Evolving with technology
The Economist is a well respected, over 100 years-old publication. Prior to working with Sparkpr, it had the reputation of being conservative and narrowly focused to academics and finance professionals. In reality, the publication had begun reaching a broader tech-savvy audience through its website. The Economist engaged Sparkpr to help successfully usher the publication into the next phase—social media.
Changing Perception
A large portion of Sparkpr’s strategy focused on changing perceptions. Our objective: move the needle of The Economist from being perceived as stodgy, conservative, and serious to erudite, witty, and classically liberal. Social media is perfectly suited for such a transition. Using The Economist’s online Debate Series as a tactic, Sparkpr aggressively targeted bloggers for coverage. As the blogging and social media awareness grew, we transitioned The Economist to a presence on Facebook.
Leading The Debate
The Economist Debate Series has been well-received by readers and journalists alike.The initial strategy contributed to a 45 percent increased traffic and visibility from the previous year and helped grow number of page views of user-contributed content in the debate to 1M+ in over eight months. The Economist Facebook page, which was originally designed to support the online debate series, is now the de facto source for news and updates and a driving force of traffic to Economist.com.
