THE power of regional media to connect strongly with the community has been highlighted, with the release of new EMMA and Nielson readership figures revealing The Gympie Times has grown its audience by 10 per cent over the last six months.

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While your local daily newspaper's print readership is stable year-on-year (one of the few publications in the country where that is the case), The Gympie Times' digital audience has grown considerably, up by 14 per cent, or an extra 6000 people visiting our site in the last six months.

Every month The Gympie Times and our sister newspapers connect with nearly 2.7 million (or 73 per cent) of Queenslanders, including four out of every five regional Queenslanders.

According to the latest emma results, The Gympie Times' average daily readership is 14,000 from Tuesday to Friday, and 15,000 on Saturdays. Our monthly digital audience is 48,000, our monthly print audience is 32,000 and our total monthly audience is about 80,000.

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Last September, The Gympie Times was awarded the Community Newspaper of the Year at the Pacific Area Newspaper Publishers Association (PANPA) awards.

Announced as the best community paid daily in Australasia at a gala dinner in Sydney, it was the third time in four years the paper has claimed the title. Finalists for this year's award will be announced next week.

Editor Shelley Strachan was honoured to accept the award on behalf of The Gympie Times staff, attributing their hard work and dedication to the product and the community as crucial to the success of the paper.

"We have more journalists on the ground right here in Gympie than anyone, so when local residents need to know something, they come to us,” she said.

Source: emma CMV 12 months to April 2018; Nielsen DRM April 2018

So that's all from me this week. Please don't hesitate to contact me with any feedback, letters, or suggestions at editor@gympietimes.com