The Liberian Observer is Liberia's first independent daily newspaper that envisions expanding into new markets and becoming the leading national digital newspaper. After thoughtful investigation they chose Ramsalt as digital partner.

The Liberian Observer Corporation was founded by Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Y. Best in Monrovia in 1981. It is an independent newspaper, its goals are government accountability and popular awareness of current events. In 2021 the newspaper celebrated its 40th anniversary.

Thunder and Ramsalt Media

- We envision having an online media platform that will enable us to power up content and experiences beyond our mainstream news service, such as a number of niche publications in multiple content formats and across numerous devices, said the Managing Director Bai Sama G. Best when he contacted Ramsalt in July 2021.

Upon learning about Thunder and its immense benefits for the online publishers, Liberian Observer began searching for a Certified Thunder Integrator that could help them move from their current publishing platform.

- We chose Ramsalt Media as our newspaper platform because of Ramsalt’s qualification on Thunder, their track record in supporting online news publications and because of their interest in exploring the African media space, which is as new and potential to them as Thunder is to the Liberian Observer, Best added.

Ramsalt Media is a ready-to-go newspaper software built on top of Thunder, an open source  Drupal distribution. You can have a new online newspaper ready in a day. Use a standardized design that can be customized to your preferences, or go for a full design process on top of our software. Modules are already in place for subscription, advertisement and producing printed copy online. Ramsalt takes care of the technology, while the journalists can focus totally on content. 

Launched within a month

-With the Ramsalt Media product, the Liberian Observer website is now future-proofed to continuously provide maximum value for our readers, advertisers, and other partners, says Best.

The new website was launched in August 2021, around a month after the initial contact. With a Drupal solution from Ramsalt they were able to get increased security, a host of ready to use functionality and integrations, as well as more than 17 years of experience in both the editorial and technical department in the Ramsalt staff.

- Exploring the new market with different reading habits and editorial requirements helped us to create a more flexible new version of the Ramsalt Media 2 product.

Together with the Liberian Observer we developed a more intuitive frontpage publishing workflow for editors which will help them to produce and update the newspaper frontpage more efficiently, says, Stephan Zeidler, Chief Technical Architect in Ramsalt.

 Check out the website liberianobserver.com

Who is on the team? 

The Liberian Observer:
Project Manager Bai Sama Best 

Ramsalt:
Project Manager Yngve Bergheim
Tech lead Stephan Zeidler
Developer Sohail Lajevard