Helping New Zealand and Pacific Publishers Succeed Online

As the media landscape across Aotearoa and the Pacific continues to evolve, news organisations of all sizes are navigating a digital transition. Meeting audiences where they are while building robust, sustainable revenue streams has never been more important. The Google News Initiative (GNI) is dedicated to providing newsrooms with the tools, capability-building programs, and strategic consultations they need to thrive.

Here are the major milestones and impact stories from our latest joint initiatives.

Building Sustainable YouTube Strategies

YouTube is essential for modern journalism. To help newsrooms build loyal audiences and drive long-term growth, the GNI and Changer Studios ran two 16-week YouTube accelerators in 2025 and 2026.

The results speak for themselves: 100% of our 2025 cohort reported their channels are now better positioned for long-term success.

Here is how local, Pacific, and Māori newsrooms transformed their channels during the program:

• Chris Lynch Media: Shifted from simply repurposing website videos to creating specifically for the YouTube audience. By publishing consistently, they hit 10K subscribers (+23%), grew views by 27%, and joined the YouTube Partner Program. "The sessions changed everything for me. I've now gone all in on YouTube," said Chris Lynch.
• Aukaha News: Went back to basics to amplify Māori storytelling. By optimising their analytics and channel branding, they grew subscribers by 10% and views by 14%. “This workshop has driven us as producers and content creators to be better every day, helping us stand out from the noise.” said Mana Wikaire-Lewis.
• Te Ao Māori News: Rapidly tested new thumbnails, formats, and Shorts to drive a massive 30% jump in subscribers.
• Pasifika TV (PCBL): Used 1:1 coaching to analyse audience retention. They spotted a 24% viewer drop-off in the first 11 seconds, ditched their long intro graphic, and immediately boosted return viewership.
• Scoop NZ: Leveraged our workflow training to successfully advocate for and hire a dedicated digital video lead to maintain their momentum.

Taking Control of Audience Data

To keep its independent journalism free and accessible, The Spinoff relies on a strong, direct relationship with its readers. But outdated technology was holding them back.

By relying on third-party platforms, The Spinoff was locked into a rigid system where readers were either anonymous visitors or paying members. There was no middle ground to nurture casual fans into loyal supporters.

To fix this and take full ownership of their audience insights, The Spinoff spent 10 months building a custom data platform, supported by Google.

"Our members are absolutely vital to keeping The Spinoff without a restrictive paywall," says Amber Easby, CEO of The Spinoff. "With Google's support, we now truly own our data and can connect with our community more directly and meaningfully than ever before."

Growing Subscriptions

To help publishers boost their digital subscriptions, the GNI teamed up with Financial Times Strategies (FTS) for an intensive two-day workshop in June.

Leaders from five top newsrooms—The Spinoff, BusinessDesk (NZME), Stuff, Newsroom, and Allied Press (Otago Daily Times)—came together to tackle the core drivers of reader revenue.

Through hands-on exercises and expert coaching, the cohort focused on:

• Value: Aligning content with what readers are actually willing to pay for.
• Pricing: Finding the mathematical sweet spot for subscription costs.
• On-boarding: Smoothing out the checkout process to remove sign-up barriers.
• Strategy: Translating daily newsroom pressures into clear, long-term goals.

The response was overwhelmingly positive. The workshop earned a 4.7/5 overall satisfaction score and a 4.9/5 likelihood to recommend to industry peers.

“We achieved a 290% increase in subscriptions purchased via Subscribe with Google in our second year of partnership, proving that providing additional payment options continues to drive strong conversions for our local newsrooms.” said Belinda Lush, Stuff Limited.

"I feel very privileged to have attended and took away a huge amount of knowledge," says Mark de Jong, Otago Daily Times.

Innovation with the Google News AI Workshops

We teamed up with Other Labs and The AI Training Company for the GNI AI Workshops with one clear goal: help local newsrooms turn AI hype into practical tools.

During this 12-week sprint, we challenged newsrooms to take a single AI idea from concept to a working pilot. For small teams, these custom, Google-powered prototypes didn't just tweak workflows—they completely transformed how the news gets made.

Here is what the local cohort achieved:

• Pacific Media Network (PMN News): Built a custom Gemini Gem to automatically translate daily news bulletins into Tongan and Cook Islands Māori. This slashed manual translation time from up to three hours down to just 15 minutes. The tool is working so well that they are rolling it out regionally in September 2026.
• The Central App: Created a Gem to instantly pull key news angles out of dense council meeting transcripts. Armed with this tool, just two local reporters doubled their story output and are now breaking news days ahead of the official livestream.
• Newsroom NZ: Developed an SEO Gem to help reporters write better search metadata. The tool took the guesswork out of the process, boosting journalists’ confidence in tackling SEO from a hesitant 2.7 to a solid 4.3 out of 5.

Looking Ahead: A Dedicated AI Lab

Building on the success of Aukaha News and the Pacific Media Network, we are launching an 18-month AI program for New Zealand and Pacific publishers in 2026.

This program is designed for newsrooms ready to turn AI into a daily advantage. We are equipping publishers with the hands-on tools and expert guidance they need to completely transform how local journalism is produced, distributed, and monetised.

We look forward to continuing our collaboration with local news publishers, ensuring they have the digital business models, technical capabilities, and platforms they need to succeed online.