What do you really want: noise or news? Rumours or the truth? Propaganda or unbiased facts?

The above seem like rhetorical questions, right? Well, what if I said that many people were deprived of these basics at a time when they needed the truth more than anything else?

The multiple waves of COVID-19 in India impacted newspaper circulation adversely because of the ban on door delivery of newspapers that was imposed by several housing societies. In addition, many newspaper stands were shut down during the lockdown.

Several localities were also converted into containment/micro-containment zones, barring the movement of personnel. In the interim, deprived of their morning newspaper, several readers migrated to alternatives such as electronic and social media to fulfill their information needs.

This made them susceptible to potential rumors and fake news on their social media feed and WhatsApp. Despite newspapers being the most credible source of information, our readers were deprived of them.  The one thing that spread as rampantly as the virus itself during the pandemic was the air of confusion caused by rumours. Adding to this was the growing phenomenon of noisy, toxic television debates and politically motivated propaganda instead of factual, unbiased news.

Retaining readers

The challenges of retaining our existing readers, winning back lapsed readers, and acquiring new readers necessitated a brand campaign where we re-engaged with readers to reinforce our brand promise as the only unbiased source they could trust — especially during trying circumstances when correct, truthful, and comprehensive information is the need of the hour.

Maharashtra Times swung into action with a 360-degree brand campaign with the following objectives in mind:

• Leveraging Maharashtra Times’ comprehensive all-around COVID-19 coverage to dial up our product credibility and superiority within our readers — present, lapsed, and potential.
• Reassuring our readers that Maharashtra Times is their most trusted and credible source of information, especially during these testing times
• Spreading the word that Maharashtra Times gives readers the complete picture, orienting their thinking to the real, balanced view of the world

Creating a campaign

Our campaign “What do you want?” was built around three basic situations to take on the three major evils that plagued the information space:

1. The perils of social media rumours.
2. The toxicity of noisy debates on television news channels.
3. The planting of propaganda and selective reporting of news by media houses with political allegiances and loyalties.

We sought to highlight to our readers Maharashtra Times’ unbiased credentials and why they need to choose us.

We developed a thought-provoking campaign that asked our audiences three pointed questions about what they really wanted:

• “Rumours or the Truth? What do you want?” to take on the social media rumour mills.
• “Noise or News? What do you want?” to counter toxic and polarising television newsroom debates.
• “Propaganda or Unbiasedness? What do you want?” to take on sections of the media with political allegiances.

The campaign was executed across multiple media elements such as print, radio, and digital with creative adaptations of each of the three situations.

The campaign was well-received by our audiences and helped our circulation bounce back to nearly pre-COVID levels, especially in Mumbai and Pune — the two largest markets in the state of Maharashtra.

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