The Times-Reporter in New Philadelphia, Ohio, has been running a great reader involvement piece related to Father's Day. The newsroom asked readers to send in father-child look-alike photos and then created a poll, allowing readers to select their favorite.
The package has so far generated dozens of photo submissions, nearly 15,000 page views, hundreds of votes and some great comments - "Goodness! This is so awesome to see dads in a positive light!" [It's not too late to run your own Father's Day callout. Find it here.]
Editor/publisher Tom Jekel tells us how the piece came together:
Several weeks back, we decided to do a look-alike-fathers callout for Father’s Day, hoping to generate some good reader-submitted photos that would help us pull together an anecdotal centerpiece feature for the Sunday, June 20 Times-Reporter front page. Several callout efforts in print and online helped generate 15 photo contributions through the middle of last week.
During last Wednesday afternoon’s weekend planning meeting, I suggested taking it one step further. Our online activity tends to slow down with the arrival of warm weather and the end of the school year, so I was also looking for new ways to drive online activity. While still encouraging dads to submit photos of themselves with their offspring (FYI, photo contributions include sons and daughters), we decided to introduce a poll to let readers decide who looks the most like dad. I asked Julie (Watts, online editor) if she could do the formatting before beginning her vacation Friday night, and she jumped on it.
Announcement of the contest was made in an A1 rail graphic (attached) in Friday’s Times-Reporter, and that promotion more than doubled the number of contributed dad/sibling pictures. The print promo just ran the one time. The contest also in the No. 1 position on our carousel, with voting off to the right of that page.
As of this writing, we have 31 photos currently on our carousel with several more e-mailed in today that we still have to put up. If a reader looks at all of the photos each time, that’s 31 views per visit — pretty good numbers.
Readers also have a chance to make comments, and many have complimented us on the contest. Said one: “I think this is a great thing!! congrats to all the dads who were entered!! you are all winners!!!”
We’ll announce the top vote-getter with Sunday’s A1 package.
The Times-Reporter in New Philadelphia, Ohio, has been running a great reader involvement piece related to Father's Day. The newsroom asked readers to send in father-child look-alike photos and then created a poll, allowing readers to select their favorite.
The package has so far generated dozens of photo submissions, nearly 15,000 page views, hundreds of votes and some great comments - "Goodness! This is so awesome to see dads in a positive light!" [It's not too late to run your own Father's Day callout. Find it here.]
Editor/publisher Tom Jekel tells us how the piece came together:
Several weeks back, we decided to do a look-alike-fathers callout for Father’s Day, hoping to generate some good reader-submitted photos that would help us pull together an anecdotal centerpiece feature for the Sunday, June 20 Times-Reporter front page. Several callout efforts in print and online helped generate 15 photo contributions through the middle of last week.
During last Wednesday afternoon’s weekend planning meeting, I suggested taking it one step further. Our online activity tends to slow down with the arrival of warm weather and the end of the school year, so I was also looking for new ways to drive online activity. While still encouraging dads to submit photos of themselves with their offspring (FYI, photo contributions include sons and daughters), we decided to introduce a poll to let readers decide who looks the most like dad. I asked Julie (Watts, online editor) if she could do the formatting before beginning her vacation Friday night, and she jumped on it.
Announcement of the contest was made in an A1 rail graphic (attached) in Friday’s Times-Reporter, and that promotion more than doubled the number of contributed dad/sibling pictures. The print promo just ran the one time. The contest also in the No. 1 position on our carousel, with voting off to the right of that page.
As of this writing, we have 31 photos currently on our carousel with several more e-mailed in today that we still have to put up. If a reader looks at all of the photos each time, that’s 31 views per visit — pretty good numbers.
Readers also have a chance to make comments, and many have complimented us on the contest. Said one: “I think this is a great thing!! congrats to all the dads who were entered!! you are all winners!!!”
We’ll announce the top vote-getter with Sunday’s A1 package.
