The Pioneer Press, owned by the Chicago SunTimes group and publisher of dozens of Chicago neighborhood and suburban weekly papers, found a way to provide a unique and highly relevant service to its customers this election. Through Twitter, Pioneer pushed out election race updates to over 220 followers. On Election Day, updates came every few minutes sharing reports on the wait times at polling stations around the Chicago area.
Congratulations to the Pioneer Press for providing a true public affairs service and being highly relevant to readers this election. While the Tribune and Sun-Times use Twitter to push out stories it publishes online and in print, the Pioneer Press did a superb job of sharing content, showing relevant news updates not found anywhere else and responding to Twitter users questions. It demonstrated the true use of Twitter as a give and take medium. Rather than broadcasting messages as Jacob Morgan points out guest-blogging on Chris Brogan’s blog, which nobody really likes, Pioneer kept the conversation and interest alive.
I think this is a great lesson in the new journalism. Pioneer’s Twitter use proved that not all content can or should be published online or in print. Furthermore, the true value of a paper – especially a local paper – is to provide local information not covered by the larger city or national papers. Pioneer showed they are a true authority on local news.
A real community formed around Pioneer’s Twitter use and will continue to look to the publication for local info. I hope that Pioneer saw the value in Twittering and will continue to use it even after the election.
