Since its March launch, the Arizona Republic’s texting campaign, Connecting Arizona during a pandemic, has not slowed down for one minute. They’ve been providing daily updates, iterating on their format based on feedback from their audience, and answering countless individual questions.
“There has been a ton of confusion [in Arizona],” said Kim Bui, director of audience innovation at the Arizona Republic. “From the start, I’ve seen myself as a traffic director, getting requests and fielding them where needed.”
“The best thing is the time I take each day to reply to as many people as I can,” said Kim. “The other day, I got a thank you text from someone who said they know they can get this data elsewhere, but they are blind and unable to read the state dashboard, so this is how they stay informed. Those stories really make me feel a lot better.”
“It is not easy some days, and sometimes I cannot get to it, but that interaction has been so lovely, to the point where people really notice when I am gone and get excited when I am back.”
One thing Kim has changed since the start of the campaign is the time of day she sends the broadcast text which goes out to over 2,600 people. “I no longer try to send updates around 5 or 6 pm, too many driving replies! Usually like 10 am and 4 pm work best, even 7pm.” That’s a great observation!
Congrats to Kim and her team at the Arizona Republic! Looking forward to what’s next for them.
