Coming back for more: Reader Loyalty and the Fayetteville Observer's Website (2009)
Undergraduate: Lucia Parker
Faculty Advisor: Penny Abernathy
Department: Journalism & Mass Communication
Motivation: As the classic business model for newspapers crumbles, it is crucial to explore how a newspaper can shift from the old model for profitability to the uncharted territory of the future and in so doing, take a step toward making real journalism sustainable.
Methods: A secondary data analysis was performed on data collected by The Fayetteville Observer. The survey was posted on FayObserver.com and was based on Fred Reichheld’s research linking customer loyalty and profitable growth. The loyalty question Reichheld developed was followed by a brief survey seeking demographic information about the website’s users. This was designed as a baseline study that can be re administered on a routine basis, with results compared over time.
Results and Conclusions: The survey provided a snapshot of the demographics and usage patterns of visitors to FayObserver.com. Specifically, the survey responses indicated that FayObserver.com has an audience that is entirely independent of the readership of the newspaper.This in turn, underscored the importance of creating a core of digital content that engenders loyalty in that online audience. Teasing out what exactly that loyalty-inspiring content is will help news media organizations understand how their readers define them and what those readers value.