In 2020, the Henrico Citizen experienced a problem many newsrooms were facing — businesses were slashing their advertising budget due to the pandemic. The Citizen needed to identify a new source of revenue or go out of business.
Rather than fold the newspaper, owner and publisher Tom Lappas put his efforts into growing his online audience to generate new revenue. Thanks to this shift in focus, the Citizen added 9,000 email subscribers and generated $34,000 in reader revenue in just one year.
Lappas recently wrote a piece for Better News on how other news organizations can grow reader revenue and expand their email subscribers by focusing on the audience funnel. Lappas discusses that with host Michael O’Connell on this week’s Better News podcast. Read the full study.
The Better News podcast is a partnership between It’s All Journalism and the American Press Institute to a) showcase innovative/experimental ideas that emerge from the Knight-Lenfest Local News Transformation Fund and b) share replicable strategies and tactics that benefit the news industry as a whole. Sign up for the Better News newsletter to receive news about the latest resources, case studies, and insights. For more news about the IAJ podcast, sign up for the weekly IAJ newsletter.
