World press freedom day
2023 Finalist
Overview of this campaign
The Swedish press is strong. But we’re not immune to the zeitgeist. Many countries have pushed things further, but we’ve got our fair share of politicians who want to limit freedom of the press. Swedish news outlets publish dutiful articles about this from time to time. But few people outside the confines of the newsroom really care.
We wanted to change this, at least for a day. We wanted to truly put the spotlight on our democratic function and remind people of a freedom that many take for granted. At the same time we need to acquire more subscribers. A strong financial account is the best way to guarantee editorial integrity.
On May 3rd we managed to combine these two things. That’s when we celebrate World Press Freedom Day – a holiday that few people care about. But we wanted to change that, at least a little bit.
The newsroom and the marketing department collaborated on a campaign based around a column about the plights of Russian journalists. The column was published in all our channels in a censored and an uncensored version, to highlight how it might have turned out if the Russian state apparatus had their say about the content.
When World Press Freedom Day was over hundreds of thousands of swedes had seen the message, and we had grown our subscription base by almost 1 percent.
Results for this campaign
- May 3rd became one of our best days ever with regards to new subscribers. 1330 people converted, which is an increase by 1 percent in total subscribers. Half of them where people who never had a Göteborgs-Posten subscription before.
- The message reached at least 300 000 people through print, on site and social media. This is the part of the reach we can measure through our own platforms. The organic reach is even larger.
- The campaign had a major social media impact. Lots of readers shared the story. Among them the editor-in-chief of Swedens largest newspaper Dagens Nyheter to his 250 000 Twitter followers.
