Approaching its tenth anniversary, Guardian Australia has entered the competition for shoppers’ attention, placing news headlines on outdoor billboards and video screens.

Growth director Jocelin Abbey says in an INMA Ideas Blog, that the UK-headquartered publisher wanted to engage new audiences with its independent, factual journalism.

“As a digital-only brand, we needed to find a way to reach new audiences without the benefit of having a local legacy masthead or newspaper to build a brand or regular readership,” she says.

With just two companies accounting for around 80 per cent of the metropolitan and national newsprint media, the Australian media market is one of the most concentrated media markets in the world, according to the 2022 Reuters Digital News Report.

In bespoke research through YouGov, more than 80 per cent of Australians agreed that media ownership influenced the content produced, and a third wanted a more diverse range of options.

“This spoke to an unmet need in the market, indicating the potential for The Guardian’s independent, progressive and trusted journalism to reach a broader audience,” says Abbey.

“With about one in every two Australians aware of The Guardian, and one in every three visiting us every month, we identified our opportunity for growth was to build awareness and regular engagement with The Guardian’s journalism, reaching audiences who wouldn’t normally come into contact with the brand through their day-to-day routines.”

The aim was to engage with people as they went about their daily routines, and create a daily habit that wasn’t just about passive consumption. This would then help build a connection with The Guardian’s journalism and motivate audiences to consider it as one of their top news sources.

“Tunstall’s theory of audience engagement was helpful in framing up the execution of this idea, which was to use secondary and tertiary modes of consumption (outdoor billboards and video screens at metro train stations) to drive primary engagement with our top news headlines,” she says.

A partnership with outdoor media provider JCDecaux targetted commuters in capital cities, offering high-quality, independent journalism as a public service. Headlines were generated directly by the newsroom, with news editors and production teams managing rolling news updates throughout the day.

New processes and technology needed to be developed within the editorial teams, taking time, resources and a buy-in throughout the newsroom.

“We used high-impact, public OOH screens to amplify the on-site experience, which meant we could treat the OOH like an extension of the product by using The Guardian’s distinctive language, layouts, and brand codes,” she says.

“The addition of a direct call-to-action to visit The Guardian, served at a time when people had higher mental availability on their commute, acted as a prompt around ‘What did I miss in the news today’.”

Abbey says the campaign has delivered a strong impact since its launch in September 2022, with the The Guardian’s share of search increasing 11 per cent, and awareness among the target demographic up 12 per cent.

Recurring on-site surveys of current Australian readers found that advertising prompted visitation for about 15 per cent, and over one-third of readers reported the advertising reminded them to search The Guardian next time they wanted to be updated on the news. Additionally, 42 per cent said the advertising makes it more likely they would choose The Guardian as a news source.