Sunday, June 08, 2008
Your feedback is valuable
Michael Stowe
Message board
Recent columns
Age of Uncertainty, our occasional series focused on the challenges facing our elderly population, is getting attention. In fact, a recent survey suggests the past two installments were read by more than 80 percent of people who looked at the paper.
Interestingly, though, the series written by Beth Macy and photographed by Josh Meltzer has resonated far more with women than with men.
Check out this snapshot of how they viewed the May 25 installment that examined the growing shortage of doctors trained in geriatrics:
- 95 percent of female readers felt strongly that it contained useful information, compared with only 81 percent of men;
- 78 percent of female readers, but only 53 percent of men, believe it's important content to have in the paper;
- 75 percent of women said the story was well-written, but only 43 percent of men felt that way.
Getting immediate feedback on what readers like has long been a challenge for newspaper editors. So, how do I know the stats quoted above?
The Roanoke Times has a new online reader panel that provides us insight into how our customers interact with the paper.
More than 500 readers have joined the panel so far, but we'd like to double that number. It's open to anyone willing to register.
Panelists are e-mailed a weekly survey (usually on Mondays) asking about specific stories and advertisements in the paper. You don't have to participate each week, but we're offering gift cards to respondents who earn points by completing the surveys.
A detailed report compiled from each survey is distributed to newsroom editors so that we can use it to make better choices about which stories to pursue and how to display them in the paper.
So far, most of the surveys have asked about stories in our Sunday paper, such as the Age of Uncertainty series.
Let me share a few other highlights from the surveys:
- Both male and female readers liked our May 18 guide to what's new at Mill Mountain Zoo this summer. More than 80 percent of the panelists read the story, and 93 percent of those felt it contained useful information.
- Fewer than half of our May 25 readers said they read the Your Community calendar in the Virginia section, but nearly 90 percent of those who did considered the information valuable.
- Men like to read about women's sports -- or at least they like to read about Virginia Tech softball. Eighty-seven percent of men (but only 61 percent of women) said they read last Sunday's story detailing Tech's College World Series loss and pitcher Angela Tincher's last game.
I could go on and on quoting the surveys. The feedback is fascinating and valuable to us, and it's only going to get better as more people participate.
So, I encourage you to sign up: www.roanoke.com/panel.
