Beyond the broadcast: Modernize your station’s digital infrastructure with Indiegraf

If you couldn't make it to our webinar, Public Media’s Digital Shift: Scaling Audience and Revenue with Indiegraf, don't worry—we’ve got you covered in this recap. 

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Bridget Thoreson, Director of Local Media Partnerships, and Allison McIlmoyl, Senior Product Strategist, shared how Indiegraf is serving as the complete operating system for independent newsrooms.

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Here’s a breakdown of how we are helping public media stations scale their audience, grow recurring revenue, and defeat transformation paralysis.

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1. Deeper public media roots via Hearken

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A major highlight of the session was our recent acquisition of Hearken. Born 11 years ago out of WBEZ’s Curious City, Hearken was built specifically to help public media organizations listen to and engage their audiences.

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The results speak for themselves. Newsrooms utilizing the Hearken framework see:

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• 2x to 5x higher subscriber and member sign-ups.
• 50% of newsletter opt-ins are coming from entirely new contacts who weren't previously in the newsroom's database.

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2. Funding your shift: The Digital Transformation Program

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Moving your newsroom to a new tech stack can feel overwhelming, which is why we introduced the Digital Transformation Program for Public Media. In partnership with the Knight Foundation, this initiative offers a graduated, two-year subsidy to ease the financial transition:

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• Year 1: Get 70% off Indiegraf’s tech products and 50% off our Expert Services (like website migration and audience growth audits).
• Year 2: Receive 50% off tech products and 50% off services as the platform integrates into your standard budget.
• Year 3: Graduate to full pricing, fully sustained by the recurring, diversified revenue you’ve built over the last two years.

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Who qualifies? You must be a U.S.-based station producing original local content. While designed for nonprofits, for-profit organizations are eligible if they explicitly serve a news desert or a marginalized community.

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3. Demo: Inside the radio-first operating system

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We walked through a live look at both the front- and back-end of Heartland Signal—Indiegraf’s first radio-first publisher. Rather than duct-taping disconnected software together, the system unifies everything a modern station needs into a single dashboard:

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• Persistent Live Player: A fixed audio player pinned to the bottom of desktop and mobile screens that allows users to browse your articles without interrupting the livestream.
• No-Code Programming Blocks: Drag-and-drop elements to easily build out show schedules, display host bios, and embed past episode archives.
• Integrated Revenue & Newsletters: Built-in tools like Indie Email and Indiegraf Pay seamlessly sync reader donation data with your newsletter lists—no manual data exports required.
• Secure Ad Server: A standalone ad platform that lets your sales team or external advertisers track performance in real time without giving them access to your editorial back-end.

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4. Answering your FAQs

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• Does Indiegraf OS connect with our current tech setup? We don't want to trap you in an isolated ecosystem. We are actively collaborating with industry players to ensure our tech stack remains open and flexible.
• Does Indiegraf OS offer custom integrations? Existing CRMs or payment platforms can be integrated on a case-by-case basis. Additionally, features like Hearken and the Indie Ads Manager can be purchased as standalone tools.

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Ready to take the next step?

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Spots for our subsidized Digital Transformation Package are limited and reviewed on a rolling basis. Submitting an application is completely non-binding and simply serves as the best way to see if your station qualifies.

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👉 Apply for the Digital Transformation Package today

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