By Marcelo Duran
Associate Editor
The YourHub citizen journalism syndication service is beginning to take root at papers beyond those owned by its primary backer.
The Buffalo (N.Y.) News and The Gazette in Colorado Springs, Colo., each rolled out the grassroots initiative last year. They are the first to sign on to the service outside of papers owned by E.W. Scripps and MediaNews Group.
The (Denver) Rocky Mountain News in 2005 developed YourHub in concert with Denver software developer Indigio. The service is offered in the Mile High City by the News and its JOA partner The Denver Post, owned by MediaNews.
The Gazette, owned by Freedom Communications Inc., launched its YourHub service last fall, using it to power 13 different sites, according to Tim Bergsten, editor of YourHub at coloradosprings.com.. The paper found it easy to integrate YourHub into its operation.
“We spent about three weeks learning to use YourHub at the administrative level and pre-loading a variety of information, stories, photos and blogs on each site,” he said.
The paper opted for YourHub because of the close proximity of technical support — Denver is 60 miles north of Colorado Springs — and readers’ familiarity with the Denver-area hubs.
Concept familiar
“The brand name was already out there; we simply introduced it in the Colorado Springs market,” he said.
The paper receives about 20 to 30 entries daily from its more than 2,000 registered users.
“I think people enjoy reading the blogs and stories, but we need to get more people involved,” he said. “We’re still too new to know for sure what people like.”
The Gazette delivers three weekly YourHub print editions to subscribers, which replaced the paper’s former weekly editions. A fourth YourHub edition rolled out in May; it’s the first print product introduced by The Gazette in six years, Bergsten said.
“We are giving regular citizens the opportunity to write about the people, issues and events in their lives that are important to them,” he said.
The Gazette employs five community journalist and one photographer to cover Colorado Springs’ YourHub communities. The journalists monitor the Web sites, lightly edit stories and choose which ones earmarked for print.
“They also write a short story or two each week, but the need for reporter-generated stories is going away as more citizen copy rolls in,” he said. “But their biggest responsibility is embedding themselves in the community, stretching the role of journalist from observer/reporter to participant/reporter.”
Buffalo wings it
The Buffalo News, meantime, is managing eight YourHub sites with six more to come, said Leigh Balcom, The News’ sales and operations manager.
The paper picked YourHub because it liked the platform and extended the brand of the paper, Balcom said.
“The best thing about YourHub is that it allows people to report on things the newspaper may not,” he said. “Events like Little League games, neighborhood events and even some issues affecting the community.”
The Buffalo YourHub has more than 550 registered users who have generated more than 2,000 pieces of content since the site went live.
“I hired two online interactive managers who go into the community and talk up the product and encourage people to post content,” Balcom said.
Unlike The Gazette, The News doesn’t currently produce printed YourHub editions, but its sites recorded a combined 64,000 page views last month, Balcom said.
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Yahoo strikes agreement with Job Network to extend recruitment reach
By Marcelo Duran
Associate Editor
The Job Network LLC formed an alliance with Yahoo HotJobs to deliver search, graphical and classified advertising to local consumers.
The company, jointly owned by TownNews.com, RedMatch and the PAGE Co-op, will be able to offer its recruitment advertisers a larger candidate pool through the HotJobs Web site and give Yahoo an opportunity to access additional local newspaper markets, backers contend.
“Newspapers can choose to tell the major advertisers in their markets that they have the ability to distribute the employment ads through Yahoo HotJobs in addition with their own Job Network and their own local newspaper,” said Marc Wilson, president of the Job Network and chief executive officer and general manager for TownNews.com.
The Job Network signed a three-year agreement with Yahoo and newspapers can sign up for one year, Wilson said.
“At Yahoo HotJobs, users will click back to the newspaper’s own Job Network site,” Wilson said. “The newspaper gets to keep its own brand and it’s a much better story for the advertising department to be able to go to an advertiser and be able to say that if you buy an ad from us we’ll put it in our print product, our local Web site and if you want, we’ll have it distributed to Yahoo.”
Working smarter
The deal with Yahoo HotJobs will allow newspapers to take on the growing number of companies vying for local employment classified dollars.
“A problem that all newspapers have is there’s more competition overall, for advertising and readership,” Wilson said. “Smaller newspapers are more like a PT boat, they are easier to turn around than a metro daily, but they also have limited resources and have culture issues where they don’t want to change.”
The cultural issue is that newspapers are no longer the only option for local advertisers.
“It’s difficult for smaller newspapers to do the complete remake of themselves that’s necessary for them to capitalize on being the number one Internet player in town,” he said.
The relative lack of competition in their markets gives smaller newspapers a slight breather before other rivals come into town.
“If the newspaper management recognizes the need to change in a smaller market and they perceive a change they can successfully own the number one and number two media buys in the market,” Wilson said. “Number one being the print product and number two being its online newspaper.”
Associate Editor
The Job Network LLC formed an alliance with Yahoo HotJobs to deliver search, graphical and classified advertising to local consumers.
The company, jointly owned by TownNews.com, RedMatch and the PAGE Co-op, will be able to offer its recruitment advertisers a larger candidate pool through the HotJobs Web site and give Yahoo an opportunity to access additional local newspaper markets, backers contend.
“Newspapers can choose to tell the major advertisers in their markets that they have the ability to distribute the employment ads through Yahoo HotJobs in addition with their own Job Network and their own local newspaper,” said Marc Wilson, president of the Job Network and chief executive officer and general manager for TownNews.com.
The Job Network signed a three-year agreement with Yahoo and newspapers can sign up for one year, Wilson said.
“At Yahoo HotJobs, users will click back to the newspaper’s own Job Network site,” Wilson said. “The newspaper gets to keep its own brand and it’s a much better story for the advertising department to be able to go to an advertiser and be able to say that if you buy an ad from us we’ll put it in our print product, our local Web site and if you want, we’ll have it distributed to Yahoo.”
Working smarter
The deal with Yahoo HotJobs will allow newspapers to take on the growing number of companies vying for local employment classified dollars.
“A problem that all newspapers have is there’s more competition overall, for advertising and readership,” Wilson said. “Smaller newspapers are more like a PT boat, they are easier to turn around than a metro daily, but they also have limited resources and have culture issues where they don’t want to change.”
The cultural issue is that newspapers are no longer the only option for local advertisers.
“It’s difficult for smaller newspapers to do the complete remake of themselves that’s necessary for them to capitalize on being the number one Internet player in town,” he said.
The relative lack of competition in their markets gives smaller newspapers a slight breather before other rivals come into town.
“If the newspaper management recognizes the need to change in a smaller market and they perceive a change they can successfully own the number one and number two media buys in the market,” Wilson said. “Number one being the print product and number two being its online newspaper.”
ChiTrib launches civic sites
By Marcelo Duran
Associate Editor
The Chicago Tribune last month threw its hat into the citizen journalism ring as it launched TribLocal, an online publishing venture using software from Kodak and Advanced Technical Solutions Inc.
The newspaper’s (Monday-Friday, 576,132; Saturday, 501,324; Sunday, 937,907) pilot program consists of two new Web sites covering nine Chicago suburban communities.
“Once registered, users will be able to read and submit news stories and photos similar to other citizen journalism sites,” said Ted Biedron, president of Chicagoland Publishing Co., a subsidiary of the Chicago Tribune.
The first cluster of communities covered in the project include St. Charles, Batavia, Geneva, Elburn and Maple Park. The second consists of Orland Park, Orland Hills, Tinley Park and Homer Glen. The towns included are just a handful of the scores of suburbs in the Chicagoland area.
“The entire Chicago area contains 170-plus suburbs so with any project of this nature you’ll have to make sure you are scalable,” Biedron said.
The content on the sites is a mixture of news stories generated from TribLocal journalists as well as local residents. Two professional journalists and one sales rep will cover each cluster.
Online and print
For now, TribLocal will be an online-only venture. But Biedron said the Tribune plans to print microzoned tab editions once the TribLocal sites gain traction. Each edition will encompass about 12,000 to 15,000 copies and be produced by third-party printers.
The tabs will be delivered to home subscribers and available with single copies, he said.
The Tribune started exploring the idea of launching a citizen journalism program last spring, working with vendor mWave, which ATS acquired earlier this year.
“Last year we chose mWave, they were the original vendor and we felt they had an opportunity to create something unique,” he said.
The Tribune is the first newspaper to be using Kodak’s new Microzone Publishing Solution, which includes software that lets newspapers manage citizen journalism Web sites and associated print products.
“We worked together to develop the citizen journalism portal and TribLocal will be the first newspaper to use the new software,” he said. “There’s a lot of underlying technology that enables the site to post online quickly and efficiently.”
Kodak signed an agreement with ATS to jointly sell and support the microzone publishing software.
Kodak, ATS teaming up for venture
“We have a very tight go-to-market partnership that will see both Kodak and ATS sales people promoting and selling the Microzone solution in the industry,” said ATS New Media Group Business Development Director David Monks.
Kodak’s MPS consists of three products, Citizen Journalism, Advertising and Microzone Management.
“We think of it as a multichannel publishing system, enabling newspaper publishers to produce relevant content on the Web as well as in print,” said Monks.
Monks said the MPS’ core is the management app, which lets newspaper publishers assemble content, edit copy, format pages and publish output for print and online versions.
“It will enable publishers to have as many portals as they want,” he said. “They can target as finely as they want to their readership. It may not even be a community, it might be a specialty organization, but the portal will be configured according to those demographics.”
Monks said MPS’ features would let publishers reduce the amount of oversight needed to manage the community sites, although he doubts most publishers would relinquish control.
“My guess is that most newspaper publishers will not want to do that. They will have an editorial staff that will check the stories being published,” he said. “The solution we are delivering provides some substantial tools and automation features that enable publishers to do a number of tasks as they determine what should and shouldn’t be published.”
The Citizen Journalism app lets users submit stories, photographs and community listing events while the ad management module allows advertisers to oversee how they place, and pay for, ads slated for both online and print.
Paul Lynch, the Tribune’s senior manager of quality and commercial print, said the paper received positive feedback from communities in the TribLocal area as well as inquires from neighboring communities asking when their sites are going up.
“Without a doubt we’ll be adding to the list of communities,” he said. “Local advertisers have begun to fill our ad inventory, something that bodes well for this new publishing model. The Kodak reverse publishing module will let us deliver narrowly targeted print products economically.”
Associate Editor
The Chicago Tribune last month threw its hat into the citizen journalism ring as it launched TribLocal, an online publishing venture using software from Kodak and Advanced Technical Solutions Inc.
The newspaper’s (Monday-Friday, 576,132; Saturday, 501,324; Sunday, 937,907) pilot program consists of two new Web sites covering nine Chicago suburban communities.
“Once registered, users will be able to read and submit news stories and photos similar to other citizen journalism sites,” said Ted Biedron, president of Chicagoland Publishing Co., a subsidiary of the Chicago Tribune.
The first cluster of communities covered in the project include St. Charles, Batavia, Geneva, Elburn and Maple Park. The second consists of Orland Park, Orland Hills, Tinley Park and Homer Glen. The towns included are just a handful of the scores of suburbs in the Chicagoland area.
“The entire Chicago area contains 170-plus suburbs so with any project of this nature you’ll have to make sure you are scalable,” Biedron said.
The content on the sites is a mixture of news stories generated from TribLocal journalists as well as local residents. Two professional journalists and one sales rep will cover each cluster.
Online and print
For now, TribLocal will be an online-only venture. But Biedron said the Tribune plans to print microzoned tab editions once the TribLocal sites gain traction. Each edition will encompass about 12,000 to 15,000 copies and be produced by third-party printers.
The tabs will be delivered to home subscribers and available with single copies, he said.
The Tribune started exploring the idea of launching a citizen journalism program last spring, working with vendor mWave, which ATS acquired earlier this year.
“Last year we chose mWave, they were the original vendor and we felt they had an opportunity to create something unique,” he said.
The Tribune is the first newspaper to be using Kodak’s new Microzone Publishing Solution, which includes software that lets newspapers manage citizen journalism Web sites and associated print products.
“We worked together to develop the citizen journalism portal and TribLocal will be the first newspaper to use the new software,” he said. “There’s a lot of underlying technology that enables the site to post online quickly and efficiently.”
Kodak signed an agreement with ATS to jointly sell and support the microzone publishing software.
Kodak, ATS teaming up for venture
“We have a very tight go-to-market partnership that will see both Kodak and ATS sales people promoting and selling the Microzone solution in the industry,” said ATS New Media Group Business Development Director David Monks.
Kodak’s MPS consists of three products, Citizen Journalism, Advertising and Microzone Management.
“We think of it as a multichannel publishing system, enabling newspaper publishers to produce relevant content on the Web as well as in print,” said Monks.
Monks said the MPS’ core is the management app, which lets newspaper publishers assemble content, edit copy, format pages and publish output for print and online versions.
“It will enable publishers to have as many portals as they want,” he said. “They can target as finely as they want to their readership. It may not even be a community, it might be a specialty organization, but the portal will be configured according to those demographics.”
Monks said MPS’ features would let publishers reduce the amount of oversight needed to manage the community sites, although he doubts most publishers would relinquish control.
“My guess is that most newspaper publishers will not want to do that. They will have an editorial staff that will check the stories being published,” he said. “The solution we are delivering provides some substantial tools and automation features that enable publishers to do a number of tasks as they determine what should and shouldn’t be published.”
The Citizen Journalism app lets users submit stories, photographs and community listing events while the ad management module allows advertisers to oversee how they place, and pay for, ads slated for both online and print.
Paul Lynch, the Tribune’s senior manager of quality and commercial print, said the paper received positive feedback from communities in the TribLocal area as well as inquires from neighboring communities asking when their sites are going up.
“Without a doubt we’ll be adding to the list of communities,” he said. “Local advertisers have begun to fill our ad inventory, something that bodes well for this new publishing model. The Kodak reverse publishing module will let us deliver narrowly targeted print products economically.”
Sun-Times trots out grassroots site, PDF
The Sun-Times News Group in Chicago launched NeighborhoodCircle.com, a series of community Web sites.
STNG said sites serving the Chicago suburbs of Montgomery, Oswego and Yorkville, Ill., will be joined by similar community sites throughout the rest of the year.
“This is all about community journalism,” said Fred Lebolt, STNG’s vice president of new media.
STNG publishes more than 90 papers in metropolitan Chicago, including the Chicago Sun-Times.
Meantime, the Sun-Times launched an afternoon PDF edition as part of an upgrade to its Web site.
Sun-Times P.M. features breaking news, sports, stocks, a crossword puzzle and the Sodoku puzzle, the paper said. Users can obtain a copy via linked e-mail or through suntimes.com.
The Sun-Times also kicked off Jump2Web, a feature that will allow readers to jump from stories in the paper to related Web content. The enhancements, introduced April 4, were linked to changes the paper made in its printed editions.
STNG said sites serving the Chicago suburbs of Montgomery, Oswego and Yorkville, Ill., will be joined by similar community sites throughout the rest of the year.
“This is all about community journalism,” said Fred Lebolt, STNG’s vice president of new media.
STNG publishes more than 90 papers in metropolitan Chicago, including the Chicago Sun-Times.
Meantime, the Sun-Times launched an afternoon PDF edition as part of an upgrade to its Web site.
Sun-Times P.M. features breaking news, sports, stocks, a crossword puzzle and the Sodoku puzzle, the paper said. Users can obtain a copy via linked e-mail or through suntimes.com.
The Sun-Times also kicked off Jump2Web, a feature that will allow readers to jump from stories in the paper to related Web content. The enhancements, introduced April 4, were linked to changes the paper made in its printed editions.
Smaller papers seek vendor help to boost online presence
By Marcelo Duran
Associate Editor
Size doesn’t matter as newspapers both big and small are being forced to navigate through rough economic waters.
But resource-pinched smaller papers find it more challenging to adapt quickly in an online environment.
The answer, at least for the Aiken (S.C.) Standard, is cross-training and software from a single vendor that can perform multiple functions, said Tim O’Briant, news director. “Layout folks handle CTP, prepress duties and updating the Web site.”
The Standard (daily, 16,496; Sunday, 15,950) employs one full-time person who handles content coordination, posting and scheduling of ads.
The newspaper uses MediaSpan Online Services’ suite of hosting modules to run and handle running its Web site. The software meshes with the paper’s IQue editorial app, from MOS’ sister company, MediaSpan Media Software.
The integration makes posting seamless, O’Briant said. Once editors deem an article ready for posting, the software does the rest. “All the FTP work is done in the background by Mediaspan’s Transporter (app) and the site is built with MediaSpan templates, employing saved searches that display material in proper categories relatively automatically.”
By employing the software, the Standard has been able to keep a tight rein on Web development costs.
MediaSpan’s software is also used to manage user access. The paper makes its local news content available as a premium service. The vendor’s Access Control module lets the Standard create accounts for users and also oversees verification and billing.
“We use their PDF edition to generate an e-paper daily and all the other news feeds and such come directly from our IQue server, used by reporters and editors,” he said.
Getting help from vendors
The Washington (N.C.) Daily News also looked to application developers to anchor its Web efforts. The newspaper (daily, 8,842; Sunday, 8,954) tapped TownNews.com to coordinate the creation of its e-edition, said Lawrence Keech, special projects manager.
“The e-edition allows us to sell online subscriptions, and the viewers get the entire paper they would’ve bought out of a rack or home delivery subscription,” he said.
The e-edition is helpful for subscribers who ordinarily receive their paper through mail but want to read the paper immediately online.
The Daily News makes its e-edition available free of charge to current subscribers; 85 percent of people reading the paper online are also print subscribers, Keech said. More than 150 other readers signed up to receive the e-edition exclusively.
Readers dropping their print subscriptions for digital ones led the Daily News to change how it compensated carriers concerned they would lose money, he said.
“They were concerned that if a subscriber moved to the online edition how would they get credit,” Keech said. “What we did was charge the same price for online delivery as for home delivery and the carrier still receives credit for that person.”
The paper’s coverage area is a little more than 7,000 square miles and it has six staff writers in the newsroom to cover print and online news.
The number of new residents moving to the area is compelling the Daily News to boost its online coverage, Keech said.
“We have seen a lot development over the last five years, a lot of snow birds moving in and they came down with expectations of the newspaper,” he said.
Competition from other media outlets is another factor pushing the paper to bring in more online features.
“We’ve had a local television station pushing their online presence heavily between their classified and video home tour feature,” Keech said.
With that in mind, the paper plans on adding video content to its Web site, initially in the advertising section with home tours and clips featuring historic sites.
Associate Editor
Size doesn’t matter as newspapers both big and small are being forced to navigate through rough economic waters.
But resource-pinched smaller papers find it more challenging to adapt quickly in an online environment.
The answer, at least for the Aiken (S.C.) Standard, is cross-training and software from a single vendor that can perform multiple functions, said Tim O’Briant, news director. “Layout folks handle CTP, prepress duties and updating the Web site.”
The Standard (daily, 16,496; Sunday, 15,950) employs one full-time person who handles content coordination, posting and scheduling of ads.
The newspaper uses MediaSpan Online Services’ suite of hosting modules to run and handle running its Web site. The software meshes with the paper’s IQue editorial app, from MOS’ sister company, MediaSpan Media Software.
The integration makes posting seamless, O’Briant said. Once editors deem an article ready for posting, the software does the rest. “All the FTP work is done in the background by Mediaspan’s Transporter (app) and the site is built with MediaSpan templates, employing saved searches that display material in proper categories relatively automatically.”
By employing the software, the Standard has been able to keep a tight rein on Web development costs.
MediaSpan’s software is also used to manage user access. The paper makes its local news content available as a premium service. The vendor’s Access Control module lets the Standard create accounts for users and also oversees verification and billing.
“We use their PDF edition to generate an e-paper daily and all the other news feeds and such come directly from our IQue server, used by reporters and editors,” he said.
Getting help from vendors
The Washington (N.C.) Daily News also looked to application developers to anchor its Web efforts. The newspaper (daily, 8,842; Sunday, 8,954) tapped TownNews.com to coordinate the creation of its e-edition, said Lawrence Keech, special projects manager.
“The e-edition allows us to sell online subscriptions, and the viewers get the entire paper they would’ve bought out of a rack or home delivery subscription,” he said.
The e-edition is helpful for subscribers who ordinarily receive their paper through mail but want to read the paper immediately online.
The Daily News makes its e-edition available free of charge to current subscribers; 85 percent of people reading the paper online are also print subscribers, Keech said. More than 150 other readers signed up to receive the e-edition exclusively.
Readers dropping their print subscriptions for digital ones led the Daily News to change how it compensated carriers concerned they would lose money, he said.
“They were concerned that if a subscriber moved to the online edition how would they get credit,” Keech said. “What we did was charge the same price for online delivery as for home delivery and the carrier still receives credit for that person.”
The paper’s coverage area is a little more than 7,000 square miles and it has six staff writers in the newsroom to cover print and online news.
The number of new residents moving to the area is compelling the Daily News to boost its online coverage, Keech said.
“We have seen a lot development over the last five years, a lot of snow birds moving in and they came down with expectations of the newspaper,” he said.
Competition from other media outlets is another factor pushing the paper to bring in more online features.
“We’ve had a local television station pushing their online presence heavily between their classified and video home tour feature,” Keech said.
With that in mind, the paper plans on adding video content to its Web site, initially in the advertising section with home tours and clips featuring historic sites.
MPS’ endeavor
It took several companies to get the Chicago Tribune’s TribLocal civic journalism initiative off the ground.
Advanced Technical Solutions Inc. and Kodak are the two primary backers of the Microzone Publishing Solution software underpinning TribLocal, although Creative Circle Advertising Solutions and Bluefin LLC also played important roles.
“This is a product that allows a metropolitan paper to target advertising in its outlying regions and for advertisers there that wouldn’t see the benefit of advertising in the core product,” said Kevin Ward, global product manager, newspaper workflow for Kodak. “A local advertiser may be inclined to advertise in a microzone edition circulating in a neighborhood or specific region.”
MPS is sold under the Kodak brand and gives the vendor a chance to help newspapers move in a new direction to tap additional ad revenue streams.
“We saw an opportunity to help our customers increase their business, rather than forcing them to remove cost from an existing business,” Ward said.
MPS has three components, or portals: citizen journalism, advertising and content management. Each can be used together or function independently.
CCAS developed the citizen journalism portal, which allows registered users to submit stories, photographs and community event listings for use in print and online products.
“We built a community journalism product based on a lot of the same technology as the self-serve classifieds” software the firm offers, said CCAS President Sue Tremblay.
“It’s very easy for a user to submit a story or post a photo and we’ve taken the philosophy behind user-submitted content and matched it up with newspapers pushing out content.”
The CCAS app lets newspapers either standardize the Web sites with a common look and feel or customize them as desired.
Bluefin, meantime, helped build the Microzone ad portal, basing it on its self-service Community Marketplace software. The ad portal lets advertisers create and place ads, as well as manage and store the ads they create. It also lets advertisers pay for the ad space through a secure e-payments system.
Advanced Technical Solutions Inc. and Kodak are the two primary backers of the Microzone Publishing Solution software underpinning TribLocal, although Creative Circle Advertising Solutions and Bluefin LLC also played important roles.
“This is a product that allows a metropolitan paper to target advertising in its outlying regions and for advertisers there that wouldn’t see the benefit of advertising in the core product,” said Kevin Ward, global product manager, newspaper workflow for Kodak. “A local advertiser may be inclined to advertise in a microzone edition circulating in a neighborhood or specific region.”
MPS is sold under the Kodak brand and gives the vendor a chance to help newspapers move in a new direction to tap additional ad revenue streams.
“We saw an opportunity to help our customers increase their business, rather than forcing them to remove cost from an existing business,” Ward said.
MPS has three components, or portals: citizen journalism, advertising and content management. Each can be used together or function independently.
CCAS developed the citizen journalism portal, which allows registered users to submit stories, photographs and community event listings for use in print and online products.
“We built a community journalism product based on a lot of the same technology as the self-serve classifieds” software the firm offers, said CCAS President Sue Tremblay.
“It’s very easy for a user to submit a story or post a photo and we’ve taken the philosophy behind user-submitted content and matched it up with newspapers pushing out content.”
The CCAS app lets newspapers either standardize the Web sites with a common look and feel or customize them as desired.
Bluefin, meantime, helped build the Microzone ad portal, basing it on its self-service Community Marketplace software. The ad portal lets advertisers create and place ads, as well as manage and store the ads they create. It also lets advertisers pay for the ad space through a secure e-payments system.
4 Questions with Bob Behringer
N&T speaks with Bob Behringer, president and chief executive officer of Presteligence Inc., about the challenges papers face online.
What trends are you seeing in the online media market?
One trend that is becoming more mainstream is the ability for users to access online information while mobile. Users can now subscribe to RSS feeds and podcasts through Internet Explorer 7.0 and Vista and access them on their cell phones. That lets publishers expand their online media marketing.
What are some of the major issues facing newspapers in regard to increasing their online presence?
A major issue facing newspapers in increasing their online presence is finding ways to make their Web site one that consumers want to go to each day and throughout the day. Newspapers have to become known as a portal for local information, whether it’s weather, movie times, phone numbers, etc. That will increase their site traffic and online presence.
What is a newspaper’s greatest strength to potential online advertisers?
Potential newspaper advertisers have the ability to promote in print, online, and in any other media format the newspaper offers. There’s a good chance the consumer will see the advertisements through all of these channels. Newspapers are the No. 1 source for local information so they are a great tool for local advertising.
In what areas do they need to improve?
Newspapers could improve in marketing by transforming their Web site to a local portal of information and increasing methods of accessing their local information in a more mobile way — through podcasts, mobile editions, etc.
What trends are you seeing in the online media market?
One trend that is becoming more mainstream is the ability for users to access online information while mobile. Users can now subscribe to RSS feeds and podcasts through Internet Explorer 7.0 and Vista and access them on their cell phones. That lets publishers expand their online media marketing.
What are some of the major issues facing newspapers in regard to increasing their online presence?
A major issue facing newspapers in increasing their online presence is finding ways to make their Web site one that consumers want to go to each day and throughout the day. Newspapers have to become known as a portal for local information, whether it’s weather, movie times, phone numbers, etc. That will increase their site traffic and online presence.
What is a newspaper’s greatest strength to potential online advertisers?
Potential newspaper advertisers have the ability to promote in print, online, and in any other media format the newspaper offers. There’s a good chance the consumer will see the advertisements through all of these channels. Newspapers are the No. 1 source for local information so they are a great tool for local advertising.
In what areas do they need to improve?
Newspapers could improve in marketing by transforming their Web site to a local portal of information and increasing methods of accessing their local information in a more mobile way — through podcasts, mobile editions, etc.
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