apr 280 group project 2(1)

Meghan Poljak and Ashley Paulmeno

In this assessment we are focusing on the goal of our project, which is to understand the relationship between the millennial generation and news consumption-- specifically to understand why The New York Times is not the millennial generation’s go-to news source. Initially, to better understand the issue we were facing, we began by analyzing our main competitors. After researching The Skimm, Snapchat Discover and BuzzFeed, we realized that The New York Times is facing a branding issue. NYT is perceived by millennials to only contain hard-hitting, dense content, while their top competitors have more variety in the news they present. The Skimm, Snapchat Discover and BuzzFeed all present information in a mixed way; they have heavy news stories alongside lighter, or more easy to digest news. Moving forward we had see if our predictions were correct. Our secondary research lead us to The Media Insight Project, conducted by the American Press Institute and the Associated Press Center for Public Affairs Research. The study showed us that college student do in-fact care about news and current events. They want to stay informed on all topics, and prefer to do so on electronic devices. This was an interesting discovery considering that went it against our initial thoughts that millennials only care to read entertainment-type stories. The insight we found in The Media Insight Project formed how we structured our primary research. Since we found that millennials value heavy and light news topics, we chose to focus less on the content, and more on how each news source was being presented-- which goes back to the branding issue we originally thought was present. We found strong, recurring patterns during the in-depth interview process we conducted. Almost everyone we interviewed said something similar to “I don’t go to NYT, but if it’s on Facebook or there’s an article somewhere

else I’ll click on it and read it because I feel like it’s a legitimate source.” This is a perfect summary of how the millennial generation prefers news to find them, instead of actively seeking out information for themselves. News sources can no longer rely on their reputation to acquire readers. This also lends credit to why sources like The Skimm and Snapchat Discover are so successful-- it bring the news to you. Our primary research re-confirmed our secondary. Through our survey we discovered that around 70% of college students prefer to receive their news electronically, either through their computer, phone or email. Going back to the original competitors that we identified through our survey, it was apparent that The Skimm has the most committed readers. This also supports the high number of students who prefered to receive the news via email. Understanding all of the issues NYT is facing, we have decided to make a New York Times Newsletter available to students 3 to 4 times a week. This compliments the needs of our target market-- an on-the-go, intelligent, multifaceted college student. This solves the issues of news content and complements how college students prefer to have news find them. Students will have the opportunity to choose for themselves the categories of content present in their own personal newsletter. This mixes the selling-points of all of our main competitors, but now the content is coming from what students already know to be a credible source.

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Executive Summary

Situation Analysis

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The New York Times is one of the most renowned and credible news sources to date. Over the course of its 162 years of publishing news it is now the largest circulation of any metropolitan newspaper in the U.S.-- second only to The Wall Street Journal when it comes to national circulation.

We chose to focus on The New York Times’ relevance to the Millennial generation. Through our secondary research we have identified the problem as a branding issue. While NYT has proven itself as a credible source, it is perceived by millennials to be a paper meant for older generations. NYT is being forced to find new ways to compete with news sites like BuzzFeed and The Skimm that are growing in popularity among this generation. The New York Times is also having to find a happy medium between keeping the news professional and making it applicable to a younger generation. It is a common misconception that college students are not as interested in the news as previous generations. However, recent studies disproved that claim. A collaborative study named “The Media Insight Project,” done between the American Press Institute and the Associated Press Center for Public Affairs Research, hoped to combine previous quantitative research with qualitative research to gain insight on millennials’ use of the internet and their news gathering habits. While this study was done on a broad scale, and focused on news sources as a whole, the information is vital to the future of The New York Times because it disproved the notion that millennials are not reading the news. According to our secondary research, keeping up with news is the third most frequent activity that millennials participate in online.

The Media Insight Project gave us insight on millenials and their news gathering tendencies.

To fully understand the issue facing NYT, we also have to understand the wants and needs of our target market. The Media Insight Project asked millennials “what are the main reasons you, personally, tend to use news and information?” The results show areas that The New York Times can use to tailor their messages and communication strategy so they can better engage people within this age group. “Stay informed and be a better citizen,” “find it enjoyable and entertaining,” “like to talk to people about the news,” are all aspects of news that millennials most enjoy- which is far from not reading the news at all. So the problem is not that younger citizens are not interested in the news, it is that they are not currently using The New York Times as their main outlet for the news. This newspaper is facing another road block, and that is: people just do not want to have to pay for the news, especially the millennials. When finding hard hitting news stories it is as easy as a Google search, so why would anyone pay for it? A study called, “Young People Love News But Won’t Pay For It,” from PRNewser says it best, “The big catch is that, while young people are more than willing to pay for news services and a majority spend their own money on movies, video games, cable TV, and e-books, they seem to view the news itself as a public commodity that should be free.” Their statistics show that 21 percent of young people have a paid

subscription to a print magazine, but only 16 percent subscribe to a print newspaper. Recently, more traditional media channel have been losing hold of their viewers because of their failure to adapt to the changing times. The New York Times, however, recognized this problem and decided that they needed to hire a digital outreach team to generate more readers. In this fast paced and ever changing world, brands can not expect people to come to them, no matter how prestigious your name is. Rather, companies need to reach out and convince people to be loyal. The New York Times adjusted their approach and expanded to the internet to spark up some interest. To the left is the Times’ new and improved look. The New York Times is looking to appeal to a younger audience by expanding its brand to a sleeker, more captivating online look. Their target audience young professionals, or millennials, who are impressionable; the ones who probably are not dead set on a certain news outlet yet, but who are perusing through any news source that looks authentic and credible enough to stick with. This audience wants to feel unique and educated, so they choose sights like The Skimm and Buzzfeed, because it comes with an air of rebellion against the mainstream news sources, yet most of the articles mirror what The New York Times is publishing.

Research Design and Implementation

Are you aware of the free print news that’s available to you across campus? If so, how often do you take advantage of that?

“Never- because I don’t read the crimson white and I don’t want to walk around with a newspaper, I’d rather just get it on my phone”

“I don’t because I never really think about it.”

“No, I don’t choose not to, I just forget about it.”

What attracts you to the news source that you use?

“It’s mixed up with other things so that way it’s not to heavy of information- you can look at it passively and look at pictures of cats or news and it’s super easy and requires minimal effort”

Do you read The New York Times? Why or why not?

“I don’t go to NYT, but if it’s on Facebook or there’s an article somewhere else I’ll click on it and read it because I feel like it’s a legitimate source”

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SURVEY

We chose to send out our survey to college students, since they

are our target market, and received 182 total responses. We focused

asking questions based on main on prefered

methods of news consumption.

In-Depth Interviews

It was through the 10 in-depth interview that we conducted that we found our key insight-- it is not that students do not want to read the news, it is that they just need to the news to find them.

Overview

In this section of our reports, we used a mixture of research methods founded through our survey cross-tabbed using SPSS. We identified different target markets throughout the survey and their specific needs. This also provides a basis of understanding to later compare to our qualitative data obtained in the interviews we conducted.

Colleges and Frequency of Reading

A wide variety of students at the University of Alabama participated in our survey, along with other millennial at Universities across the nation. While we have a high number of college of Communication and Information Sciences students, there are students represented from each college.The college of Arts and Sciences, Culverhouse College of Commerce and the college of Engineering all had large presence in our survey data. Also, the

majority of those who participated in the survey were females within those respective colleges. Through a cross-tabulation of this information with the question, “How often do you read the news.” Arts & Science students (along with C&IS students) read the news most frequently. This category scored the highest in the daily and the 2-3 times a week category. But, it is important to keep in mind that C&IS and A&S students are the highest population of students we have data for in our survey.

Surprisingly, engineering students have the highest percentage of reading the news daily. Out of 18 students who participated in the survey 6 responded that they read daily, and 6 responded that they read 2-3 times a week. The engineering population was one that was the most surprising to us, because we had not anticipated such a large percentage of those students reading the news. This could possibly be a potential target market that is not receiving as much attention as it needs.

Findings and Insights

The highest rated sources, as we guessed, are online. Together they encompass 74 percent of the overall medium choices available, while only 4 percent of participants chose traditional print news. This proves our initial hypothesis-- that millennials are heavily relying on digital media outlets for the news.

This makes sense for why The Skimm is the overwhelmingly dominant source of news. Understanding how and why this provider has such a huge impact would offer NYT some insight and give them a more competitive edge.

News Consumption

This is one of the more noteworthy crosstabs. While it is not that shocking that most of the participants were not willing to subscribe to The New York Times, the breakdown of who is “likely” to subscribe is very interesting. One person said that even though they never read the news, they would still be likely to subscribe to The New York Times. It is also crucial to point that the people who are consuming news the most frequently are not subscribing to The New York Times. Since most people read the news 2-3 times a week, this is an important target market to focus on as we continued our research.

Radio

Newspaper

Application

Television

Email

Online via

Computer or Tablet

Online via Mobile Phone

News Sources and Preferred Ways of Viewing

Executive Summary of In-Depth Interviews

We conducted these interviews to receive deeper insights into how Millennials, in particular those belonging to Generation Y, feel about the news. After interviewing ten individuals throughout campus, we combined their answers and gained insight on the issue at hand. Throughout all of the interviews one of the main running themes was that of “ease.” Whether the interviewee was talking about picking up the paper issue of different news sources in the Ferguson Center, or accessing it online, it was evident that they preferred the news to be delivered to them.

Instead of actively searching for the news, it seems as though they preferred for the news to find them. Snapchat Discover is something that recurrently became part of our discussion. Snapchat does something very interesting with providing a mix of news stories-- anything ranging from the latest celebrity gossip to CNN news coverage. But, not only is there a diversity in the type of news, it is also diverse because it is mixing news with social interaction.

“Like even when I’m not thinking about the news, it’ll just pop up and remind me to go look,” said Joshua Campbell, an interviwee, referring to Snapchat Discover.

Focusing on The New York Times, our team decided that it was

important to include a question about paying

for subscriptions. While it is a known fact that cheaper is better, we felt that we need to dig deeper into this generation, and figure out what circumstances affect their likability to pay

for the news. They all responded with

a resounding, “no” when I proceeded to ask

if they were willing to pay for subscriptions. “No, there are so many free options available” Natalie Boyd said in an extremely assertive manner. Other students we interviewed had similar options when asked if they would pay for the news.

“No, I can get the news for free,” said Isaac Futrell, a french and finance major at UA.

To advertise to college students like Campbell, Futrell and Boyd I believe that NYT has to more actively seek out their audience. While it is established in credibility already, it seems to be becoming less relevant. Whether all of the interviewees are watching the news on TV, Snapchat or reading it online, it’s seen as something that they are surrounded

by, but do not find themselves.Throughout the interviews, there seemed to be an overwhelming need for accessibility and entertainment. Easy readability and wit were standards that these students needed in their news source. Natalie found this by watching certain news anchors on FOX. Emily quickly searches Buzzfeed for writers and articles that interest her. Laura has summarized news stories waiting for her in her inbox everyday when she wakes up. Regardless of what medium they choose to obtain their news, they feel as though it should have these certain minimums for them to even consider straying away from what is of the norm. None of the participants felt that print news accurately captured the essence of

concise, humorous stories.

In order for The New York Times to break

through to this rising generation, it needs to rebrand in order to relate. The college students I interviewed view newspapers as a stuffy news source that

older people read. This generation seems

to stray from tradition and the “norm,” yet newspapers such

as The New York Times are very conventional; it is something that their parents and grandparents read, and that makes it seem outdated and irrelevant. In order to survive this fast paced, constantly changing world, The New York Times needs to break through the mold.

“I like the Skimm because it is

written in a quick way that is

easy to understand and it is

funny. It is also in my inbox

everyday so it’s extremely

accessible.” -Laura Phillips

“I like to interact with the

new passively, and look at

pictures of cats, or choose

to read a hard-hitting story

if it seems interesting.”

-Katherine Thiel

Consumer Publics Profile

Jane Doe

(She is part original target market who probably already reads NYT or something similar to it.)

Age: 20Occupation: studentMajor: communication

Personality:

• On-the-go: too busy to actively seek out the news

• Intelligent: wants to stay informed, but needs quick and easy information to digest

• Leader: Likes to be seen as an opinion leader among friends

• Multifaceted: Wants diversity in news consumption. She likes to see silly pictures of cats, but also wants to have knowledge on foreign affairs.

• Oldest of her siblings, so she’s really mature

Activities:

• Likes to read fiction novels for fun• Enjoys art and art/ music festivals

John Smith

(He is part of a target market discovered through insights in primary research. This newsletter will help him, because he currently just gets news from social media type outlets.)

Age: 21Occupation: studentMajor: Chemical Engineering

Personality:

• Likeable: extroverted personality • Easy-going: doesn’t sweat the small stuff• Informed: Likes to know what’s going on

in the world, so that he can talk about them with his friends

Activities:

• Likes to go hiking/ kayaking on the weekends

• Never misses a home football game• Has a dog, and loves taking him on walks

Execution: Newsletter

NEWSLETTER

We have decided to make a New York Times Newsletter available to students 3 to 4 times a week. The newsletter will be offered on a free trial basis for the first month, along with access to the online version of NYT. This compliments the needs of our target markets-- on-the-go, informed and involved, college student, who is on a college budget. This is the solution for students who prefer news to seek them out. Students will have the opportunity to choose for themselves the categories of content present in their own personal newsletter. This mixes the selling-points of all of our main competitors, but now the content is coming from what students already know to be a credible source.

MEASUREMENT AND EVALUATION

Since the newsletter we would provide is an option that students would have to opt-in for themselves, we can measure the success of the program through how many students register to receive the newsletter over three months. We would survey the rate of subscriptions over this amount of time to see if students are choosing to keep the newsletter. We can also see how students are interacting with the newsletter and how many articles they choose to read by measuring the transfer or click rate from the newsletter to nytimes.com.

apr 280 group project 2(1)

Documents