Hey Tyee Reader, Let's Get Better Acquainted!

What languages do you speak? When you read the news, do you like to be informed, surprised or delighted? Do you listen to podcasts with your morning coffee or on your daily commute?

These are just some of the questions we’re curious to ask you, Tyee readers, to get to know you all over again.

As a totally independent, non-profit newsroom built and sustained by reader support, doing the job our readers hired us to do is of critical importance.

But how can we hold ourselves accountable to those who make our journalism possible?

Well, by hearing from you! So we're asking you to answer a few questions to guide us.

The Tyee hears from and engages with you in a variety of ways, from reader polls about your hobbies and habits to reader stories where we compile and highlight your submissions. We even did an audience survey back in 2016 in which we learned how quirky you bunch are!

And, sure, we have access to some web analytics that tell us which provinces are reading us, what age groups you’re from and whether you use mobile or desktop to read our stories.

But our readers are... a lot more than that. So, we want to go further. That’s why we’re launching a new audience survey.

We want to hear about your values, your lived experiences — and how they shape the issues and stories that you care about.

How it works

In our survey, you’ll find questions about you — where you reside, what you do for work and some demographic information. These questions are important to us because we want to better represent you and the issues that affect you through our coverage.

You’ll also find softer questions, like: What other news outlets do you enjoy? What style of podcast is your favourite? And is there a Tyee story that really nailed it for you? This is where we get to the interesting stuff that can help us tailor our programming to better reflect your needs and interests.

And even though The Tyee’s editorial team does our work independently, driven by relevance and importance of stories, we also believe in serving our audience. You hired us, after all.

So, we hope to find some inspiration in your responses for new reporting projects to take on, too. By getting to know what our readers are interested in, we can back our ideas up with evidence and potentially secure funding for even more journalism.

Finally, in our survey, we also ask you about our advertising partnerships. While we don’t stuff our pages with ads, we do strike advertising partnerships with carefully chosen organizations and causes, and we want to be able to feature advertisers that are a good fit for our audience.

If you’d like to participate, we ask that you fill out our survey by Friday, June 20.

Some things you should know

You may skip any question you don’t want to answer.

The survey is entirely anonymous, unless you provide your email address.

You will not be contacted about your answers unless you consent to it and provide your email address.

Your answers and personal information will never be shared with or sold to third parties.

We pledge to share insights from the results with you.

It takes just 10 minutes to complete.

Finally, to show our appreciation, you may choose to enter our optional draw for a set of Tyee prizes! Three survey respondents will be randomly selected to win a Tyee tote bag, a Tyee mug and our book of essays, Points of Interest.

The stories making headlines in the last few years have shifted immensely. Social media as we know it is changing. After 10 years, we have a new prime minister. The deadly effects of climate change have become a normal part of everyday life for people in Canada.

As the issues you consider top of mind change, we want to change. As our readers grow, we want to grow with you. As corporate media continue to choose what they cover based on algorithms, clickbait and rage, we want to ensure you feel seen, heard and valued by media you support and engage with.

So, click here to take the survey.

Thank you for helping us build a more thoughtful and representative Tyee. We couldn’t do this without you.