How to reach new audiences

Chris Lloyd takes a close look on how to reach and connect with new audiences, basing on his experience in The Telegraph Media Group

The Telegraph Media Group is a publisher of The Daily Telegraph (with circulation of 881,071 copies and 2,075,000 readers), and The Sunday Telegraph (circulation – 635,968 and 1,786,000 readers). It is also the owner of the website telegraph.co.uk (for audience of the webpage please scroll to the end of this article) , which was promoted as a different brand rather than a part of newspaper.

In order to find the new audience (and not to lost the old one), the TMG company had to move the whole organisation to be audience focused rather than print focused – said Chris Llloyd. The problem was that the audience was leaving the newspaper because it was able to find the information elsewhere. It was the key issue to give the audience to what they wanted and where they wanted it.

During the speech, the listeners were asked a very interesting question: how many editors in chief in different editorial offices would start their day asking for the online figures. Not seeing many hands in the air, Chris Lloyd asked then a rethorical question about how can those editors know which story was most interesting for online readers.

So the strategy of the Telegraph Media Group is to keep their printed product alive for as long as possible (without losing the audience), and at the same time to care about their online audience by providing them with content when they want it, where they want it and in the format that they prefer. That is how the website telegraph.co.uk was created.

The plan was to develop and distribute a high quality, intelligent content across all the media: print, online, audio, video. The content in the printed newspapers was backed with the information the reader could find related stories (in different forms, updated on the go) on the webpage. This was done such way, because what editors from TMG did notice was the fact that the same content on different platforms can only annoy the readers. TMG also made the decision about sharing its content wherever it was possible – whether it was Digg, Reddit, Farkor Facebook. The idea was not to give their articles away for free but to bring as many visitors as possible to the source of the news.

Telegraph focused on being everywhere, easily and conveniently available. This was where the idea of widgets came from. Telegraph offers a wide range of widgets which are are useful and versatile, with customisable content, available for most major websites / platforms:

Going mobile was another factor that helped build online audience. At the moment the content is offering news, finance, sport, and travel, and what matters most – it is approachable now from everyones pocket.

Telegraph is going social as well. It is offering its readers a platform called Tell the Telegraph, where users are engaged as a community. It works as a two way communication forum where readers ask and are asked questions. Another brilliant idea of the company was to convince a famous author, Alexander McCall Smith, to cooperate with a newspaper in the creation of the content. As the space in the printed newspaper is limited, Smith writes his online novel on the Telegraph’s pages. Each chapter is available for reading, commenting and listening as a podcast.

All these ideas combined result for the telegraph.co.uk webpage in 22,1 million monthly global audience (6 million in 2006), up 126% year over year, and 6,3 million monthly UK audience (2 million in 2006), up 71% year over year.

lloy finished his presentation with few words of advice for the listeners:

• cultural change and real ownership from all areas of business is essential
• make it as easy as possible for people to find the content and shout about it yourself
• utilise new channels of distribution
• try new things
• don’t be afraid to make mistakes

Chris Lloyd is the Assistant Managing Editor in Telegraph Media Group, in the United Kingdom

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