A dozen different newsrooms across Oklahoma are completing data-driven projects designed to enhance trust in and the sustainability of local journalism as part of the nonprofit Oklahoma Media Center’s Ecosystem Engagement Project.
The statewide collaborative’s multiphase project consisted of contracting scientific polling as well as qualitative academic research. This comprehensive data helped gain a clearer perspective of how Oklahomans consume information, what they consider trustworthy and what would spur them to support local journalism. In September 2023, OMC facilitated a training with the national nonprofit Trusting News at the Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Oklahoma to discuss how to turn the study’s findings into practical applications to enhance the impact of local newsrooms.
Next, OMC began accepting proposals and awarded over $112,000 in stipends to 12 media organizations to undertake projects related to the ecosystem study and the subsequent training. Working closely with cohort members, Trusting News Director Joy Mayer provided specially designed online training sessions, one-on-one coaching, office hours and additional support through the end of March.
“Across Oklahoma, there are journalists building on the research and working hard to understand their communities, connect with new audiences, and explain the value of their news coverage,” Mayer said. “It’s been inspiring and exciting to support them as they’ve evolved their practices to offer an improved public service.”
During OMC’s monthly group meetings in April and May, participating organizations gave presentations that discussed these lessons learned from their projects:
• Enid News & Eagle shared how they wanted to play more of a leadership role in providing reliable information to their community instead of the social media rumor mill. They do have a social media presence but wanted to leverage community members to help spread the word. They targeted Enid’s substantial Marshellese population. Language barriers and cultural differences make engagement challenging, but they are continuing to look for ways to include this historically underrepresented population by reaching out to employers, schools and other organizations to find the individuals to share local information and provide feedback to the publication. They worked with an outside marketing person with a news background to develop a survey, find other community ambassadors and organize a meeting with potential community contributors. They continue to work with these contacts to develop their content as well as help expand their reach on social media.
• The Frontier shared how they implemented a subscription text messaging service with two-way texting. They also are planning two in-person events in June in Tulsa and Oklahoma City. The texting service allows readers to share story tips and comments, as well as allowing the publication to promote its content directly to engaged readers. They are using the SimpleText platform to do this. As social media algorithms have changed, they have seen engagement on those platforms decrease, so they hope directly texting readers will eventually increase traffic. With a six-person staff, the events have taken a bit longer to organize, but they are now planned and being promoted. They are designed as legislative forums to connect with new people who are interested in public policy and local news. They are currently confirming legislative speakers and sponsors. Three lawmakers already have committed, but they are working to ensure equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats attend.
• The KGOU/Oklahoma Watch collaboration shared how they planned to do several in-person events across the state, where they talked to community members, learned about their concerns and developed personal relationships that would let the public learn more about the news media. The collaborators did a similar project in 2022 at seven locations around Oklahoma. As they began to plan the project, they were reminded of the importance of emphasizing promotion and building their audience. They did find that the two best-attended events were places with KGOU transmitters and most attendees were listeners. With the compressed grant timeline, they decided to focus on four events with more geographically centered locations: Chickasha, Woodward, Ponca City and Durant. Participants provided good feedback on what their concerns were and how they related to local journalism. Many people did not realize how few people are involved in most newsrooms, and these events helped build trust and make journalism more relatable to the general public. Common community concerns included information on crime, schools, infrastructure, funds to promote business and job creation and health care. Participants appreciated the sincerity, transparency, time and resources that were put into conducting these listening events.
• KOSU shared how they sought to create an advisory board to enhance collaboration and help emphasize civic engagement. The project began more slowly than anticipated, so they are still in the process of finding board members. They worked with a consultant outside of the media field in order to get different perspectives from what they would usually have. They held a few community listening sessions with Focus: Black Oklahoma on journalistic accountability, fairness and other areas. Initially, they were very focused on central Oklahoma and reaching every demographic in the area, but instead they are now trying to focus the board on specific tasks related to community engagement and other listening events. Developing job descriptions for the board has helped to direct their work, and they are being very intentional about setting both the board and the station up for a successful relationship that will inform their coverage.
• The Lawton Constitution shared how they conducted a readership survey to understand where to best allocate their limited resources and staff and provide desired community coverage. Using a third-party consultant through February, they reached out to both current and former readers. Initial attempts via email did not receive much attention, but a Facebook survey garnered over 600 unique responses, split fairly evenly between readers and nonreaders. They found 94% of respondents wanted more coverage of community events and festivals, which is something the paper had de-emphasized due to time constraints and community organizations shifting primarily to social media promotion. Since then, they have been able to add a new reporter and have re-emphasized covering local events. A majority of respondents also want a clear mix of local, state and national news, particularly about state government, so they are looking into ways to collaborate with other newsrooms to better provide this content.
• NonDoc shared that they are in the process of creating a news ambassadors program to help grow text and newsletter subscribers, establish republication partnerships with local outlets and support their annual fundraising campaign. So far, they have partnered with 11 people in communities across Oklahoma and check in with them monthly. They have seen subscriber and social media follower growth every month since starting this project. They also have created a Google Doc with pre-shortened stories for smaller papers to share, particularly regarding state government and statewide matters. Story surveys and community listening sessions are still in the works but had to be pushed back due to time constraints. It took more time than initially expected to build trust in different communities and identify ambassadors who have the skills and time needed to help promote journalism effectively. They already have received real-world feedback from their ambassadors about how they have connected their own social network with NonDoc reporting. They are continuing to nurture these relationships as well as identify additional ambassadors in a more intentional way.
• The Oklahoma Eagle shared how they sought ways to more effectively distribute their content. As they developed the idea, they found they first needed to get a better sense of who their readership is and what more it expects from the Eagle. Instead of their original six-pronged approach, they decided to focus on a more targeted strategy that included creating a Trusting News page on their website, creating a content group of readers and asking for feedback, making outreach presentations to the general public and partnering with other local organizations to spread the word about their work. The presentations were targeted to six different audiences around Tulsa, and the Eagle surveyed attendees and passed out copies of the paper to get direct feedback. They found the publication carried considerable weight in the area’s Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) communities and is considered trustworthy, especially in the 45-plus age group, though its following among younger audiences is not as strong. They received feedback about how their online presence, especially across non-Facebook social media platforms, could be improved. After the conclusion of these efforts, the Eagle produced reports on their results, which showed high levels of perceived accuracy, trustworthiness and interest in the publication’s content, though they found that readers did request more variety of reporting topics. They also learned important insights on their readership to enable them to develop ways to reach new audiences, particularly younger people. They plan to regularly engage readers and the broader community moving forward.
• The Oklahoman shared how they focused on Oklahoma’s 13 remaining all-Black towns, bringing attention to the issues facing these historic communities through residents’ own words and amplifying their voices. By visiting each town, they planned to do individual profiles and vignettes that spoke to what is special about the community, what residents’ needs and concerns are and what they would like other Oklahomans to know about these towns. The commentaries will include infrastructure and revenue concerns, education and other topics. They also include print, digital and video elements. The Oklahoman found that many residents had previously moved away, but they returned later in life hoping to build up these unique communities and share them with the younger generation. Currently, the organization has gathered commentary from six communities, with the remaining ones scheduled for later in the year. One challenge they encountered was staff changes, which delayed project implementation, but they found workarounds that will ensure success despite the unexpected hurdle. This project could easily be replicated in other marginalized communities. The Oklahoman found the trust issue in these small communities is a very real problem. It takes time to work within marginalized populations to build trust and help them understand how journalists want to give them a voice and not exploit their stories.
• The Oklahoma Press Association shared how they decided to measure news coverage in two OPA members. They analyzed a year’s worth of coverage from those weekly newspapers, surveyed readers to gather feedback on what they wanted and provided this data to the newsrooms so they could adapt their reporting based on reader interests. Despite both newspapers serving rural areas, their reporting varied enormously in terms of topics, the annual analysis showed. These disparities also were not in alignment with what their communities actually wanted to read. Both newspapers were publishing few features, but readers said human interest stories were among the most requested. The surveys revealed that if coverage is not balanced, then readers will seek out different sources of information. When content is more balanced, readers are much more likely to support local newspapers. The surveys also showed most respondents did find their local newspaper to be an important part of the community and considered it trustworthy, but they did not generally see it as providing content readers could not discover elsewhere. Issues with high-speed internet connectivity also limited online access and digital news delivery options in these rural communities. The newspapers are just in the beginning stages of altering their content based on the analysis and survey results, but OPA is continuing to monitor the coverage and provide resources to help them succeed.
• OU Daily shared how they sought to enhance audience engagement through a number of different initiatives. They have created an engagement desk with four students creating content and providing deeper analytics. They also have revamped their monthly newsletter to increase visual elements as well as providing more space for advertisers. The newsletter has seen significant growth in open rates since these changes were implemented. Centralizing and automating their social media accounts have increased engagement, access to analytics and improved content moderation. Readership surveys revealed a majority of their readers are older than 25. The OU Daily’s first ever business survey showed a number of opportunities to expand revenue and enhance partnerships with various businesses around Norman. They also deepened their fundraising efforts, which included earlier planning, making cross-platform appeals and offering more donor incentives.
• VNN shared how they created a Citizen Journalism Project using their custom web application to develop news training for underserved communities. Though they had the platform for a little while, they had never embarked on actually training individuals to be journalists. Through surveys, they found that many people simply lacked confidence to contribute, so they developed a specific training program to bridge this gap. The program was promoted primarily through word-of-mouth recommendations they received from current readers. Contributors could sign up under a number of traditionally underserved groups and then receive training on media literacy, how to conduct interviews, write like a journalist and work with editors to share important stories affecting their communities. Seven individuals, who were already community influencers in one way or another, attended the training. VNN found they came in with considerable skills, so the training could go more in-depth than initially expected. All the participants completed the program, including three people who had considerable travel involved. Every member came from underrepresented populations, often in multiple ways.
Rob Collins, executive director of OMC, said he was impressed with how the newsrooms experimented with new tools and ideas to deepen community engagement.
“By listening to the needs of local citizens, we’re being intentional about better serving relevant information to meet folks where they are located,” Collins said. “Expanding beyond journalism’s traditional bandwidth, local newsrooms are interacting with audiences in innovative ways through the execution of these engagement experiments.”
Launched in 2020 by the Inasmuch Foundation and the Local Media Association, OMC’s mission is to support and strengthen Oklahoma’s journalism ecosystem and spur innovation through statewide collaboration that benefits diverse audiences. A nonpartisan 501(c)(3) organization, OMC includes more than 30 news outlets statewide, ranging from broadcast stations and nonprofits to Indigenous and Black-owned outlets to longstanding newspapers.
For more information about these projects, email Collins at rob@oklahomamediacenter.com.
