Texts work even on TikTok: Chernihiv newspaper increasing its audience on social networks

What’s New Here? the editorial office of the Chernihivskyi Visnyk newspaper has implemented the project through its online platform. The publication set itself the goal of increasing the level of interaction between government officials and community residents.

“We’ve interviewed activists, posted questions in local groups, on news sites and community pages on social networks. Four major topics were singled out: social benefits, mobilization, land issues, decommunization,” journalist Maryna Zabiyan lists.

Subsequently, we began to work on the topics above and publish news not only in the newspaper but also on media platforms.

“Our Visnyk Che is a well-known and most widely circulated printed publication in the region, with a circulation of 28,900 copies. In 2023, we started functioning as a media publication. And currently, we appear on such platforms and social networks as Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and Telegram. We also cooperate with the site Chas Chernihivskyi on partnership relations. During the implementation of the project, What’s New Here?, we entered Instagram,” notes the editor-in-chief Serhii Narodenko.

“We have 81,000 publications about social benefits, 56 comments, over 1,000 reposts, and almost 200 saves. Mobilization topics bring 35,000 in coverage and 45 comments. The publication about decommunization has 41 shares, while the topic of mobilization brought us 75 shares. During the project, the TikTok audience grew from 800 to 2,500 subscribers. The reach on Facebook increased by 300,000: from 700,000 to more than a million,” says journalist Maryna Zabiyan.

The publication increased its audience and even received paper letters from readers, which is an indicator of well-chosen topics. In particular, during the work on the material about the creation of a nature reserve in the village of Klochkiv, people sent letters with signatures in parallel with messages on social networks to emphasize how important the issue of the nature reserve is for their community.

“We understood that the texts work even on TikTok. We have published text material on this social network as part of the project. And it increased the audience. Also, for the first time, to increase the activity of the audience, we posted a survey on our YouTube channel. People reacted to us there as well,” says Maryna Zabiyan.

Over the course of two months, 21 local and regional media, on the initiative of the National Union of Journalists of Ukraine (NUJU), will implement their own projects aimed at strengthening interaction with the audience and communities of local communities. As part of the work on the projects, the editors receive assistance from the Ukrainian Media Fund with the assistance of the German Marshall Fund of the United States. TV and radio companies, online media and print publications will participate in the project.

Nazarii Vivcharyk