Are newspapers the dinosaurs of our era, doomed to extinction because of the Internet and social media?
I’ve been asked that question countless times as the online world explodes with more news sites, postings and blogs than one can possibly imagine.
And my answer is absolutely not — especially not community newspapers like The Laker/Lutz News. So it’s tongue-in-cheek that we chose T-Rex as our theme to promote our papers at community events, marketing ourselves as the T-Rex of newspapers.
By now, hopefully, you realize your paper is much larger than its previous size. In August, we took a leap of faith and went from a tabloid size, to one that is the same size as a daily newspaper. That’s a 30 percent jump in page size.
To introduce our larger format to the business community, we produced a fun video that I also invite you to watch. It’s on YouTube, and you can find it at tinyurl.com/LakerXLVideo.
In our video’s opening scene, you’ll see vibrating glasses of water mimicking that iconic moment in “Jurassic Park” right before T-Rex burst into the scene.
And here’s why we want you to make the connection between T-Rex and The Laker/Lutz News:
- To give you a visual that our papers are bigger — the T-Rex of community newspapers. We’re bucking the industry trend of shrinking sizes and fewer pages.
- We’ve both been around a long time. Dinosaurs walked the Earth for 160 million years, and our papers have been in circulation longer than any other weekly newspaper in north suburban Tampa: The Lutz News since 1964, and The Laker since 1981.
- By making T-Rex our icon, we’re debunking the myth head-on that newspapers are on a path to extinction.
The Laker/Lutz News has never been financially stronger, and we’re not alone. Community newspapers everywhere are thriving because we give people news about their community that they look forward to reading, and cannot get anywhere else.
The Internet and social media have not, and will not, replace the relevancy of community newspapers. We too have an active Facebook page, and a growing website with more than 25,000 page views each month. While impressive, this still does not compare to the 64,000 people who read us each and every week.
Why is our printed product so popular? Industry research consistently reports that people prefer reading stories about their neighbors, community groups and upcoming events in a traditional printed newspaper they hold in their hands.
Since increasing our size, we have received overwhelming support from readers and advertisers. More stories in the paper mean it is a better read, and more readers result in more customers for our advertisers.
We have positioned The Laker/Lutz News to be the No. 1 source of local news, and the best way to market your business in north Hillsborough and Pasco counties.
So, to those of you who still think newspapers are dinosaurs, you are wrong.
We are here to stay. Extinction is not in our vocabulary.
Published October 29, 2014
See this story in print: Click Here
