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Norway’s Avisa Nordland wins World Young Reader Prize for Editorial

Erik Bjerager, President World Editors Forum, Denmark, (at left in photo) presented the World Young Reader Prize for Editorial to Avisa Nordland, Norway at the start of the 12th International Newsroom Summit on Tuesday afternoon in Berlin. Accepting the prize was Jan Eirik Hanssen, Chief Editor of Avisa Nordland.

by Brian Veseling brian.veseling@wan-ifra.org | October 8, 2013

Said Bjerager: “Avisa Nordland of Norway has won the top World Young Reader Prize in the editorial category for truly breaking down boundaries by opening itself up to the young people in the community. It invited 60 members of its audience, as young as age 15, to join its team as special editors to examine everything and make real change, from content to platform to participation to subscription schemes.”

The group helped the small daily (circulation 20,696) create new content on all platforms and adjust pricing. The cost? The 15- to 39-year-olds got a low-cost subscription to the paper.

“What is so brilliant with this project is that the collaboration with the editorial staff is so close, that they are feeling an ownership in this,” said Anne Jacobsen, chief analyst for parent group Amedia. “They felt that they could deliver their input, and that these inputs would be reflected in the paper. To them that was the reward.”

The result: The next readership survey showed a halt in the declining numbers in that group. Amedia plans to implement the strategy in all its newsrooms.

Jacobsen will discuss the project with Dr. Aralynn McMane, Executive Director, Young Readership Development, WAN-IFRA, during a presentation at the Newsroom Summit on Wednesday afternoon entitled “Engaging the Millennials.” See the full programme here.

See more about all of this year’s World Young Reader Prize winners here.

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