Ideas to help spark conversation with your audience in June (part 2).
☀️ Summer Solstice (21st June) 🕶️
With the first day of summer arriving on June 21st (and the longest day of the year), many countries celebrate this in different ways (Stonehenge gatherings in England, Midsummer celebrations in Sweden, and the feast of Sant Joan in Spain for example), a time your readers are ready to get involved!
Here are some engaging ideas to capture that sunshine-filled feeling and get the conversation going with your audience.
📷 Summer photo competition: (could be sponsored) Send us your best summer photos, on the beach, in the park, your travels or simply your drinks outdoors for a chance to win X.
⛱️What is there to do this summer? Tired of doing the same thing every summer? Let’s be each other's local guide and help promote our favourite places!
🔥With the weather getting warmer are fires on your radar? Send us your questions and concerns.
🚸How do you entertain your kids whilst they are not at school? Are you screen conscious whilst they are less busy?
🐕 Pets and the heat: Are you only taking your dogs out at certain times of the day? Found a great way to keep them cool, share your hacks.
🎒Exam results: Did you get bad exam results, and how are you doing now? Let’s share some insights and maybe even hopeful stories for those that are going through this stressful time.
😍 Past example that we love:
HBVL Summer photo competition
What they did: Summer photo competition, sponsored with a prize (an Iphone). To get involved, since the prize is so valuable (the value exchange), readers had to download the app to submit their entry and to vote.
How they used the content:
1. Every week HBVL shared the best photos of the week in an article promoting the competition. There was a winner for July and another for August.
2. They used them in social media and in print with a QR code to pull back to the site/apps.
Extra gamification: They then used the best photos in a quiz, where readers could guess where the photos were taken (genius!)
💊 International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking (26th June) ⛔
A difficult yet interesting topic here are some ideas:
🪴To legalise or not to legalise? Give us your opinion (you could include a poll).
💉Drug stations and disposal points (if you have them in your area). Has that improved your area or do you feel it has created other problems? Have you noticed more drug consumption in your local area? Send us your stories and experiences.
🏙️ Share with us: Have you noticed a difference in drug intake in your part of town?
⚽ UEFA Women’s Euro Championship 2025 (2nd July - 27th July) 🥅
Did you know… Euros legacy helps 129,000 more girls take up football
Let’s support grassroots women’s football - Local Female footballers of all ages in our area, we want to show you off - share a photo and tell us why you started playing and why you enjoy it so much.
Your views: Women’s football is now seen as the more inclusive family event. Will you be watching the Women's Euro's for the first time? Or have you recently joined the hype?
Debate: Is the Women's Euro's promoted enough? (sports marketing agency SPORTFIVE finds a growing interest in women’s football as more than half (54%) of the population aged 16-64 have an interest in women’s football, but 76% of fans feel they don’t see enough coverage of the sport.)
Girls playing football has increased, do your daughters play? Send in your best goal to win a prize (sponsored).
👩🎓A real example - The results from our last call-out idea email and how it went:
For the 14th June, I suggested World Blood Donor Day call-out ideas and NoordHollands Dagblad decided to take that call-out head on.
Here is how it went: They received 51 heart warming, high quality stories from readers in anticipation of the day.
These stories resulted in a long form article, with people having donated of 600+ times, and family members saved (they also included a gallery with all of the contributions at the bottom).
We love that: All the content is shared, not just the best, meaning no engagement is lost and all readers feel valued, creating more trust and relevance...
🤔 Before you dive in - Here is what to consider to help everything go smoothly:
Barriers to entry:
If you have never requested opinions from your readers, starting with a serious or sensitive topic might stop them from sharing with you. Think light and easy callouts to begin with to get them used to interacting with your newsroom first.
Making a topic too broad can make it hard for readers to think of something to share, ie. Your LGBTQ+ stories vs something more specific - ‘Share with us how ‘coming out’ went for you’ or ‘what is the hardest part about being LGBTQ+ in your day to day life’.
If you are asking for readers' best goal videos, readers might need to go out to film them, this is a barrier to entry - the value exchange needs to be in line with this. If people are likely to win something for example, they are more likely to put in the effort.
Terms and conditions:
Do not forget to include a checkbox, or T&C sign up with the right ‘Terms and Conditions’ which allow you to use the content and process your readers' data.
GDPR and Data laws:
Make sure to get readers to agree to your privacy policy and let them know what you will do with their data and contribution.
Want to double check if you can get in touch to find out more? You can always add an extra check box: ‘Select if you are happy for a journalist to get in touch if they have any questions’
If you are asking for contributions from minors (GDPR age limits change per country. Ie 13 years in Belgium) include a second tick box to include something along the lines of: I am over 13 years old, and or have permission from the legal guardian of the minor to submit this contribution.
If you are already using Contribly - your standard forms will include your Terms and Conditions and Privacy policy, so no need to worry.
Why would I want to do this?
👂Inviting readers to share helps them feel heard, respected and builds trust with your newsbrand.
👯You might just get some amazing stories you would have never had access to. If you don’t ask, you don’t get.
🤗 ️ Using your readers photos and videos connects them with your news brand and each other! (user needs model: Connect me)
🫶Readers are more loyal when they have been published on a newsbrands page, and are more likely to share.
✨When you engage with readers regularly, you build up your team's capacity and this means you can create magic when big news events happen, ie. breaking news, weather disasters, or even another ‘Covid’.
♾️ Reader habits are built through regular engagement, they are likely to come back to see what happened to their contribution.