Everyone’s Getting the Hyperlocal Religion
by Matt on Feb 23, 2009 in Industry
The decline of traditional media is one of my four reasons why hyperlocal blogging works. As TV stations and newspapers cut back on staff and production, the opportunity gets even bigger for us local bloggers.
But let’s not count the other guys out just yet. It seems hyperlocal religion is spreading far and wide. To wit:
In the UK, Trinity Mirror has re-launched 22 hyperlocal sites and the top stories from those sites will appear on the Evening Gazette’s home page. And yes, there’s a blogging element in play, too. According to the MediaWeek article, the new hyperlocal sites “are designed to make it easier for readers to access news about their locality and contribute their own stories.” (emphasis mine)
The Los Angeles Times has recently launched a new project called Mapping L.A., an ambitious project that lets readers help map neighborhoods across the entire “Southland” region. This isn’t a blogging project, but it is an interesting dive into hyperlocal in one of the more challenging cities to do so. In his post about Mapping L.A., Peter Krasilovsky says the Times intends to someday put “hyperlocal marketing, advertising and blogging efforts” on these neighborhood maps. (emphasis mine)
I dare say that my Search Engine Land colleague Greg Sterling thinks the Times should do something like that. He recently wrote about the San Francisco Chronicle’s poor attempt at creating neighborhood pages, and compared them to some much more effective geo-pages on TurnHere and Flickr. Assessing the opportunity for newspapers, Greg says:
Done right these new neighborhood sites or pages would rank highly in search results and drive thousands of new pages views. And in so doing would attract new/additional advertisers across a range of categories.
Meanwhile, the purely online HelloMetro network of web sites isn’t stopping at just being a collection of city guides with business listings. Peter Krasilovsky’s also wrote about them recently — and we learn that they’re hiring writers to cover their local markets with extra content related to local attractions, restaurants, events, and nightclubs. HelloMetro already fairly well in Google for some local terms I watch in my area, and additional local content will only help them with that.
What’s It All Mean To You
If you’re blogging locally for business purposes, no one said that this was going to be an easy, bump-free ride. You should expect other business people and media outlets to see the same opportunity you do. Your job is to stay ahead and provide a unique local voice that attracts and keeps an audience.
If you’re not blogging for business purposes, some of this should be welcome news. If traditional media does the job of informing people and getting them interested in hyperlocal information, you may find yourself with a new, growing audience of readers interested in your hyperlocal blog.
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