Daily Circulation: 11,545
Sunday Circulation: 11,265


List the major steps you have taken in the last four years to increase readership. Please organize your response under four headings: content, brand, service, culture.

Content
Hired a new managing editor who redesigned the paper to emphasize community coverage.

Underwent an API evaluation of content and appearance and implemented those recommendations.

Sought local columnists for regular publication.

Redesigned the flag to include line art of the area’s most significant landmark to help create a “sense of place.” (also brand)

Included consistent messages inviting reader participation with news tips, letters to the editor and guest commentary, calendar items, photos, etc.

Initiated regular in-house training for newsroom and budgeted for industry training opportunities. Work more closely with reporters to improve the clarity, organization and impact of their writing.

Continuous study of best practices at similarly sized papers.

Purchased software and trained copy desk to seek every opportunity to employ graphics, typography and photography as aids to story presentation.

Brand/Service
The Baytown Sun converted to morning publication and added a Sunday issue, becoming a legitimate 7-day daily.

New logos were created, along with a consistent tag line for house ads and promotions — “Together we’re building a better Baytown.”

Adopted and promoted a “Just say yes” attitude about content, service and advertising.

Implemented a consistent, planned campaign of self-promotion in the paper, as well as on news racks and at single copy sales points. Promotions feature content, community partnerships, special advertising opportunities and reader participation invitations. Self-promotion house ads are dummied in daily.

Created a reader advisory board that meets monthly.

Changed the name of the circulation department to “Home Delivery” and also restructured organization and training and created an employee manual with sample scripts for handling delivery issues.

Culture
Improved employee morale and encouraged voluntarism within the community.

Continuous brand emphasis of the newspaper as an indispensable part of the community.



What is the most innovative, successful or noteworthy thing you have done on readership that you think other papers might learn from or want to emulate?
We studied best practices elsewhere and adapted the appropriate ones into our market. Although it’s not really innovative, the "just say yes" attitude has gained the most reader/advertiser feedback. Previously, this paper’s culture was authoritarian in nature, founded on too many negatives. We instituted a can-do policy and abolished barriers to reader participation such as a barbaric telephone system and tedious voice mail prompts. We eliminated lengthy, scolding rules about letters to the editor, accepting submitted photos and deadlines and recast them into guidelines and suggestions about publication. The new attitude was codified in a process-color brochure with step-by-step information on how to get news into the newspaper, including contact information and points of entry, samples of news items, calendar items, business briefs and youth sports reports. The brochures are available in our lobby, distributed to civic organizations and government entities, handed out by reporters and outside sales representatives and mailed annually to all advertisers.



What is the most persuasive indication you have that your readership efforts are producing results?
Tangible: Increased circulation and ad inches. Intangible: more good will and improved reputation within the community.



What is the most important lesson you have learned as you have worked on readership in the last few years?
The intensity with which readers claim ownership of The Baytown Sun. Because our readers believe it is their paper, we’re listening more keenly to their concerns and trying to be more reflective of their interests.



What would you like to do on readership that you have not been able to do and why haven't you been able to do it?
We still don’t reflect the entire ethnic demographic of our community. Literacy is a major problem in our Spanish-speaking population, while among African Americans historical mistrust of the traditional media seems to limit their participation in typical newspaper interaction.

Getting Traction on Readership

Survey Responses by Topic & Newspaper