State of Local

Last year, I was invited to participate in a panel discussion at the TVB conference that centered on multi-platform sales for TV station Web sites. I had lots of prepared remarks that were unremarkable. But one thing I said off the cuff ended up in the New York Times: “If you don’t have any capabilities, go get some.”

The idea was simple. Stations can no longer take the “If you built it, they will come” approach when thinking about Web sales. A web site, regardless of how good or highly visited, is not enough. The time has come for another round of investment.

“Invest in what?” you might ask.

Good question.

My short answer is anything you think will work for your market. Category or “vertical” strategies seem to be making the most sense and the most money. Web products in automotive, home improvement and healthcare are all nearly a must nowadays. There are all kinds of classified products out there that are good. I like the ones that incorporate user generated content and also provide an e-commerce component.

We work with more than 70 stations around the country and I don’t know one that hasn’t already invested in or is about to invest in some new sales products that they can take to their local advertisers. The time is now because the local guys are getting smarter and expecting more from their Web advertising.

Here’s my thinking generally about what the revenue breakdown should be for your site. Fifty percent of your revenue should come from traditional Web sales (impression-based campaigns and sponsorships) and the other 50 percent should come from program and vertical sales. So, without investment in these kinds of Web opportunities, you’re probably selling half of what you could be.

How can a local news organization make a big pile of money online? With MinnPost, Joel Kramer offers an interesting answer: don’t even try.

MinnPost, a Minnesota-oriented news site that launched Nov. 8, is a nonprofit operation. Promising a “thoughtful approach to news,” MinnPost aims to serve the public good with quality stories and commentary readers won’t get anywhere else.

The idea is to do good journalism without facing profit pressure from Wall Street or anyone else. You won’t see celebrity slideshows, viral videos or other sure-fire “clickers” here (unless you count goofball contributor Al Sicherman’s poetry contest).

Kramer, former publisher of the Minneapolis-based Star Tribune, assembed a nest egg of $850,000 from four philanthropic families, including his own, to get the site off the ground. MinnPost also boasts a growing stable of individual donors.

MinnPost’s lineup of contributors also sets it apart from most digital news startups. Kramer is not relying on user contributions or citizen journalists. Instead, most of MinnPost’s contributors are veteran journalists, many of them reporters who recently took buyouts from the downsizing Star Tribune and St. Paul Pioneer Press. MinnPost employs several editors, but pays writers by the piece. Read More… »

Take a heap of staff stories. Stir in a cup of AP and aggregated articles. Fold in some user-generated content and material from media partners. Don’t forget that pinch of secret algorithm.

What you get is Pegasus News, a tasty blend of local news, events, commentary and ads. Mike Orren, former publisher of Texas Lawyer, created the recipe more than a year ago to serve the Dallas market. One unique ingredient is The Daily You, an algorithm-based feature that learns a user’s interests and delivers customized content.

Pegasus News was an interesting little experiment – until July. That’s when Seattle-based Fisher Communications, owner of 19 TV stations and eight radio stations in the Pacific Northwest, bought the site and announced plans to duplicate the operation in other markets.

Fisher aims to use its sales muscle to help Pegasus garner more ads and leverage its database of registered users. Nothing frightfully original there. The real cash may come from Fisher’s plan to license the Pegasus model in other markets. The idea is to market an out-of-the-box solution to media companies and others eager to grab a share of local traffic and ad buys.

Pegasus isn’t a journalistic powerhouse just yet. Some of the staff articles are a line or two long. And the lead item in the “Your Neighborhood” section might be a notice about a lost Yorkie. But with the Fisher sale, Pegasus sheds its ma-and-pa status and became a real player in the mad dash for local traffic. Read More… »

Singer Mary-Chapin Carpenter once noted that “sometimes you’re the windshield, sometimes you’re the bug.” And I suspect many local news operations have felt a bit like both in recent years.

As print circulation and advertising swoon, the newspaper industry, and news providers generally, have looked for a lifeboat online. And there have been some promising pieces of news in the online advertising market.

The Newspaper Association Of America’s Randy Bennett recently pointed out that in 2003, newspapers collected a mere $1.2 billion from their online operations; last year the figure was nearly $2.7 billion. “We’re growing at a double-digit rate,” he says. Read More… »