Traditional Media are Funny

funny It’s sometimes funny to watch/read the traditional media write about hyperlocal.

I’ve read TIME magazine’s article, Are Hyperlocals Replacing Traditional Newspapers?, a couple times now. It’s pretty good overall.

But I can’t not chuckle at the first paragraph on page two:

Most hyperlocal sites don’t have the budget for flashy graphics or searchable databases. Their content comes from observant neighbors (and local gadflies) who care about both large and small goings-on around town. Hyperlocal sites also frequently publish upbeat accounts of parades and high school sports, as well as information on which local vendors sell the best produce. Recent headlines on Record’s site noted a “mega-low” tide and an upcoming garden tour.

Hehehehe. It’s as if the writer is completely flummoxed over the possibility that people actually care about parades (BTW, have you ever attended a downbeat parade?), high school sports, local food/vendors, garden tours, and local weather conditions.

Funny.

By the way, the “Record” mentioned in that excerpt is frequent HLB commenter Tracy Record of the West Seattle Blog, who makes a few appearances in TIME’s article.

July 23, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | 1 Comment

Sacramento Bee & Local Blogs: “Win-Win”

sacramento connect While my newspaper (and, no doubt, many others) is afraid of local blogs and citizen journalism, the Sacramento Bee is describing its partnership with dozens of local blogs a “win-win” for all involved.

Bee Editor Melanie Sill writes about Sacramento Connect, the local blog network/partnership that began with the newspaper and 18 blogs/sites, and now boasts a roster of more than 70 partners.

Launch was greeted enthusiastically. Readers who commented liked the network concept. Metrics tracking showed immediate use of the “Share” function of the toolbar, and the rich media format of the ad position got attention from some advertising customers. Ad revenue was steady, though modest, from the outset, through the toolbar and ads served on sacbee.com pages. Page views, “shares” from the toolbar, revenue and other metrics were established at the outset, and we’re pleased by progress.

The greatest lesson wasn’t about technology. It was this: Sacramento Connect’s successes and potential spring from the network effect — the activity and involvement of partners and the value of connections among them and The Bee. Partners share insights about their readers, subject matter and the local communities they cover. They ask questions about blogging and technology. They have offered praise and critiques of The Bee and sacbee.com, and have contributed content ideas.

She ends the piece by calling the paper’s partnership with local blogs a “win-win.” Nice to see a traditional media outlet not afraid to reach out and make connections with local blogs and citizen journalists.

July 21, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | Leave a Comment

Hyperlocal News Roundup

newsstand Very excited about the upcoming week here on HLB. In addition to part three of the SEO/hyperlocal blog series, I’m expecting to publish an excellent guest post on Wednesday. And if all goes well, an article about Main Street Connect — a fairly new hyperlocal blog network — by the end of the week.

Meanwhile, among the links below, be sure to check out the Outside.in piece on “Information Shortfall.” That was a topic I had hoped to write about here on HLB, but have not found the time to do so.

Announcing Two Important GrowthSpur Partnerships, Growthspur Blog
Community blog Freehold InJersey launches a newsroom in a café, Editors Weblog
‘We’re helping to rebuild a profession’: Hyperlocal network founder aims for 3,000 sites, www.journalism.co.uk
A few words from our panelists, The Hyperlocalist
Five free SEO tools to improve your search rankings, www.reportr.net
Pegasus News rolling out in select cities, Lost Remote
6 Best Practices for Multi-Author Hyperlocal Blogs (aka Bloggers We Love: Tom Bridge of WeLoveDC.com), Outside.in Blog
Caroline’s Secrets of the Blogging Lifestyle (aka Bloggers We Love: Caroline on Crack), Outside.in Blog
Ever notice a story on your Neighborhood News Page…, oipblog.outside.in
GrowthSpur’s First Two Media Partners: TBD.com and Journal Register, Growthspur Blog
Blog Networks Try One More Time to Turn Local Journalism Into Cash, gigaom.com
Information Shortfall? Not So Fast, says Outside.in, Outside.in Blog
On Hyperlocals, Hyper-hiring, and Hype, www.cjr.org

July 18, 2010 | Filed Under Industry | Leave a Comment

MapQuest Dropping Local Blog Support

In one of the first articles on Hyperlocal Blogger, I showed and wrote about an opportunity for local bloggers to get exposure through the popular MapQuest web site: MapQuest Wants Your Local Content.

They don’t want it anymore.

Greg Sterling first mentioned in passing that MapQuest Local — the company’s excellent local start page — is going away, and that immediately made me wonder if the local blog content would be, too. I spoke today with MapQuest GM Christian Dwyer and he confirmed that it is … although MapQuest may bring it back in the future.

Background

If you’re not familiar, take a look at local.mapquest.com and you’ll see what this is about. That’s the home page for MapQuest Local, and it should default to your current location. You should see, somewhere near the top, a “Blogs in…” widget like this one from the Seattle page:

mapquest-local

You can see that there’s an “Add Your Blog” button, and some real estate agent has wisely taken MapQuest up on that offer. I don’t know how much exposure she’s received, but this was always a pretty brain-dead simple thing to do. Even if it didn’t lead to a ton of new visitors to your hyperlocal blog, it also didn’t require a ton of effort to setup … so any exposure was a fair trade.

Current Situation

MapQuest Local will eventually go away, Dwyer tells me, and the support for accepting local blog content will go with it. He says there’s no timetable for this to happen, though; it depends on how quickly MapQuest users adopt the new MapQuest home page at new.mapquest.com. When there’s substantial adoption there, the “classic” version of MapQuest, along with MapQuest Local, will go away.

For now, MapQuest is bringing in local blog content … but, as an AOL-owned property, it’s focusing on content from AOL’s growing Patch network. Dwyer showed me Maplewood, NJ, restaurant listings in MapQuest’s system that are pulling business information from the Patch hyperlocal site covering Maplewood.

patch-mapquest

Future Possibilities

But all isn’t lost for local bloggers. Dwyer did say that MapQuest is thinking about how to capture local blog content from non-Patch sources and make it part of the main experience on the new MapQuest.com. A likely addition to come sooner than that will be local news sourced from AOL’s news property.

Bottom line: It may be many months before MapQuest Local goes away, so if you want to submit your blog to the local site covering your area … go for it. Just be aware that it won’t be around forever.

(PS – while you’re on MapQuest, do check out the new site. It’s got some pretty darn cool mapping tools that I’ve not seen on Google Maps or anywhere else.)

July 16, 2010 | Filed Under Industry, Promotion | 3 Comments

Great Hyperlocal Advice…From 3 Years Ago

I just read an article and was so thrilled with how great it was that I never even noticed when it was published: three years ago. Don’t let that stop you from reading. It’s still just as relevant today, perhaps even more so given the growth and interest in the hyperlocal blog/site, community news space.

Backfence: Lessons Learned

It was written by Mark Potts, founder of Backfence — a hyperlocal news community site that was probably ahead of its time and shut down before this article was written. He shares some real down-to-earth wisdom for anyone running and thinking about starting a hyperlocal site:

Engage the community.
It’s not journalism—it’s a conversation. (Actually, it’s whatever the community wants it to be.)
Hyperlocal content is really mundane.
Trust the audience.
Focus on strong, well-defined communities.
Leverage social networking.
There is most certainly a robust hyperlocal advertising business.
Keep costs down.
Partner with a media company or some other distribution source.
Hyperlocal works. You need patience and hard work to embed yourself in a community and become a vital cog in the life of that community. But when a community comes together, it’s striking.
Hyperlocal is really hard. Don’t kid yourself. You don’t just open the doors and hit critical mass.

The article goes deeper into each of those points above, so go read it; you’ll be glad you did.

Mark Potts, by the way, is currently the CEO of GrowthSpur, a company that offers a variety of tools/services to help hyperlocal sites make money.

July 9, 2010 | Filed Under Blogging, Industry | Leave a Comment

Hyperlocal News Roundup

newsstand Happy Independence Day to all readers here in the U.S. Hope you’ve had as enjoyable a holiday weekend as I’m having. I just posted a couple fireworks photos on one of our hyperlocal blogs, and coupled it with some griping about people setting off pro-level fireworks in a residential neighborhood. Seriously, it’s sounded like a war zone tonight around these parts.

On a much brighter note, the SEO for Hyperlocal Blogs series will launch on Monday with the first of five articles. Stay tuned for that. In the meantime, here are a half-dozen links from the past week. I particularly enjoyed reading the Jeff Jarvis piece below on his Buzz Machine blog.