New York Times Offers Class in Hyperlocal Blogging

NYT courses logoInteresting: The New York Times is offering an online class in Citizen Journalism: Hyperlocal Blogging and it begins next week.

It’ll be taught by Mary Ann Giordano, the Times’ Deputy Metro Editor who oversaw the paper’s recently shuttered hyperlocal blogs called “The Local,” and also appears to be involved in the Times’ most recent hyperlocal project, a collaboration with NYU students called The Local East Village.

From the course description:

For those who want to start a blog to serve the news and information needs of their community, this course has all the basics. Using the expertise of veteran New York Times journalists, the course will help you decide what sort of community blog you want to build, then show you how to build it. A substantial segment will teach the fundamentals of community journalism and local reporting, including how to find and present information; how to check facts and preserve fairness in coverage; what you need to know about the basics of media ethics. The course will also cover how to find and develop an audience; how to get your blog noticed, and how to get your community (including potential sponsors) involved.

There’ll be weekly live sessions online as well as self-paced material. It starts next Tuesday and runs for five weeks and costs $175. You can read more about the class (and register by October 4) at the link above.

It would be easy to take the low road here and question the Times’ motivation or ask what one of the world’s major newspapers knows about on-the-ground hyperlocal blogging. But I see a lot of value in what that course description says:

“…the fundamentals of community journalism and local reporting, including how to find and present information; how to check facts and preserve fairness in coverage; what you need to know about the basics of media ethics.”

It’s not that difficult to learn to use WordPress, to learn to shoot breaking news photos or videos on an iPhone, and so forth. But real journalism is a craft and, if that’s what the Times is going to teach hyperlocal bloggers, I say “well done.”

September 30, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging | 1 Comment 

Do You Have a Print Strategy?

thumbprint-smOkay, local bloggers/journalists/webmasters, here are the questions before you:

1.) Do you have a print version of your local news site/blog?

2.) Have you ever considered doing a print version?

3.) Do you think it’s a good or bad idea to also have a print version of your blog?

I’m curious mainly because of this recent article in The Guardian about HU17.net, a hyperlocal site covering Beverley, England. Paul Smith is producing a 28-page, full color print version that is published every Tuesday — about 100 copies, the article says — and is distributed to “bars, barbers, and social clubs.”

Could you see yourself doing something similar? Here’s a quick poll. Don’t know how many replies you guys will give me, but I’m curious to gauge how many are doing this.


Comments are open if you’d like to expand on your vote. If you’re not doing a print version, why not?

September 27, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging | 5 Comments 

Reading Blogs: More Mainstream; Blogging: Not So Much

Some interesting stats out this week from eMarketer about the penetration of both blog reading and blog writing in the U.S. In a blog post earlier this week, eMarketer says more than half of all Internet users in the U.S. will read blogs at least once a month this year. Their forecast says that number will hit 60% by 2014.

blog stats

Blogging, on the other hand, will continue to be the work of the few: eMarketer says about 12% of U.S. Internet users will update a blog at least monthly this year, and only 13.3% by 2014. We’re the minority. Not too surprising, especially with many “regular folks” finding it much easier to maintain a Facebook or Twitter presence and using that for sharing content.

There’s another important distinction to be made, and I’m glad to see it was mentioned in the eMarketer article: Going forward, the distinction between a blog and a web site will be harder to make. It’s already difficult in many cases, and you could argue it’s a completely unneeded distinction. Says eMarketer:

But there is a caveat to this forecast: Over time, blogs will continue to become indistinguishable from other media channels.

I already foresee the day when I need to change the name of this blog you’re reading now. It won’t be Hyperlocal Blogger. It’ll be … something that doesn’t force a distinction on blogging.

September 24, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging, Industry | 2 Comments 

Jay Rosen’s Advice for Journalism Students (and bloggers)

I’m a bit distracted at the moment, so the weekly “Hyperlocal News Roundup” will return next weekend. But there’s one link I want to share with you today and I’ll take the risk of calling it the only article you really need to read this week.

It’s by Jay Rosen of New York University and recaps a presentation he gave recently to new students on their first day at a French journalism school. There’s great stuff in here for those of you who are hyperlocal news bloggers:

7: Your authority starts with, “I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it.” If “anyone” can produce media and share it with the world, what makes the pro journalist special, or worth listening to? Not the press card, not the by-line, not the fact of employment by a major media company. None of that. The most reliable source of authority for a professional journalist will continue to be what James W. Carey called “the idea of a report.” That’s when you can truthfully say to the users, “I’m there, you’re not, let me tell you about it.” Or, “I was at the demonstration, you weren’t, let me tell you how the cops behaved.” Or, altering my formula slightly, “I interviewed the workers who were on that oil drilling platform when it exploded, you didn’t, let me tell you what they said.” Or, “I reviewed those documents, you didn’t, let me tell you what I found.” Your authority begins when you do the work. If an amateur or a blogger does the work, the same authority is earned. Seeing people as a public means granting that without rancor.

(emphasis added at the end is mine)

The article is geared toward journalists, so if you’re a hyperlocal business blogger, I’m not sure how much is in it for you. But if you’re an interested, engaged citizen (regardless of your blogger focus), I think you’ll gain from reading it. Here’s the link:

The Journalists Formerly Known as the Media: My Advice to the Next Generation

September 13, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging | Leave a Comment 

Hyperlocal Blog SEO: The Series

With the publishing of yesterday’s article, the five-part series on hyperlocal blog SEO is complete. In the series, I spoke about the importance of internal linking — providing links on your blog to other content on your blog. I also talked about making it easy for others to link to your content. So, assuming most people won’t want to link to five separate articles, here’s a recap of the series in one post that I think others will be more likely to link to.

Thanks to all who read through the whole series. More thanks to those who read and left valuable comments on any of the articles. And perhaps the most thanks to those who encouraged me to write the series in the first place, way back in April when I asked you. :-)

August 3, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging, MY BEST POSTS | 4 Comments 

SEO Final Steps: Content Promotion for Local Blogs

(This is the last of a five-part series about SEO for hyperlocal blogs/web sites.)

seo-2You may have a terrific local blog — and I hope you do! — but no matter how good it is, you’re making a mistake if you think that just writing good local content with all the right SEO tactics is automatically going to bring in loads of new visitors. No matter how great your content is, you still have to promote it in other places.

I’m stretching the definition of SEO here, but we’re still talking about increasing readership and that’s the bottom line. Here’s a list of online and offline ways to promote your content.

Online Content Marketing

facebookFacebook
As much as I dislike Facebook, there’s no denying its popularity nor the fact that it could be a great venue for increasing awareness of your hyperlocal blog. Pages are the primary tool that Facebook offers for this kind of thing. If you’re ready to create a page for your local blog, here’s where to start.

Although I’m hardly an expert on Facebook, Cari and I have setup Facebook pages for all four of our local blogs. We post links to our blog articles, have local photo albums, and sections for local event listings and discussions. Our pages are new and we don’t have a ton of activity on any of them right now. But, if you want to see what we’re doing, here are the pages:

Rather than relying on what we’re doing as a guide, you might want to read these excellent articles about Facebook pages and promotion.

twitterTwitter
At some point, Cari and I may follow the same path and create separate Twitter accounts for each blog; but at the moment, I don’t think that’s smart for us. There’s not a ton of local Twitter users in our area, and I don’t think any such account would get many followers. (Our Facebook pages don’t have many “likes” yet, either.) So, for now, I’m posting links to some of our local blog articles via my Twitter account. In a larger city, though, I’d think that you would want to separate your personal Twitter account from your blog’s account.

youtubeYouTube
YouTube is the second-largest search engine on the planet — it gets more searches than Yahoo and Bing. If you’re creating video content — and why wouldn’t you be? — you should be sharing it on YouTube. Three quick suggestions:

1. Setup an account specifically for your blog; don’t use your personal account. People may want to subscribe to your blog videos, but not your personal ones.

2. Be sure to mention your blog name and URL in the descriptions of your videos so people can learn who the source is when they find your videos.

3. Be sure to promote your YouTube channel on your blog, so that any heavy YouTube users know that they can subscribe to your channel and see your videos when they visit YouTube.

flickrFlickr
If you’re taking photos for your blog — and again, why wouldn’t you be? — Flickr is a great place to upload and share them. Again, you’ll need to decide if you want to use a personal Flickr account or create one specifically for your blog. Either way, when you share photos on Flickr, be sure to link to the blog post that’s related to the photo (if there is one).

Also, do a search in Flickr’s Groups section to see if there’s a specific group for your town or neighborhood. I bet there is — at least at the town level. Join that group and get involved in any interesting discussions that are happening (or start some yourself). Share your photos with the group. This is a great way to get your target audience to learn about your blog.

outside.inoutside.in
I’ve written about outside.in many times before, so this is probably not new to anyone. In a nutshell, you can add your blog into outside.in’s system to increase exposure. Your blog posts will show up on outside.in itself, and may show up on its partners’ sites, like local media outlets and even CNN.

Offline Content Promotion

You can use pretty much any “traditional” marketing to promote your blog. In a smaller town like mine, there’s a chance these will be more successful than some online promotion methods. Here are some worth considering:

When it comes to offline blog/content promotion, the possibilities are almost endless.

Summary

This wraps up my five-part series on SEO for hyperlocal blogs. If you didn’t know what SEO was, I hope you learned a lot and have a better idea of how to start optimizing your blog for search engine visibility. If you already knew something about SEO, I hope I shared at least a few new ideas you weren’t aware of or clarified some things you weren’t sure of.

Either way, don’t ignore SEO. I don’t think it should be your primary concern in creating local blog content, but I do think it’s smart to use SEO to introduce your blog to new readers — people who are looking for local information via Google, Bing, or Yahoo and didn’t know that your blog existed.

As always, if you have any comments or questions about this article or the series as a whole, the comments are open.

(This was the last of a five-part series about SEO for hyperlocal blogs/web sites.)

August 2, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging, MY BEST POSTS | 5 Comments 

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