The Eastern Bay App, a hyper-local news and information app serving the Eastern Bay of Plenty region of New Zealand, has been selected as a finalist in the country’s national media awards in the ‘News App of the Year’ category.
The annual Voyager Media Awards recognise excellence in journalism and news delivery and are normally dominated by large media outlets.
“We are delighted to be a finalist in New Zealand’s premier media awards event in the category for News App of the Year along with the Stuff App and the New Zealand Herald App,” Aaron Buist, chief executive officer of Beacon Printing and Publishing Ltd which owns the Eastern Bay App, said.
“Our Eastern Bay App being included as a finalist is I think the first time an entirely regional community based app has featured as a finalist in this category.”
The Eastern Bay App was launched in December 2019 and recorded 18,360 unique readers in the past 12 months and over 1.3m page views.
“The App has provided an additional platform for our advertisers to get their key messages out to an expanded audience and specifically to those people who might not prefer to regularly pick up traditional newspapers,” Aaron said.
The Eastern Bay App licenses the LIMA (Local Independent Media Application) software from New Zealand based media business and developer Schistrockmedia Ltd (SRML).
Managing director of SRML Tony O’Regan said he was delighted and excited to see a licensee recognised in this way.
“The Eastern Bay team has made a concerted effort to ensure their content is timely and relevant to their market. The software is a great enabler for delivering news and generating new revenue streams for media organisations,” Tony said.
Aaron said the most obvious point of difference of the App is the ability to publish timely and/or breaking news between print editions.
“We can have news stories being posted any day of the week with the added functionality of notifications to make people aware of that new content,” he said.
The LIMA platform was developed in 2018 and offers publishers a software option for the development of a mobile app and a web app which are specifically designed for local publishers.
To inquire about LIMA contact Tony O’Regan at [email protected].