Biggest Success Factors

The biggest success factor is the Bristol Cable community. Around 2,500 people are members, supporting the Cable financially, but above all in terms of content with their responses to surveys, articles they contribute or by making decisions on the direction in which the Cable should develop in terms of content. Community members also voluntarily participate in a Directors Board, which acts as a kind of supervisory board or advisory body. At the Annual General Meeting, all members are also invited to make important organisational decisions. The community is therefore a central component of the entire organisation, both in terms of content and governance. The declared aim is to increase the number of members, as this is the greatest lever for Bristol Cable to establish a sustainable financial position and no longer be dependent on grants. The success of the Membership Programme is therefore fundamental to the continued existence of the newsroom. To make a long story short: Without the community, the Cable would not exist.

Another important success factor, which is also linked to the community, is a membership system that the Bristol Cable developed in-house. They not only use this system to manage members and their payments, but also carry out a large part of the community engagement, namely the surveys, via this platform The organisation also uses the tool to handle important elections or votes in the cooperative. By connecting a newsletter provider, the most important communication channel with members is also linked to the system. It is therefore a CRM software with connected payment tools and a survey function. This special combination of functions is therefore perfectly tailored to the Bristol Cable’s model. By developing its own solution, the Cable remains independent of proprietary software in the long term. Under the name beabee, the membership system of the Bristol Cable is scaled to be used by other newsrooms.