"Election coverage is table stakes for our organization, and any local news organization," said Jill Shiroma, Director of Digital Operations for Morgan Murphy Media. "We needed a timely solution that aids in publishing election results across platforms."
Headquartered in Madison, WI, Morgan Murphy Media operates television and radio stations, a print magazine, websites, mobile and OTT apps, and a digital marketing agency across eight markets.
"It's imperative that we have tools that help us inform our audiences quickly, accurately, and efficiently," Shiroma said. "BLOX Digital offers robust infrastructure and technical support, and has been a valuable partner in providing an elections solution to meet newsroom needs."
Rounding out results with additional coverage
As a beta tester, Morgan Murphy Media had early access to BLOX Elections Stats, a new solution available from BLOX Digital. With this tool, results can be manually entered or brought into BLOX CMS via a feed such as Associated Press (AP).
Morgan Murphy Media’s newsrooms use BLOX Election Stats as part of their full multimedia coverage of elections online and on air.
"Gathering data is the part of your election coverage you don't want to have to worry about. With BLOX Elections Stats, we're automating results so we can really focus on adding context to the coverage."
The newsrooms can then use BLOX Elections Stats to easily publish results, allowing for more time to focus on providing context and commentary. "Text, video, and interactive infographics—all these things really round out our coverage and make sure we're serving our local audiences."
Adapting to a variety of local audiences
With stations across the United States, Shiroma needed a solution that could be easily set up on each site. "We need tools we can customize and then 'plug and play' for each market. BLOX Elections Stats allows us to do that."
With BLOX Election Stats, sites such as KOAMNewsNow.com can easily provide results no matter how many regions they cover.
One Morgan Murphy Media site based in Joplin, MO, KOAMNewsNow.com, covers local elections for sixteen counties in four different states: Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Missouri. With the large number of districts, local elections happen frequently for many unique audiences.
"We've had to be creative in how we set up Joplin's elections page. They're one of those stations that seems to have a local election every other day. With BLOX Elections Stats, we've been able to set up the tool to make it easier for consumers to find their specific regions."
From the first days of the campaign to the final vote count, BLOX Elections Stats makes every election moment an engaging journey for your audience.
Capitalizing on traffic spikes during election season
BLOX Elections Stats not only streamlines the setup of Morgan Murphy Media's elections pages but helps Shiroma's teams take advantage of traffic increases.
"You see that in the numbers around election time, leading up to Election Day and then people looking for results immediately after. Our traffic—and I'm sure every local news organization's traffic—spikes at that time because consumers are really relying on local news to keep them informed about elections."
Thanks to the integration with BLOX CMS, even employees who are fairly new to digital can jump in and build races almost immediately. "It's really easy to use. Once you have your general BLOX Digital onboarding and knowledge, anyone can set up elections."
