General information
Internews’ Newsroom Organizational Resilience Models and Strategies (NORMS) project, supported by the US Embassy in Moldova, aims to develop a vibrant, sustainable, independent media sector at the regional level in Moldova that can increase access to relevant, diverse information for Moldovan citizens outside Chisinau. To accomplish this goal, the project will provide comprehensive long-term support to five independent media outlets outside of Chisinau to build their managerial, business, and editorial capacity. As a result, outlets will improve the overall organizational capacity, financial sustainability, and editorial quality and audience.
The project will also commission detailed audience research to give partners a clearer idea of their audiences’ information demands and help create content of interest, build relationships with their audiences, and explore new opportunities to generate and diversify their revenue. Internews is looking for an organization or company to conduct this research.
Why the survey
Regional media lack detailed information about their audiences (beyond Google Analytics statistics) that can provide information on consumers’ preferences and needs, underserved audiences, and gaps in coverage (both in terms of topics/issues and geography). This data is vital for deciding what subjects to cover and how to target content to audiences, as well as developing and implementing content monetization and other revenue generation strategies.
The audience research will help project Key Partners (KPs) create a detailed audience profile and broaden their content to best meet their community’s information demands and fill holes in coverage. Improved understanding of readers’ information needs will also help the KPs build stronger relationships with their audiences and provide opportunities to diversify revenue.
Objectives of the survey
The audience survey will examine:
- Audience profile (ex. area of residence, age, and education level, among other factors) for the project’s five Key Partner media outlets – Bas TV (Basarabeasca), Nokta (Comrat), Observatorul de Nord (Soroca), Studio-L (Causeni), and TUK (Taraclia);
- Media consumption habits (ex. how, when, how much, why people consume the content) of the five outlets;
- Information on the five outlets’ consumers’ preferences and needs;
- Data about issues/topics that are not covered by the five outlets (gaps in coverage);
- Size of potential audience for each of the five outlets;
- Size of the current audience for each of the five outlets;
- Size of lost audience among each of the five outlets;
- Level of brand awareness for each of the five outlets;
- Main competitors of the five outlets, etc.
Applicants will be expected to:
- Develop the methodology (including the survey questionnaire in Romanian and Russian) for an audience survey;
- Conduct a representative audience survey to identify the specific audience profile for each of the five project partners, provide information on consumers’ preferences and needs;
- Provide the collected data (including a stratified database) and survey results in Romanian, Russian, and English;
- Deliver a presentation with suggestions and trends/issues to pay attention to for each media outlet.
The methodology and questions will be consulted and approved by Internews in Moldova. The study implementation period will be negotiated with the selected company.
Necessary qualifications
- At least three years of experience in the field of sociological research;
- Qualitative and quantitative research skills;
- The ability to draw up analytical reports in Romanian, Russian, and English languages.
Application content
A. Technical proposal that should include:
- Description of the organization with details of its experience and capabilities, teams expertise, portfolio etc.
- Description of the proposed research methodology (what/why/how ex. data on researched population, sampling and method(s));
- Timeline/calendar for planned research;
- Two reference letters proving experience in conducting similar assignments.
B. Financial proposal
Detailed budget (clear budget categories, including all taxes and costs).
Application deadline
Applications (as described in the “Application content” section) can be submitted until: COB, July 29, 2022, at this email: igotisan@internews.org.