Feb 24, 2011

Where hyperlocal news meets the “like” button

On Tuesday evening, I received a message via Facebook from Cynthia Cotte Griffiths, a friend and fellow hyperlocalist from Maryland. It was the kind of message that made me wince, smile and then slap my knee at her ingenuity.

First, the wince. Cotte Griffiths announced that she and her business partner, Brad Rourke, were pulling the plug on their Rockville (Md) Central news website. After three and a half years in publication, both had grown tired of juggling content creation and advertising sales, she told me. Furthermore, competition from Patch, another indie website, the local print publication and the municipal government’s site made their reporting redundant, Rourke blogged.

Then came the smile. Rockville Central would live on as a news source through its Facebook page, where their fans were already gabbing about current events. With a combination of news aggregation and original reporting, “we can create a true community hub,” Cotte Griffiths wrote.

And then the knee slap. Even though Cotte Griffiths and Rourke won’t generate advertising revenue from their Facebook page, they can establish themselves as social-media experts with tabs on the local vibe. That can translate into serious revenue from social-media consulting, building an online presence for small businesses, nonprofit groups and even government agencies.

Then another knee slap. Facebook is already a mobile-friendly service, whether one uses its mobile website or a native (platform-specific) app. That gives the Rockville Central fan page greater reach without having to “mobilize” its own website or develop an expensive app. The technical witchcraft has already been done for them.

And still another knee slap. Cotte Griffiths and Rourke can take their social-media savvy onto Twitter, where they can generate revenue from sponsored tweets. Also, they can use the multimedia-heavy publishing platform Tumblr to build a portfolio of marketable stock photos or to publish original audio or video content, though Tumblr’s community of users is still small relative to Facebook and Twitter.

By the time I reached the closing salutations of Cotte Griffiths’ message, my knee was swollen from the slapping and I was swearing up a storm. (“Fucking genius!” came up a lot.) Sure, they’d have to stay ahead of the social-media curve in case some future service turns Facebook into MySpace. In the meantime, they can provide hyperlocal information, foster dialog among neighbors, and make bank as consultants.

One day after our Facebook exchange, the news of Rockville Central’s transition had made its way through Twitter. And by Wednesday evening, members of the Online News Association were talking about it at a mixer inside the offices of The New York Times. Some were intrigued, others were disappointed that local news would take this route.

I’m hitting the “like” button on this one.

Illustration courtesy of Flickr user Christopher S. Penn.

Jul 7, 2010

Getting mom and pop to go digital

Last spring, an advertiser with my now-defunct news site asked whether his restaurant should have a Facebook fan page. I told him yes, but my eyes burned an angry “hell yes,” and my foot ached to make contact with his ass for not already having a presence on the social-networking site. I also encouraged him to get his business on Twitter.

That’s when his eyes glazed over. “What’s Twitter?” he asked.

I tried my best to explain it: 140-character squirts of information broadcast to followers, who then might rebroadcast (or retweet) that information to their followers, and so on. My advertiser didn’t see its value; admittedly, I didn’t do a good job illustrating it to him. It just seemed like a lot of work that he didn’t really need.

He was right. Digital marketing can be a full-time job, or at least a labor-intensive one for a small, neighborhood business. Mom and Pop Shopkeeper can’t spare their first-born child to tweet daily specials or post notes on a Facebook wall. That kid needs to be at the register or on a bicycle making deliveries.

The Tribune Company stepped into this tough sell earlier this week and Gannett started in late May. But they’re onto something: Digital-marketing services are certainly a revenue stream that allows online hyperlocalists to leverage social-networking skills they already have (or at least should have).

Making this work means first educating small business owners on the value of Facebook and Twitter (I’ll toss in Foursquare while I’m at it). That can be done one-on-one during a sales call, or in a free presentation to the chamber of commerce or other local business groups. The goal is to introduce business owners to the concepts of social networking and not to instruct them on exactly how to use it. They won’t buy the cow if they can get the milk for free.

Next, it might mean scaling a digital-marketing campaign to fit a business’s needs and budget. A restaurant might have plenty of information to post on its Twitter and Facebook feeds, and such a business can use (and afford) the help of an online hyperlocalist to set up those accounts or create content.

Conversely, a corner convenience store might not have much to say, but one inexpensive “sponsored” tweet on a hyperlocalist’s Twitter feed can extend its services to an online audience.

I’ve had some success offering digital-marketing services to small businesses: I ghost-tweeted text and photos for a local crafts fair using that business’s Twitter account, and transmitted teaser tweets through my news site’s feed. I also convinced the restaurateur mentioned above to purchase tweet time on my feed, though as part of a larger display-ad package.

In the interest of transparency, each tweet appearing on my feed was labeled “sponsored.” Likewise, any mention of the crafts fair or that restaurant in the website’s content included some mention of them as sponsors or advertisers.

Digital marketing is a professional service and revenue stream that online hyperlocalists should consider, especially since Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare are well adapted to mobile devices. It’s an easy way to break into mobile monetization with existing technology.

Photos courtesy of Flickr user Jeremy Keith and Tommaso Sorchiotti.

May 26, 2010

Still life with money

Hyperlocalists might be familiar with the idea of content syndication, where larger news outlets pay smaller ones for permission to republish (or rebroadcast) their timely hyperlocal news. I’m not sure how often it’s done these days, but given the big push into hyperlocal news, it’s probably a reasonable revenue stream for hyperlocalists to pursue.

But one form of syndication I’d never considered is that of photographic content, and not just shots related to news events. Last week, an art director for a regional magazine requested permission to reprint a photo I’d taken for my former hyperlocal news site. The photo (right) was taken at a fashion show last year, and as it turned out, the magazine was publishing a small blurb about the show’s return to the area.

The best part: The art director offered to pay me a nice fee to reuse my previously published photo.

Moreover, I made myself available to this art director as a stock photography supplier. I’ve got a hard drive loaded with copyrighted pics of street scenes, food from local restaurants, seasonal and recurring events, and of course topical news items that this magazine and other publications might be interested in using. Why not capitalize on existing works.

Admittedly, selling republishing rights to regional magazines might not bring in big bucks immediately, but the magazine industry seems to be recovering from the recession. Also, advertising agencies might be interested in using a hyperlocalist’s photos and video to meet their clients’ needs. And other local businesses might make use of such content for self-produced print, broadcast and online promotional material.

The easiest way to publicize the availability of stock photography is to slap photos on the web, either on Flickr, a hyperlocal news site, a photo blog or some other online venue. The photos (or at least the web pages on which they’re posted) should have search engine-optimized titles that point directly to where and when the pics were taken. And all content should be labeled with a copyright statement and contact information.

I don’t expect to retire from my non-existent day job with income from reuse licenses, but it’s certainly an efficient revenue stream that hyperlocalists should consider.

Feb 9, 2010

No job left behind

Last Friday, I had a long conversation via Twitter (it’s possible) with Dan Hugo, a hyperlocalist in the Bay Area who recently ended his Radio Sunnyvale news podcast because of poor funding. Despite that, he was still interested in creating a forum that would “make participation ‘worthwhile’ [for] contributors and consumers while creating sane, relevant, information-rich content.”

Hugo also mentioned that he was a software engineer.

So I asked him: Is your goal to generate content that facilitates civic discourse, or to build an application that does the same? If I had his software skills, I’d pump out location-based mobile apps and develop ways to break Apple’s and Amazon’s chokehold on content delivery to e-readers. Content creation is all for nothing without content distribution.

Outside of this conversation, Hugo’s background reminded me that many hyperlocal journalists don’t have journalism on their resumes. They have backgrounds in event planning, microbiology (ahem!), information technology, whatever. They just don’t have journalism degrees.

That doesn’t mean they’re not journalists. They cover local beats, interview witnesses, write and edit content, fact check and verify — stuff that J-school grads do. Hyperlocalists just do it on a community level, stuff that larger media outlets don’t do.

But in pursuing their interest in journalism, I hope they don’t ignore their prior work experiences. Instead, they should use those experiences and skills to create new revenue streams for their media outlets. Seriously, if Hugo solves the mystery of e-reader content distribution and then monetizes it (by offering content on a subscription basis, or by selling the technology to other content producers), he’ll have one more revenue stream for his journalism project.

I don’t mean to add more work to the busy life of hyperlocalists. If the revenue stream doesn’t benefit the hyperlocal news project either financially or in terms of publicity, then don’t bother. And remember that there are other ways to contribute to a hyperlocal news outlet — as an apps developer, event planner, even as a microbiologist — without creating content.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user silverlinedwinnebago.