large number of members, but they lack awareness about the services available to them. These include educational and training seminars, newspaper critiques through GPA s newspaper contests, lobbying the state legislature, conferences, technology services and a statewide website for public notices, among others. Opportunities: GPA has many member organizations that can help with the promotion of its campaign. This will give the campaign an opportunity to be spread across the state of Georgia. Many communities in Georgia are interested in supporting local businesses. We can use this interest to help promote GPA s mission to make local newspapers more relevant. Many young people are now interested in supporting local businesses as well. This can be used to our advantage while targeting a younger demographic. Threats: Amateur journalism in the form of social media is slowly but surely becoming a threat to local newspapers and the GPA. Modern technology has made it possible for anyone with a camera phone and a social media profile to report news before more formal means of journalism can respond. Large, national newspapers such as New York Times and The Wall Street Journal are another minor threat to the local newspaper industry. Many people do not go to their local newspapers for information because these other publications are so widely available. A final threat is the increase in apathy. Many people are becoming too lazy and do not have a desire to read the local news, and the main goal of local newspapers today should be keeping the news relevant and accurate for their target markets. 3

4 Industry Trends The Georgia Press Association s goal is to provide a number of services to its members, who are namely small, local newspapers. Most of the members major competition lies with national newspapers. In this industry, the trend is clearly headed into the digital realm. Large news sources, especially national ones, have already made articles and other newspaper elements available to readers on their websites, through mobile devices and through social media. However, even as they ve been able to move their readers to the digital realm, advertising has not been able to keep pace. While digital advertising has grown, it still does not even begin to cover the losses found in print cost. In addition, this movement of publications to the digital realm has made creating a profit even more challenging for publishers. The internet supports the notion of free information available to the entire public. It is easily updated in an instant, making print newspapers and magazines less and less valuable to the general public, causing sales to consistently decrease. Although national newspapers may have these amenities, they do not report information that local newspapers do such as high school athletics programs, city and county budgets, and who won the local beauty contest. These pieces of news are the salient reason why readers value local newspapers and the information they provide. Competing Organizations While most local newspapers in Georgia do not have any direct competitors, it is worth noting that the newspaper business as a whole is directly affected by the vast amount of information available to consumers on the Internet. It is likely that many residents turn to social media and other forms of user-generated content to get updates on happenings in their local communities. Although these types of sources of information are widely available to consumers, they are not always correct or reliable. GPA must reach out to consumers to prove that local newspapers are the place they should turn to when they are looking for reliable, relevant information about their communities. Target Audience Our target audience is very broad as the Georgia Press Association seeks to reach a wide range of people throughout the state. With this campaign, we are looking to reach potential audiences for local newspapers and inspire them to read the papers that GPA members produce. In order to achieve this, our first target audience will be local communities across Georgia. Additionally, second target audience will be college-aged students who have a general interest in news. We are also interested in assuring that GPA s member publications are taking advantage of all the organization has to offer. We believe this will give newspapers more leverage when trying to stand out in their local communities. 4

5 Plan Goal 1: Increase awareness of the importance of local newspapers in communities across Georgia. Objective 1: Gain 100 followers on Twitter by April Strategy 1: Create a Twitter account. Strategy 2: Follow GPA member publications and other influencers in the newspaper industry. Strategy 3: Tweet relevant content pertaining to GPA and its member organizations twice per day. Objective 2: Reach 400 Facebook likes by April Strategy 1: Update Facebook page with current GPA logo and cover photo. Strategy 2: Post relevant content pertaining to GPA and its member publications once per day. Objective 3: Obtain 200 blog views by April Strategy 1: Create blog using WordPress.com. Strategy 2: Share weekly content that promotes the importance of local news. Strategy 3: Invite journalists and other GPA members to contribute posts about their local news experiences. Strategy 4: Promote blog posts on Facebook and Twitter. Objective 4: Confirm 30 active local news supporters by April Strategy 1: Host photo contest in which readers post a creative picture of themselves reading their local newspaper and post it on Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag #ReadLocalGA. The most creative entry wins $250. Strategy 2: Pitch press release about photo contest to GPA member publications. Strategy 3: Promote photo contest on Facebook and Twitter, implementing the hashtag for consistency. Objective 5: Confirm ad placement in at least four Georgia newspapers in support of local newspaper readership by May Strategy 1: Create an ad promoting local newspaper readership. Strategy 2: Ask GPA member publications to share ad in their daily papers and on their social media pages. Strategy 3: Create advertisement promoting local news photo contest. Strategy 4: Ask GPA member publications to share ad in their daily papers and on their social media pages. Goal 2: Increase the favorability of local news sources among young adults. Objective 1: Spread awareness about the Georgia College Press Association to 100 Georgia college students by April Strategy 1: Attend Georgia Press Institute s annual conference in Athens. Strategy 2: Live-tweet relevant seminars with the hashtag #GAPressInstitute. Strategy 3: Engage conference attendees by following them on Twitter. 5

6 Objective 2: Inform 200 college students about the importance of local newspapers by April Strategy 1: Create flier that outlines the importance of local newspapers. Strategy 2: Provide flier at the registration table of Grady s annual career fair. Strategy 3: Post more than 100 fliers in busy areas around the UGA campus. Strategy 4: Engage students in local news photo contest by creating a banner with the hashtag #ReadLocalGA written in shredded newspapers. Strategy 5: Pitch press release about photo contest to all Georgia university newspapers. Strategy 6: Promote photo contest on Grady student Listserv and on Grady social media. Objective 3: Spread awareness of Georgia Press Association internships and scholarships to 100 college students across Georgia by April Strategy 1: Create flier that outlines the details of GPA scholarships and internships. Strategy 2: flier to all GPI conference attendees. Goal 3: Increase member publication involvement with the Georgia Press Association. Objective 1: Reach out to 20 newspaper contributors about being featured in the GPA blog by April 1, Strategy 1: newspaper editors and ask them to contribute to the GPA blog. Strategy 2: Contact GPI conference attendees and ask them to contribute to the GPA blog. Objective 2: Educate all member publications about the GPA resources available to them by April 1, Strategy 1: Create fact sheet about GPA member services. Strategy 2: Distribute fact sheet via to all GPA member publications. 6

7 Timetable & Budget January Create Twitter Account and begin activity $0 Begin updating Facebook $0 Create blog with Wordpress $0 Attend and live-tweet GPI conference $0 February Create and send out digital advertisement $0 Draft press release and ad for photo contest $0 Create member services fact sheet $0 Create local news fact sheet $0 Create internship/scholarship fact sheet $0 March Finalize and pitch press release and ad for photo contest $0 Promote photo contest via social media $0 Print and post local news fact sheets on UGA campus $10 Implement guerrilla advertisement on UGA campus $4 April Choose winner for photo contest $250 Distribute local news fact sheets at Grady career fair $0 Total Campaign Expenses: $264 7

8 Implementation Starting in January, our team began putting our plan into action. We formed a relationship with GPA s member publications and stayed in touch with them consistently throughout the campaign. While the campaign was molded along the way to ensure GPA was getting the best possible results, the true purpose behind our goals and objectives was always in sight. We immediately created our social media pages and began sharing content on them. This gave us a great base for the rest of the campaign activations. On Facebook and Twitter we promoted articles of GPA member publications, as well as shared news that was relevant to the newspaper industry. On our Wordpress blog we featured articles about the importance of newspapers that were written by famous journalists throughout the state. In addition to providing content from journalists, we also created our own content to show the relevancy of local newspapers amongst college students. We created an advertisement for member publications to use that reinforces newspaper readership. This advertisement served to show current readers that the publications they read are reliable and relevant. We also created three fact sheets: one that detailed why local newspapers are important, one that described GPA s member benefits and one that informed students about GPA scholarship and internship opportunities. We were able to engage college students by attending and live-tweeting the Georgia Press Institute conference. Additionally, we provided students with information about GPA scholarships and internships as well as information about the importance of local newspapers. Our biggest activation, the photo contest, proved to be a great success. We created an advertisement and a press release for the contest and pitched it to all of GPA s member publications in addition to college newspapers throughout the state. Handfuls of newspapers helped promote this contest by featuring it in their publications or sharing it on their social media pages. Evaluation Overall, our campaign was an impressive success. We were able to meet or surpass almost all of our goals. Additionally, we have provided suggestions that we believe will help GPA continue to promote local newspaper readership in the future. Goal 1: Increase awareness of the importance of local newspapers in communities across Georgia. Objective 1: Gain 100 followers on Twitter by April Outcome: Success. We received 116 followers since the beginning of the campaign. Additional Suggestions: GPA should continue to use Twitter frequently, and build its follower base, as it is an extremely prevalent outlet for news dispersion, especially among younger 8

9 audiences. GPA could use its account for live-tweeting any events pertinent to the industry or its member publications. In addition, we suggest GPA connect its Twitter to its website for easy access. Objective 2: Reach 400 Facebook fans by April Outcome: Success. We reached 410 Facebook followers. Additional Suggestions: We, again, suggest that GPA link its Facebook to its website so its social media sites are immediately available to visitors. Objective 3: Obtain 200 blog views by April Outcome: Success. We obtained 208 total blog views since the start of the campaign plan. Additional Suggestions: GPA should also link its blog to its website so that all of its content is available in one spot. The blog should also continue to be promoted on all social media sites. In addition, we suggest GPA work to produce more posts more often from a variety of contributors in the field, perhaps from their member publications, in order to create fresher content more often. Objective 4: Confirm 30 active local news supporters by April Outcome: Success. We had more than 50 entries in our local news photo contest that ends on April 1. Additional Suggestions: Because of our success, we suggest that GPA make this photo contest an annual event. We had over 50 entries with limited time to promote. Starting earlier and encouraging member publications to promote the contest will allow it to continue to build to more and more entries each year. Objective 5: Get ad placement in at least four Georgia newspapers in support of local newspaper readership by May Outcome: Success. We confirmed that four Georgia newspapers ran our advertisement encouraging readers to continue reading local news. We also confirmed that six Georgia papers shared information about our photo contest with followers on social media. Additionally, 12 publications ran either an ad or an article about the local news contest in their paper. Additional Suggestions: We suggest that GPA continues to mold this relationship with its member publications. If member publications are actively involved in supporting local newspaper readership then GPA will continue to have success with future activations. Goal 2: Increase the favorability of local news sources among young adults. Objective 1: Spread awareness about the Georgia College Press Association to 100 Georgia college students by April 2014 Outcome: We live tweeted several seminars at the Georgia Press Institute in February that serves as an informative training event for college papers in the southeast. Additional Suggestions: We suggest that GPA reach out to college papers that are not currently members of GCPA with information about the benefits of joining in order to encourage them to do so. A fact sheet could be created similar to the one we made for GPA and distributed to them via . GPA could also attend more events like the Institute in order to make more connections with college students. 9

10 Objective 2: Inform 200 college students about the importance of local newspapers by April 2014 Outcome: We put up more than 100 fliers about the importance of local news around populated areas on UGA s campus. We also provided more than 100 leaflets about the importance of local news at the registration table of the Grady College career fair. Additionally, we created a banner in Tate Plaza, encouraging students to participate in the local news photo contest. We also advertised the photo contest by pitching information to university newspapers across the state. Additional Suggestions: We suggest sending this information out to colleges across the state in order to reach students in other areas besides Athens, making the campaign more statewide and increasing the number of students reached. Contacting the editors at each Georgia College Press Association member publication with this information would be a great way to encourage dissemination to more students. Objective 3: Spread awareness of Georgia Press Association internships and scholarships to 100 college students across Georgia by April Outcome: We provided information about GPA scholarships and internships to all participants at the Georgia Press Institute conference in February. Additional Suggestions: In the future, we suggest that GPA send the information we compiled into a fact sheet to all Georgia College Press Association member publications to disseminate to the students at their schools, allowing us to reach even more people instead of just those at the conference. Goal 3: Increase member publication involvement with the Georgia Press Association. Objective 1: Reach out to 20 newspaper contributors about being featured in the GPA blog by April 1, 2014 Outcome: All members of the Creative Consultants group reached out to GPA members and asked them to contribute to the GPA blog. We were successful in securing two contributions from journalists. Additional Suggestions: We suggest continuing to reach out to GPA members and industry experts and sharing the current content on the blog with them so they can see what they would be apart of. GPA could also work to give them more advanced notice so they have less time constraints when considering making a contribution to the blog. Objective 2: Educate all member publications about the GPA resources available to them by April 1, 2014 Outcome: We created a fact sheet of member services and distributed it electronically to all member publications. Additional Suggestions: We suggest that GPA distributes this fact sheet annually in order to remind them to be taking advantage of the resources provided by GPA. In addition, GPA should send out updates and current happenings to its member publications each month, perhaps on a Listserv, so that all members are kept engaged with the organization. GPA should also continue engagement through social media, and be sure to respond to any conversations started by its followers. 10

11 APPENDIX 11

12 Research As mentioned previously, our limited access to Georgia residents proved to be a hinderance in our research. In order to reach the largest number of Georgia residents possible, we decided to use a snowball-structured survey. This means we sent the survey to family and friends in Georgia and asked those recipients to forward the survey to other Georgia residents. We revived more than 110 responses to the survey. 12

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14 Survey Highlights 14

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17 Advertisement GPA challenged us to create an advertisement that would reinforce the behaviors of current newspaper readers. We wanted to create an ad that got the message across clearly and creatively. This ad was featured in a handful of newspapers throughout Georgia. 17

18 Photo Contest In order to promote the GPA photo contest we created and advertisement that member publication could publish in their papers and on their social media. Additionally we pitched a press release to all member publications and other newspapers about the contest. 18

19 Contact: Megan Wood For Immediate Release Georgia Press Associa4on to Hold Contest to Support Newspaper Loyalty ATHENS, Ga. (March 5, 2014)- Georgia Press AssociaAon is offering a $250 cash prize to the winner of a social media contest running for the rest of the month. Georgia residents can enter the contest by taking a creaave photograph with their favorite local paper that is a member of the Georgia Press AssociaAon. Contest entries should be posted on Instagram or TwiPer, accompanied with the hashtag #ReadLocalGA. A winner will be selected April 1, No purchase is necessary to enter. The purpose of this contest is to encourage local newspaper support amongst current readers, while increasing interacaon between the exisang reader base and GPA. Another aim of the social media contest is to encourage newspaper readership amongst younger consumers as GPA makes efforts to show younger audiences the importance of local news. The Georgia Press AssociaAon has been working closely with a group of University of Georgia students to increase its public outreach. These students are members of a CreaAve Consultants team represenang GPA. CreaAve Consultants is an on- campus student- lead public relaaons agency operaang under the campus chapter of PRSSA. Members of the GPA CreaAve Consultants team believe that the Instagram and TwiPer compeaaon will be an effecave way to engage younger audiences. ### About Georgia Press Associa4on Located in Atlanta, the Georgia Press AssociaAon was founded to protect, promote, foster and advance the interest of the newspaper industry in Georgia. GPA provides an array of resources to member newspapers within the state of Georgia. For more informaaon visit gapress.org or contact Robin Rhodes at rrhodes8738@gmail.com 19

20 The banner we used to advertise the contest on UGA s campus 20

21 Fact Sheets We provided member publications with various fact sheets to help them promote local news. Additionally we used fact sheets to promote newspaper readership and GPA scholarships and internships. 21

22 " Member Services" " Educational Opportunities Georgia Press Association Seminars" Committed to providing high-quality professional training" Contact: Ashley Sears " " Onsite Technology Training Contact James Zachary at " " Networking Opportunities GPA Annual Convention In Jekyll Island" Contact Ashley Sears " " Advertising Services Through Georgia Newspaper Service; One call, One order, One Invoice" Both statewide and national" Contact: Fax: " " Press Release Services Press Releases from GPA are sent to member publications via , and are posted in the GPA front page (gapress.org) as a downloadable PDF." FREE for all associate members" Contact Mike Freyberger mfreyberger@gapress.org " " GPA s Legal Hotline Free every month; Send a message to sireland@gapress.com" " Technology Video Tutorials at gapress.org " GPA Classifieds Free for members to post job openings to the gapress.org Job Bank" Ads will stay on the website for three months; also published in the classified section of the GPA Bulletin" To post an advertisement, contact jzachary@gapress.org 22

23 Social Media GPA s social media needed a major facelift. In addition to engaging more than 100 Twitter followers, we were able to drive record-breaking Facebook engagement. As evidenced by this Facebook insights graph (based on a year s worth of data), Facebook engagement spiked once the Creative Consultants team took over. If GPA continued engaging followers on Facebook, reach will likely continue to grow. 23

24 Example Posts 24