Brisbane Times sponsors free Wi-Fi on trains, increases traffic to mobile site

Ideas Blog | 26 August 2013

By Karl Sikora

Brisbanetimes.com.au aims to keep all its readers up to date with the latest breaking news — wherever they are.

Following our readers on their daily journey showed us that they have significant down time when commuting. We came up with the idea to give travelers a “news hit” with free Wi-Fi for the remainder of their journey.

From August 1 to September 24, 2012, brisbanetimes.com.au conducted the first integrated marketing campaign on the Brisbane city train network, Queensland Rail. The campaign consisted of sponsoring free Wi-Fi on 64 trains, one-third of the total train fleet of 197 trains.

The campaign also included, again for the first time on Queensland Rail, branding advertising on all Wi-Fi trains and an additional 480 panels across three non-Wi-Fi enabled trains.

Goals of the initiative were three-fold:

To increase traffic and awareness of m.brisbanetimes.com.au.
To increase brand awareness of brisbanetimes.com.au.
To provide the commuters of Brisbane with a free service.

The partnership with Queensland Rail was a great innovation, resulting in many commuters being introduced to brisbanetimes.com.au for the first time.

The initiative increased traffic to our mobile site by 58%, from 20,372 average daily unique browsers in July 2012, to 32,232 in September 2012. The campaign also resulted in a large spike in traffic to our mobile site and two positive articles in trade media.

This was a one-off project. However in March 2012, we also provided free Wi-Fi on a number of buses in the Brisbane transport network.

“We make it our business to be at the forefront of digital innovation,” said Managing Editor Simon Holt. “Six years ago, we were one of the world’s first digital-only news organisations, and there remains a hunger to ensure readers are provided the highest-quality news on the most modern of platforms.”

About Karl Sikora

Karl Sikora is state marketing manager/Queensland and Western Australia, at Fairfax Media, based in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. He can be reached at ksikora@fairfaxmedia.com.au.