Meet Stuff Nation

17 September 2012

Meet Stuff Nation – the latest evolution of digital news in New Zealand

Fairfax Digital today announces the release of Stuff Nation, a new product as part of its number one news website stuff.co.nz [1]. In addition to transforming the landscape of New Zealand journalism, it will also transform the way Fairfax Digital delivers media packages in New Zealand.

Building on Stuff’s existing dominant market position as New Zealand’s largest news site with an audience of 1,106,000 per month [2], Stuff Nation provides a pathway for the evolution of digital news in New Zealand, allowing readers to become citizen contributors and see their own work featured in a dedicated section of user-generated content, save news and pull down content via newsletters in the way that suits them.

“Our audience have shown great appetite for innovation in digital news,” says Sinead Boucher, Group Digital Editor for Fairfax Media. “The success of our crowd-sourcing projects around the MP expenses scandal (which was a NZ first) and the Christchurch earthquake have shown us that readers want to contribute and engage with news and events that are important to them. Stuff Nation is the next step in that evolution.”

Stuff Nation’s core features enable registered users to participate in submitting news content, as well as compete in quiz groups, and join the Open Newsroom Network. Stuff Nation members will also get exclusive access to set up public profiles; choose improved newsletter options; use better commenting functionality; and save their stories.

This puts Stuff at the forefront of news and journalism in a digital world as it allows the number one [3] news site to showcase more diverse, interesting content from the viewpoint of the New Zealand public and enables the site to create and foster interest groups and communities.

Key features of Stuff Nation are:

• Quiz Groups - Stuff’s popular Daily Trivia Quiz now enables its loyal participants to join and create Quiz Groups. Stuff Nation members can join the public leader board, public quiz groups or set up their own private quiz leagues.

• News, views and insights - With Stuff Nation users can contribute to the news. Stuff’s editorial team will set specialised assignments so members can submit specific content. Or users can alternatively submit reports on what is happening in their world where their work could be featured on Stuff Nation.

• Open Newsroom Network - Fairfax Media's Open Newsroom Network will invite members to submit their area of expertise enabling Fairfax journalists to contact these news sources when a story they're investigating is relevant.

“Not only does Stuff Nation give us an advantage to use and encourage user generated content, it provides us with an enhanced ability to collect demographic and behavioural information to provide a deep and robust understanding of our audience,” says Nigel Tutt, General Manager; Fairfax Digital.

“Advertising markets around the world are moving towards a trend of buying audiences and eyeballs rather than pages or context, publishers need to develop a better understanding of their audience; Stuff Nation will enhance this and enable us to stay ahead of the game.”

Fairfax Digital New Zealand has also selected Adobe® AudienceManager as its new data management platform to allow it to better segment its audience via the data collected. Fairfax Digital New Zealand will be the first customer in the Asia Pacific region to use Adobe AudienceManager. With the ability to consolidate multiple data sets, Fairfax Digital New Zealand will be able to deliver highly targetable segments to advertisers.

For more information visit Stuff.co.nz

Ends

[1] Nielsen Online Ratings July 2012 Audience Numbers – Current Events & Global News

[2] Nielsen Online Ratings July 2012 Audience Numbers – Current Events & Global News

[3] Nielsen Online Ratings July 2012 Audience Numbers – Current Events & Global News

© Scoop Media