For local newsrooms, looking for new ways to engage with their community is an ever evolving and ongoing process. This article looks at how running competitions can be an effective strategy to keep locals feeling connected and engaged with your publication. Whether it’s a photo contest or a local business poll, they can help grow email lists, generate revenue and spark healthy debate and conversation within the community.
Ideas to get the ball rolling
- ABC’s Heywire competition invites young people aged 18-22 living in regional, rural and remote Australia to submit a short story about an aspect of their lives. Stories can be in text, video, photo or audio form. They provide some suggestions around what sorts of stories they’re interested in, but leave the competition mostly open-ended. The program has been running since 1998. Previous years’ winners are all on the ABC Heywire page, with stories like ‘The Fitzroy River flood was devastating. It felt like our history had just been washed away’ and ‘Learning how to make bush medicine from Nan is special’.
- LINA member Inner City News ran a photo competition, teaming up with four local businesses to offer a prize: a great night out in the local community. Applicants were encouraged to submit a photo of their neighbourhood; a street corner, a house, a meal that best captured the community. The winner received a voucher for a local restaurant, bookstore, cinema and ice cream shop.
- LNP media group in Pennsylvania runs an annual ‘Scenes of Lancaster County’ photo competition. After a shortlist is created, locals can vote on their favourite photos. Winners receive a cash prize and their photo is included in the publications yearly calendar. Voting once per day is free, and after that are $1 for every additional vote.
- Will Hill from County 10 spoke at LION’s 2024 Summit about running photo contests, including back to school photo competitions with a reader voting component and prizes supplied by local businesses. The business gets email addresses for their mailing list, and so does the publisher. Will recommends the platform Second Street which offers a library of customisable campaigns including quizzes, sweepstakes, photo contests and ‘Best Of’ ballots.
- Kenny Katzgrau, local news publisher and advertiser from the US, suggests Scene Think as an editorial and event-promotion tool focused on community calendars, ‘Best Of’ or reader-choice ballots, and event listings.
Next steps for publishers
- Try a photo contest aligned with upcoming events, such as ‘easter egg hunt’ or NAIDOC week
- Define campaign phases & rules, clearly outlining email capture and privacy consent
- Engage sponsors early: local cafes, bookshops, sports clubs for prizes and promotion
- Promote: use email, your website, and social media for entries
- Amplify via storytelling: share finalists, winners, impact stories in follow‑up content
- Measure impact: track email growth, ad revenue, social shares, and content reach
