Small-Town Paper Goes Hyperlocal

HLB reader and commenter Geordie Romer pointed me toward this interesting news: The Wenatchee World, a small-town newspaper in central Washington, has just announced plans to start a network of hyperlocal sites:

It’s a simple idea, really. The Wenatchee World creates websites for each of the communities we serve, then turns them over to residents to use as online gathering places.

We show people how to post stories, meeting notices, community events, photos and much more. We also include stories and photos by our newsroom staff.

Soon, the sites are rich with intensely local and fresh information of high interest to those in the community. People go there to see what’s going on and to interact with their neighbors.

Community members moderate the sites, keeping interactions constructive and civil.

The first site isn’t public yet, but … ahem … they forgot to prevent search engine spiders from crawling the new site, and you can see it now at cashmere.ncwcommunities.com. (I’m assuming it’ll get its own domain when it launches? Hope so.)

This is intriguing to me in light of my comments yesterday about small-town papers having a longer shelf life right now than big city and national papers. The World obviously sees the writing on the wall. As Managing Editor Cal FitzSimmons wrote, “We’re doing something good for our communities and reinventing ourselves in the process.”

May 28, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | 2 Comments 

How Long Will Print Newspapers Last?

newspaperIf you run a news-based hyperlocal site, that’s got to be an important question for you. No one argues that journalism is undergoing dramatic changes, and the end of print newspapers would seem to be one of eventual results of these changes.

Britain’s Financial Times, founded in 1888, has an opinion:

Solomon says the FT is committing to “less print” and says the FT sees a five-year trajectory for having exited print in substantial part. “They’re not saying that, by five years, they’ll completely stop it, but they do see that the sunset is going to be in about five years for them.”

The “Solomon” mentioned there is Madi Solomon, part of the FT’s parent group, and the comments were made Tuesday during a panel at the E-Publishing Innovation Forum in London.

Five years. Not completely stopping print by then; but that’s their sunset. Five years.

The Times later retracted Solomon’s comments, but no mind; PaidContent UK has a list of similar comments from other print publishers trying to guess-timate how long their print editions will survive.

My Reaction

I think it’s obvious that pretty much all newspapers will eventually make online their primary home. Does anyone doubt that? But I think it’ll be the bigger papers making that switch first — the ones like Financial Times, the New York Times, USA Today, and so forth.

In smaller towns, like where I call home, getting local news online is still a challenge. There’s really no alternative here to the newspaper and its web site (at least not yet). I suspect it’s the same way in a lot of smaller towns, and so small-town newspapers might not see their print sunset for quite some time.

Your turn: How long do you think your local paper will last in print? Do you agree that small-town papers will live longer?

May 27, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | 6 Comments 

What Happens To Your Blog If You Move Away?

(This is a guest post from Ed Walker, a journalist with Media Wales in Cardiff, Wales, UK who setup and still runs the community news site, Blog Preston, for Preston, Lancashire, UK.)

moving-boxHyperlocal blogs are all about location and are generally run by people who live in the area they seek to serve. But what happens when you’ve built up a local blog and move away from the area?

I don’t think many of us would stay in an area just to keep up a local blog. We have relationships, job opportunities or other reasons for moving to pastures new. Building up a hyperlocal site takes time and dedication; you build a community around your content and, to a certain extent, yourself, but what if you’re not there?

I started up Blog Preston to act as a hub of community news, views and information in January 2009 for Preston, Lancashire, UK. I’d had the idea for a while but finally sat down one cold Sunday afternoon and got it started.

In November of 2009 I was offered a job in a different part of the country, and being 23, ambitious and wanting to further my career, I had to take it. But what about the hyperlocal site I’d created and had decent traffic coming to? It seemed such a shame to let it become tumbleweed in a Google search.

Throughout the time of Blog Preston I’d always been keen on getting guest contributors and giving them the chance to air their views about local issues. So, I turned to the community I’d built up to find someone who could take on the day-to-day running of the site.

Step forward the lovely Lisa who took on the task of filling the blog with content. She brought a whole new perspective to the role as I moved to Cardiff, but I still kept in touch and kept a watchful eye behind the scenes on how the site was doing.

I found myself impressed by the content Lisa was producing and the different angle and direction she was taking. As a parent and living in a different part of Preston she had a different take on things. And this was good. It brought a new direction and energy to the site, not to mention a new audience.

However, after five great months she had a change in circumstances and couldn’t commit the time to continue with the site. I spent a few weeks wondering what to do with Blog Preston. I’d tried with someone else and found myself back again without anyone to manage the site. Should I just give up and accept it wouldn’t be kept going?

Enter Andy Halls and Joseph Stashko, two budding student journalists at the University of Central Lancashire in Preston. I studied there myself and had come into contact with Andy and Jo after they wanted to setup a hyperlocal site called MyPreston. I gambled: I offered them the chance to join forces – using the established name of Blog Preston – and in return they would take over editorial of the site.

It’s been a hit. With more people on board we’re able to produce more content, and their fantastic live blogging of the general and local election results in Preston brought us national praise. Having them running the show frees me up to focus on long-term opportunities and the potential to monetise the site. I’ve always been able to spend time working with my web designer friend to improve the look of the site.

But, I come back to that winter’s day in January 2009 when I set up that site. Often hyperlocal sites are a one-person band, but keep an eye on what you’re going to do in the future. Who would run your site while you went on holiday? What if you had to move away? Once you have a successful site, people start to expect content and you will feel like you have a duty to keep going. Make sure you’ve got a plan for your hyperlocal sites in the future – even if you’re not around.

May 26, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging, Guest Posts | 7 Comments 

Hyperlocal News Roundup

newsstandAs you’ll see while browsing the list of links below, these once-a-week link roundups just keep getting longer and longer. I think I counted 14 links in this one. Yikes.

That’s good, in the sense that it means more people are talking and writing about hyperlocal news, blogging, etc. But it’s also a lot to read — maybe too much in one sitting.

All of which is to say that I might start posting these twice a week in order to keep the links manageable. You’ve been warned.

May 23, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | Leave a Comment 

Looking for Guest Blog Posts

Hi gang,

Between working on the monumental “SEO for Hyperlocal Blogs” series (which keeps getting more unwieldy each time I work on it) and a very busy month of June coming up, I’m looking for guest bloggers to write some articles here on Hyperlocal Blogger. Actually, I’m always happy to have guest bloggers, but it’s more imperative over the next six weeks or so.

If you’re interested in sharing a guest post here on HLB, please contact me with your idea and let me know when you think you’ll be able to send it. The tagline I use here is “Tips & Discussion for Local Bloggers,” so any idea that fits under that theme will probably be welcome.

You might check out the previously published guest posts to get an idea of what works, but I’m open to just about any idea.

I think we all get smarter by hearing about the experiences of others who work and play in the local blogging space. Whether you’re a local blogger, someone who provides services for local bloggers, a traditional journalist who has thoughts about local blogging … or whatever! … I want to hear from you. You’ll get some exposure for your ideas, not to mention a link or two that might lead to some new traffic (and help with your SEO).

Give it some thought and drop me a line with your ideas. Looking forward to hearing from you!

May 19, 2010 | Filed Under General | Leave a Comment 

Hyperlocal News Roundup

newsstandApologies for the slow blogging this month. I’m just back from GetListed Local University outside Minneapolis, where I spoke to small business owners about blogging and other social media tactics they can use to grow their businesses. I do some of my best writing on airplanes, and managed to get a really good start on that Hyperlocal SEO series that we talked about a few weeks ago. I’ll keep working on that even though I’m on the ground for a few more weeks.

In the meantime, here’s about 10-12 links of interest from the hyperlocal scene.

May 16, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | Leave a Comment 

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