For the past six years, Montreal newspaper the Gazette has run with the slogan “Words Matter” – stating that without words, there would be no newspaper, Alan Allnutt, editor-in-chief, the Gazette, tells MiC.

The Gazette first illustrated the importance of words in a 2006 stunt that had the front page of the paper absent of letters, and in their place stood a selection of photographs along with the tag.

Last week the paper launched another campaign around its slogan, making its front page into a Twitter stream with tweets from its journalists. Digital boards have also been placed in Metro stations, displaying tweets and driving to Words-matter.ca.

The campaign, which runs until Oct. 23, was developed and planned by Bleublancrouge and will also be supported by TV ads on CTV and CBC; radio on local stations like Virgin, CHOM and CJAD; online on sites including CTV Montréal, MSN, Yahoo; and a print ad in the newspaper.

Allnutt says that by bridging the gap between digital and print, the paper hopes to attract new readers who primarily read news online, as well as show them that the paper is a meeting place for opinions.

“It demonstrates that we have somewhat of an understanding of social media, something that a number of others in the [industry] have not yet demonstrated,” he says.

“We’re constantly in this mode of attracting people who are interested in journalism, but at the same time there is a generation of people who are used to getting their journalism on digital platforms,” explains Allnutt. “We are just trying to reach out to say that we are relevant to anyone who is interested in journalism.”

“This is a multi-pronged attempt to save the words that are associated with a print brand,” he adds.

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