What’s your favorite part of our newspaper? What’s the first thing you or your spouse look at? What would you change, leave as is or drop completely? How much time do you spend with our paper?
Newspapers like to learn what attracts readers – and what keeps them. We are continually fine-tuning the content and design, while keeping the familiar content and image our readers trust and expect.
During times of fiscal restraint, less market research was done on how readers felt about our newspaper.
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We’ve now decided to once again seek the readers’ viewpoint on our product. In the upcoming months we will do this in several ways, ranging from focus groups to telephone surveys across the prairies.
Focus groups will be formed in three towns, one in each province, and meet in March with a moderator.
Are big changes expected after the research is done? No. Only a small segment of our 100,000 readers will actually be questioned, so we don’t plan to drastically alter the way our paper looks.
However, the answers will influence us to try some things differently. We are interested in seeing if various trends appear. For example, are more people interested in market news? What do people think of our coverage of their province? Should the cartoons be expanded to a 45-page pull-out glossy full-color section? (Probably that last question won’t appear.)
We’d like to express our appreciation in advance to the participants in the focus groups and surveys. I would also like to encourage other people to write and let us know what you think of the newspaper. Your view is valuable and important to the future of The Western Producer.
