May 2014 Media Reach Report

=Foreword=

The Pirate Party cannot begin its work of informing Canadians and winning elections if no one knows we exist. The media, both traditional and new, remains vitally important in exposing Canadians to our views. The following is an overview of the current strength of our media out-reach, successes, and challenges.

=The Numbers=

Media Mailout List in May 2013: 412

Media Mailout List as of now: 513

Number of Press Releases over the last 12 Months: 23

Number of Stories on the Party in the same period (excludes duplicates and off-line stories): 20

Months without a PPCA Press Release in the same period: July, August, September

Months that had no media coverage in the same period: June, July, December

Average time between deciding to send out a Press Release and it being sent: 24-48 hours

Facebook Likes in May 2013: 6344

Facebook Likes as of now: 6811

Of those X are in Canada: 4875

=Successes=

The PPCA has managed to achieve modest, but consistent, coverage over the last year. It is perhaps due to this increased public profile that we have had a few reporters independently approach us for comment as well as our recent invitation to speak before the Senate Committee studying C-23.

=Challenges=

Despite a media list of just over 500 contacts I believe that just scratches the surface. I believe there to be at least double, and perhaps triple, that amount if all editor and reporter email addresses are counted. On a related note we remain weak in terms of French Canadian media contacts. Our ability to reach out to them is hamstrung by our lack of speedy translation. We have generally chosen speed over waiting for translations to be done. In the future I don't want to have to make a choice.

Summer remains a weak spot for us with people travelling and Parliament out on Summer break.

While we have had the media take an interest in some of our policy releases the fact remains that 'process' stories in regards to party activities remain the ones the media pays attention to.