Project brief: As technology radically alters the media landscape and reader expectations, the purveyors of news and information continue to explore new ways to present content and, of course, turn a profit. Industry giant Gannett Co., Inc., which shifted the newspaper paradigm in 1982 with the full-color national daily USA Today, aims to remain at the industry’s forefront in the 21st century by innovating its culture and offerings.

For two years, Gannett has worked closely with IDEO, learning human-centered design techniques and developing insightful products based on consecutive rounds of field research. Gannett began by holding several joint workshops with IDEO for key division managers across multiple divisions, including senior executives, during which they established frameworks for moving forward. Armed with a new understanding of design thinking, Gannett managers conducted training sessions for other Gannett employees at various local and national news outlets.

Directly impacted by the changes in consumer media consumption, Gannett recognized the need to rethink how to engage with a local community. Gannett approached IDEO with the opportunity to create a new local media offering unencumbered by existing structures but leveraging Gannett’s history to participate and engage directly in local communities, using IDEO’s expertise to uncover consumer insights.

Being a media company isn’t an especially enviable position these days. Gannett, one of the country’s most diverse news, information and communications companies, recognized that its industry was imploding. In an era when digital is king, consumer research showed that the average total time someone under 40-years-old spent reading a Gannett newspaper website over the course of a month was about 12 minutes. The company turned to our firm to help it create a new media start-up to build value for a parent company whose entire industry is in crisis. “We were a media company writing for people, but not talking to those people,” said one exec.

The biggest challenge: no market existed yet nor did customers for that market. It was a classic innovation scenario, but one without a clear-cut path to success. So we went to San Francisco looking for unmet needs in the local information landscape.

The Bold Italic site launched on October 16, 2009.

Approach: The six-month project was staffed evenly by Gannett and IDEO employees, which led to a highly collaborative effort. Working closely with Gannett executives on-site in San Francisco, IDEO conducted several rounds of field research, prototyped various ideas and tested potential offerings with target consumers and merchants. They found that today’s readers appreciate subjectivity vs. strict objectivity, find narrative writing a refreshing alternative to Twitter-esque communiqués and prefer highly designed premium content to user-generated scrawl. The team also determined that the site shouldn’t try to be all things to all people: niche publishing can be a sustainable business model as merchants are willing to pay to connect with the right customers.

As a result, Gannett and IDEO refocused the start-up’s mission. The offering would expose San Francisco’s cultural core rather than simply its civic image. The stories published would strive to unearth rare tidbits about the city, outline offbeat urban adventures and inform citizens about local products and services. To encourage this, the creative team ran new methods for generating content by writers and designers, breaking journalism’s conventional “pitch meeting” mold in order to establish the most efficient, creative environment possible for developing story ideas.

Effectiveness: The resulting site, The Bold Italic, is a move away from the current crop of “social media” sites. The site represents the best of old and new media, pairing carefully crafted editorial content with a diverse set of voices. The Bold Italic encourages San Francisco citizens to become better locals by inspiring new ways to interact with the city. Publishing a cover story every day, The Bold Italic delivers new intel on San Francisco by a team of savvy residents and compels readers through its highly visual design to delve into its contents and return later for more. A widget called Clipbook allows readers to save items of interest, such as details about places they’d like to explore in the future.

Gannett and IDEO see The Bold Italic as an opportunity to celebrate and explore the micro-communities that exist within San Francisco and to put real feet on the street. In doing so, Gannett is investing in content creation on a small-scale, local level—something the big internet players don’t do. Feedback and reaction to the beta version of the site has been positive, with recognition from influential designers and media brands. Most online newspapers consider page views of three to four minutes a success. So far, The Bold Italic is garnering double that—seven or eight minutes per page view. Site traffic continues to grow with more than 40,000 unique visitors per month. Additionally, The Bold Italic has been a Webby honoree, an IDSA finalist and named best webzine by SF Weekly.

Kicked ass over something hard to do. System solution that is aesthetically beautiful and smart. Media density, visual styles, personal stories and flexible design. Addresses best of print media in a modern, digital way. Encourages community involvement and cultural opportunities.

Eye candy that works! Pretty astonishing metrics!

Design for good because it engages the community and enriches lives.