It’s all about Change!
Cape Town – Good news portal MCSISA has announced a re-branding of its publishing site. Originally only highlighting the good works performed by South African businesses through their corporate social investment and responsibility outreach programmes, the portal has quickly evolved to encompass numerous other inspirational tales of those involved in creating change for the better – as a result the platform will now be called ‘Change News’.
Explaining why the portal has revamped, expanded and had a name change, co-Founder of the holding group Millennial Change Shifters Initiative South Africa (MCSISA), Glenda Mansfield said: “We always knew we had a good ideas, but over the past three to four months we have realised how important this portal can become in its efforts to ‘change’ mind-sets and provoke ‘change for good’, beyond just the showcasing of corporate news.
“People all across the country are looking for more positive ways with which to either start the day, give themselves a mid-morning boost, or some peace last thing at night. When you can read about and see, that others who might be in similar circumstances to yourself have overcome their challenges, you can easily identify with them and this can provoke a sense of hope that similar positive change can result for you.”
Underpinning this premise, at the end of February 2017 the platform was attracting 227 156 unique visitors and generating 820 294 page views, with interestingly, the bulk of views coming from mobile users – 68.7%. Mansfield and her partners believe that the rebrand will make it easier for more people to find the platform, remember it and keep their audience coming back to read and even share their own good news on a regular basis. “Aside from the expanded collation of submissions from all corners of the country, the name itself was a major factor in our consideration. It will be that much easier to recollect, as we really want to show as many South Africans as possible that there is an alternative to what they read and see in the mainstream news,” stated Mansfield.
The re-branding is just the beginning for Change News though – plans, for a dedicated citizen journalism bureau that tracks and reports on local community news, are well underway and is expected to launch in Q3 this year. The service will include video and audio streaming in line with current trends, and that’s just the start. According to Mansfield, there are also international aspirations in the wings, although she is remaining mum on the precise plans at this stage.
The re-branding of the publishing site does not however, affect the other instruments within the group – MCSISA EmPower (a xx) and MCSISA Connect (an application that tracks, measures and evaluates volunteerism).
To find out more and to read the good news, visit: www.changenews.co.za
