Making the most out of a college newspaper

[Alyssa Mitchell]

We are trying to boost our readership (our paper is already free), but we've not gotten any good ideas. We started an entertainment magazine, but its success has been moderate, and response to blogs are lackluster. Our website gets quite a few hits, but local advertisers aren't into web ads at this time. You can see it here at: uabkscope.com

Any suggestions?

[dave hogerty]

Like so often ignored in these "design" environments, the importance of picture editing is ignored. In my first look at your "magazine," I was greeted with sub-standard basketball images, and just another Barack Obama at a podium ... As a cold viewer, I would have moved on. Think about your first page, more as a cover (especially as the environment gets more and more cluttered with similar looking pages) ... And as ALWAYS, the most important design decision you'll make is choosing THE SINGLE IMAGE you think will be most attractive ... and WORK to PUT YOUR BEST ART FORWARD. More Risky? Of course, but the reward is greater when you learn to choose wisely. It's all about the editing ... Be ruthless. Hope You Do Well. Good Luck. —dave.

[Santosh]

Hi Alyssa, Incase if you want I can redesign it for you make it more visually appealing to your readers. Just send me the exact mechanical data of the newspaper

[Michelle]

Hi Alyssa,

My suggestion would be to visit this list of the best college newspapers and see what makes them so great! Then try to incorporate any new and different ideas in to your own paper. Hold a brainstorming session with your staff to see if working together might help boost your creativity.

Also, in my opinion, the best way to boost readership is to feature the readers themselves. Everyone likes to see his name or photo in the paper...yes? So feature as many individuals/clubs/organizations as you can:) Have a contest of some sort (essay, cover design, photography, etc.) and encourage readers to enter — and find a local restaurant or the school bookstore (or an important alum with an awesome business) to donate gift cards or prizes for some incentive. Feature all or some of the entries in the paper or online, and along with those, perhaps include a reader's survey asking what current features of the paper the readers enjoy, and suggestions for what they might like to see. Provide space for reader comments... and hopefully you'll find some new columnists or at least some great ideas:)

My college paper was very popular, and there were tons of places to pick it up all over campus. How is your newspaper distributed? Also, in case this helps, some of the favorites at my college paper (the Arizona Daily Wildcat, to which I will probably be unhealthy attached until the day after forever!) were Fast Facts (little random factoids about things you probably never knew), Comics, Classifieds, the daily Sudoku puzzle and, believe it or not, PoliceBeat!

Hope that helps a little — good luck! All the best.

[Shawn Alain]

There are many other, more important, strategies to boost your readership than just graphic design.
1. Check your distribution points. Add more of them.
2. Run readers contest, with prizes.
3. If you want more advertising, don't forget about special features. At our paper we run about 2 a month, and we're a weekly paper.
4. Like Michelle said above run a readers survey. It is a common mistake for a Publisher and Editor to think we know what our readers want.
Well there's more you can do but there's a few ideas anyways.

[Alyssa Mitchell]

Thanks for all you help!
And Dave you're so right. I cringe at our sky boxes every week. Actually I cringe at a lot of the news section designs. The pictures are never big enough unless the get redone by another staffer.

[Jim McBee]

I think Michelle hit it with this: "The best way to boost readership is to feature the readers." Get as many "regular folks'" words and images into the paper as possible. That's more critical to building readership than any investigative piece or page layout.

Here's one cheap way: If you're not already doing it, post your best online-forum content in the paper. Of course, you'll have to warn online users that their comments may be "reverse published."

We're not talking about your bread-and-butter journalism, we're talking about getting readers to buy in to shore up the platform from which you perpetrate journalism.

[Mark Coughlan]

Hey.

I thought you were the Editor of the Kscope, I actually sent the Ed. in Chief an email about something separate. If you could tell her about it or alternatively tell me your position in the paper so I can contact you directly via email.

I also edit a college newspaper. This year we've doubled our readership by changing from broadsheet to tabloid format (without much change in content or editorial values, just visuals)... its a serious boost! We've also started using a hell of a lot more photos and much more college-centric funny photos, i.e. we have a new "look-a-like" thing were we post look-a-likes of lecturers and well-recognized students, drunken pictures of students out partying are always popular too!

[Gayle Dar]

Mark, what college newspaper are or were you from?

[Christian Ricardo Lubis]

lackluster on differentiation!!!

[Garciaphillip]

hi,

This is a wonderful opinion. The things mentioned are unanimous and needs to be appreciated by everyone.

Garcia

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[Berry]

I would say find a "guest columnist" who can bring some controversial opinion articles to the paper. Anything politically unpopular or socially unacceptable. Do a dating advice column.

I tell you -- I really like your page flip flash deal. That's really slick.

You say local businesses are not into online right now-- I would offer it to real estate agents and car lots-- they understand online-- you do have to be less expensive but it will crack the online door open.

[Alyssa Mitchell]

Thanks, it's something I've pushed for since taking over editor in chief. Our resident techie has engineered a way to make it. Beforehand I was using Issuu, something our regional student competitors were using, but most of their sites are basic College Publishers sites that look quite bland.

In the meantime, we started another website that has gotten us some attention (insideuab.com) for having regularly updated content like band reviews from local clubs/bars and photo galleries.

It doesn't hurt us any that our school is turning a few departments upside down and we've the only ones in town that have podcasts and videos of the panel discussions. The big, local newspapers weren't allowed to take blinding photography for very long but our student staffers walked in and filmed the whole thing using point and click cameras without the flash.