The World Association of Newspapers Young Reader Conference in D.C. continued Tuesday with more information on teens, technology and media consumption. The Digital Edge covered a session Monday called “Making New Connections,” which focused on international research on teen media habits. For additional coverage of the entire WAN Young Reader Conference, including video, photos and blogs, see the WAN Web site.  

The Adolescents  

Tuesday morning’s session on adolescents featured two very different success stories from Europe.  

Brand-Building with MySpace  

Kirsty Robinson, Co-Editor of Marmalade, a magazine in the United Kingdom, found success in partnering with the social networking site MySpace. Marmalade integratd MySpace into the magazine’s content and marketing efforts and with one major project, Marmalade became an internationally known publication and one of the first to receive editorial space on the MySpace homepage   To get quality, real contributions from “MySpacers,” Robinson said the Marmalade Network offers both credibility (which is, in part, related to the exclusivity and targeted audience noted earlier) and, of course, money. “We decided to treat them the way we’d treat a regular Marmalade contributor,” Robinson said.   In addition to announcements and calls for entries through MySpace, Marmalade also started a viral campaign and did partnership activities that included prizes, like a PlayStation 3. The results were “immense,” Robinson said. The sheer volume of entries the publication received overwhelmed Marmalade’s servers and caused editing delays. “Estimate how long editing will take and double it,” Robinson said. Robinson also recommended scouting potential contributors on MySpace and put out targeting calls for entries.

Robinson said she has hired a MySpace editor to help facilitate the community conversation and keep the Marmalade-MySpace brand going strong. Part of that editor’s job is to verify Marmalade’s MySpace “friends,” ensuring their MySpace network is full of the creative types to which the magazine is targeted. It creates a sense of exclusivity.

Connecting Teens to the Newspaper  

Anders Goliger, Assistant News Editor, Gotesborgs-Posten, Sweden, stepped up after Robinson to talk about the strategy to engage young readers. At Gotesborgs-Posten dates back 10 years, and involves youth reporters who write for the paper and online editions with professional back-up editing. The long-term goal is to “make them accustomed to our brand.” The strategy starts in print.   For the youngest readers, a weekend section (and daily column) called Graffiti targets youth ages 10 to 14. It uses short text, it is graphics heavy and follows the model, “Don’t preach, don’t teach” – except for one noted feature teaching pre-teens how to kiss. Attityd, a section geared to readers ages 15 to 19, similarly includes captivating graphics and stories written by teenagers. The newspaper also has a section geared toward 20-somethings.   Attityd writers are paid “not very much,” but younger writers are not paid. “It’s extra income for them,” Goliger said. But the model of paying for content is entering a gray area with the growing online content, such as video uploaded by readers. “Obviously, we can’t afford to pay them all.”   “I think there is a strong movement among Swedish newspapers to be very strong online,” Goliger said. “But what have we done differently? I think one key to the success… is that it is a traditional newspaper and we have a strong brand up-front, and we use that position to build a strong brand with younger readers. By using the strong platform we have amongst adult readers, we are able to build a strong brand among the youth.”   The newspaper is in the process of ramping up online efforts for the youth sections through redesigns and encouraging user-generated content.   The youth editions are not yet available in mobile versions, but that is on the list for the publication.   The results: Goteborges-Posten is the No. 1 media for young people in the local area, and traffic on the Web site has increased significantly among young readers in the past several quarters. “If we attract adolescents, many will start subscribing later. 67 percent of those who read the newspaper when they grew up are subscribers today,” Goliger said.   Goliger’s tips:

• Let young readers write for the newspaper and show it with big bylines.
• Push and pull readers between your channels.
• The youth perspective should not be limited to your youth section – the rest of the newspaper must follow in terms of including youth’s perspective in articles and covering topics of interest to them.