Athlete of the Week
Newspapers often have stories, content, and entire sections dedicated to local sports teams. An Athlete of the Week ballot is an excellent opportunity to promote your current content as well as draw in a large audience interested in voting for their local favorites.
The Houma Courier’s (circ. 14,000) “Athletes of the Week” ballot ran from September through April. Each week, hundreds of users cast their vote on the paper’s top weekly athletes, and a weekly male and female favorite is chosen as winner. Sponsored by a local Honda dealership and sports medicine center, their ballot generated over $15,000 in revenue.
Food & Drink
If you’re already writing stories related to the local restaurants and bars in your community, a ballot can be an excellent way to promote that content and grow your audience. Consider running a different ballot each month relating to a different topic such as Best of BBQ, Best Bars, Best Food Truck, or Best Burgers.
If there’s one food people are passionate about, it’s pizza. The Ottawa Daily Times (circ. 15,000) created their “Pizza Games” ballot where users cast their votes for their favorite local pizza joints. The ballot had four categories: Best Overall Pizza, Favorite Specialty Pizza, Favorite Thin/Regular Crust Pizza, and Favorite Think/Stuffed/Deep Dish Pizza. The winners of the contest were announced in the paper.
Parenting
Content related to families is popular with any audience. Parenting or Family Favorites ballots can have a wide range of categories including Best Schools, Best Daycares, Best Family Restaurants, Best Pediatricians, or even Best Family Vacations.
The Citizen-Times (circ. 58,000) runs an annual “Family Choice Awards” ballot featuring eight main categories (including Food, Birthdays, and Outdoors) with dozens of subcategories (like Best Kids’ Menu, Best Birthday Party Entertainment, and Best Family-Friendly Hiking Trail). Just this year, users cast over 9,000 votes for their local family favorites. The paper published all the results in-print and online, so they live as directory for local families throughout the year.
Local Events
No matter your city or town, you’re sure to have a handful of popular local events from festivals and chili cook-offs to Octoberfests and homecomings. A ballot can be an excellent tool for not only driving awareness about the event, but it can also help you determine the businesses that get to participate. Your ballot could contain categories such as Best Festival Food, Best Summerfest Band, Must-Stop-At Vendor, and even Best Fair Ride or Attraction.
For over 30 years, the city of Madison, WI hosts the “Taste of Madison” festival. This two-day event brings together all sorts of local food and entertainment featuring over 80 restaurants and 35 musical performances. Hosted by Madison.com (circ. 100,000) the “Best of Taste of Madison” ballot is used to decide the crowd’s fan favorite participating restaurants.
Get started by making a list of all the content you’re currently producing and all the upcoming local initiatives on your calendar. Then sit down with your entire team to brainstorm ballot ideas that could fit each one. By adding just a few of these ballots into your calendar, your entire company will be able to benefit right away.
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Julie is the Senior Customer Success Manager at Second Street and a former client in local media. Her best advice for driving the most success with your revenue and audience engagement strategy is to include promotions in every business initiative.