A snapshot of our readers from the 2017 survey

You know who we are, but do we know who you are?

Some of you contact us frequently. But we wanted to know more. And our existing data was old. We’d done some surveys in the past, but they were pretty informal, a questionnaire in the newspaper with analysis done in our office.

The media world has changed a lot since our last survey, in 2013. Some of us don’t read newspapers anymore. And when we do read them, we are looking for different information from what we once expected.

So in March, with the help of a professional survey company, we put our questions online. Some 200 of you took the survey. Here’s what we found:

 • 86 percent said reading The Jewish Voice makes you feel more connected to the local community. 

• 79 percent think it’s critically important to get news and info from a trusted source in the Jewish community – and for many of you, that source is us.

• 69 percent say that community news, community events and being connected to the local Jewish community are your top reasons for reading The Jewish Voice.

• Of the people who took the survey, 70 percent have been readers for 10 years or more and 56 percent are over age 65. Only 6 percent are ages 18-34.

What about website usage? Everybody says that the web is the newspaper of the future – but we learned that The Jewish Voice website does not replace our print newspaper for our readers. But now we also know that you go online – because this was an online survey! And your responses will help us optimize our website to complement – not replace – the newspaper.

Knowing who our readers are, and what they are looking for from The Voice, will help us better tailor the newspaper to your wants and needs. For example, we already knew that you read us for community news, but we didn’t know exactly how important that is. We will continue to bring you as much of that news as we can – front and center in each issue.

We will also keep growing and evolving in an effort to attract younger readers – that’s key to sustaining the newspaper in the future. 

And we thank those of you who took the time to complete the survey. We hope our readers will continue to contact us with comments, letters and ideas. Our inbox is always open, at editor@jewishallianceri.org.

Also still open is our annual Patron Campaign. There’s just one more week to make a gift this year that will go directly to supporting your Jewish community newspaper! Click the donation button at the top of our website, at jvhri.org, or mail a check to The Jewish Voice, 401 Elmgrove Ave., Providence, RI 02906.

This issue is our last before our summer break – we’ll see you again on Aug. 11. And remember, our website will be up and running, and updated, all summer long. So visit jvhri.org every so often to get the latest news of Rhode Island’s Jewish community.

And please remember to take The Voice on vacation and send us those photos!