Features
Pedestrian Group’s Vanessa Lawrence on The C Word, self-isolation and staying connected
Now more than ever Australians are hungry for content - whether that’s because they’re self-isolating and have more spare time or they’re looking for a distraction from the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic. Mumbrella’s Hannah Blackiston spoke with Pedestrian Group publisher Vanessa Lawrence about how the youth publisher is helping its readers handle The C Word.
Publishers around the country are currently stuck in something of an editorial paradox. Traffic is up across the board, just check the latest Nielsen figures for proof, but ad dollars are nonexistent and the news cycle is almost entirely taken up by COVID-19. Every hot take has been had, every news story has been covered as many ways as humanly possible – but readers are still sitting at home waiting for more news.
Luckily for Pedestrian Group and its titles – including Pedestrian TV, Popsugar and Kotaku – the business prides itself on its flexibility, says publisher Vanessa Lawrence. Its other focus is staying connected to its readers, including using the easy access during COVID-19 to find out what content they are hungry for.
Lawrence: “At Pedestrian Group we don’t subscribe to a one size fits all approach to content.”
“Our editorial team are incredible and have their fingers on the pulse. They’re very adaptable as I think editorial always kind of has to be, but it has been hard to let go of some of the initiatives or postpone some of the initiatives that we initially had in mind for this year. But I think it’s also provided really interesting and different ways to talk to our audiences,” says Lawrence.
“It’s obvious, but young Aussies aren’t all the same and all our readerships are super different – what they’re interested in, what they want in life. At Pedestrian Group we don’t subscribe to a one size fits all approach to content. Our content strategies are always tailored based on audience insights and like the different ways that our readers find us.”
In light of that, Pedestrian Group decided to launch another reader survey, following one earlier in 2020, to find out how those tastes had changed since the COVID-19 outbreak.
“On April 2, we launched a survey to determine how 18 to 34-year-old Pedestrian Group readers are adapting to the ‘new normal‘. In less than four days, we collected more than 10,000 responses across our six sites, which we were pretty blown away by, though it didn’t hurt that boredom is so prevalent at the moment,” says Lawrence.
The biggest worries from Pedestrian Group readers were surrounding a family member getting sick (a primary concern for 30.2% of readers) and financial and job security (29.8% of readers).
“The readers of all our sites are using social media more, watching TV more, consuming more news online and doing more housework – in that order. But there are also these massive swings of people who are doing more and less of the same thing. For example, 29.9% of our overall readership is exercising more but an even greater number of people – 39.7% – are actually exercising less; you can see similar splits when it comes to drinking alcohol, online shopping and using food delivery services,” says Lawrence.
Pedestrian TV is helping its readers manage The C Word
The Group has also launched two new editorial initiatives in response to COVID-19, alongside a number of other pivots and launches across the business. The C Word is a new vertical on Pedestrian TV which offers ‘Cover your mouth and we’ll cover the rest’. It’s a home for everything COVID-10-related and helps feed the hunger for ongoing news coverage.
Popsugar is running I Will Thrive, an initiative in response to readers who are looking for tips on how to live their best life while in self-isolation.
“It’s our reader’s ultimate guide to staying really positive in all aspects of their lives at the moment. Some examples would be tips for boosting productivity from the lounge room, making face mask from ingredients at the back of your fridge, no equipment workouts. There’s also advice on maintaining healthy relationships under really testing circumstances, managing anxiety and those kinds of things. We’ll continue to kind of pivot our editorial strategies to suit the changing interests of our readers at this time.”
It isn’t just Pedestrian Group’s editorial strategy that is staying loose – the business itself has been really quick to respond to the changes brought about by COVID-19 and the impact they have had on staff. When I speak to Lawrence, Pedestrian is in its fourth week of working from home, having made the switch early. The business is monitoring its staff through vibe checks – anonymous internal surveys which give people a chance to report the anxieties they’re experiencing and air their thoughts about work issues. The overall response, beyond anxiety about the future, was good, says Lawrence, and the business has been free to focus on what its strengths are during this time.
“We always talk about how unfiltered creativity is kind of at the heart of everything we do at Pedestrian Group and I think that mentality put us in really good stead to adapt as a business at the moment.”
From creative hackathons with clients held over Zoom to 15-minute mental workouts for employees, Pedestrian is doing what it can to make sure the business continues to function as well as can be expected in a pandemic. In fact, says Lawrence, like other businesses, it’s likely some new workflows will arise out of the adjustments.
“We’ve been forced into revising some workflows that have actually started to make more sense than what we were doing before. Once we come out of this, we’ll definitely make some changes to things like meeting structures and workflows. It’s also been interesting to find out who actually thrives in a work from home environment versus people who kind of need contact with their coworkers on a more regular basis. There will definitely be things that we can take out of it for sure as a business,” she says.
The business has also managed to secure some good wins in the last few weeks, despite the restrictions. Those wins have required some creativity from the team, but luckily, says Lawrence, that’s where Pedestrian Group thrives.
“The last two weeks have actually been some of our strongest this year in terms of briefs coming into the pipe – sectors like booze, finance, health, insurance are booming at the moment, unsurprisingly.
“Entertainment’s also a big one – a couple of weeks ago, we worked with Warner Music on a live stream of a 2-hour DJ set with Flex Mami to launch Dua Lipa’s new album on P.TV’s YouTube and Facebook, which our studio team turned around in 24 hours because the global release had to be brought forward a couple of weeks due to COVID-19.”
As for how the business is positioned for the rest of the year, Lawrence says the focus is on staying connected and staying creative for both the staff, but also the readers.
“We’ve certainly come to the realization since Pedestrian Group formed that our readerships are super different, but there are unifying factors like unfiltered creativity and we try to instil that in our approach to all our different brands. So yes, they’re very different, but they also share a lot of commonalities.
“Across them all, we want to inform, entertain, educate and obviously entertain where appropriate. And we will continue to do that across our large readership.”
