Survey of Bulletin readers

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 2, Issue 37, 5 March 1985, Page 3

Survey of Bulletin readers

A number of improvements to the 'Bulletin', based on the findings of a survey carried out amongst our readers late last year, have now been implemented. The survey was carried out by students at the University of Waikato, Hamilton. It's purpose was to assess the readers opinion of the Bulletin, and to gather information on how" the paper could be improved. Readers were interviewed outside delivery points, shops and in randomly selected houses in Ohakune, Waiouru, Raetihi and Whakapapa/ Chateau.

The results show that the people in the four areas and visitors to the region have different views on, and require different information from the Waimarino Bulletin. Generally, the respondents from all regions thought the Bulletin was a good paper because of the local news content. Ohakune respondents rated the Bulletin the highest which, the survey team stated, could be due to much of the information in the paper being Ohakune news. All the other regions also rated the Bulletin highly, but indicated that they thought

the news content was too orientated towards Ohakune, while some other regions were being neglected. This is a criticism the paper has accepted and is now working to correct, with a concerted effort being made by the news gathering team to cover events in Raetihi, Waiouru and the smaller outlying areas in the Ruapehu region. Other suggested improvements made to the survey team by readers were the inclusion of a crossword and a television guide. A crossword is now a weekly item in the paper and although we do not publish

T.V. programmes fpr the full week ahead, we do now include a television preview. As time passes we hope to improve the paper further working from information gleaned from the survey and supplied to us by readers. Anyone with personal opinions as to what is good, or what is bad about the Bulletin, or who has ideas as to how we can improve the paper, should feel free to write or 'phorie the editor and make their views known. The Bulletin is your community newspaper and providing a service for you, the reader, is what we are here for.