Video News ?!?

Reading and being able to read is one of the most important skills in life, yet many people will do anything not to read!  More and more people will view a video over reading an article......so why don't we give the people want they want?  Well we have to an extent.......

Pinterest, YouTube,  Flickr, and so on are becoming more and more popular with some of the highest ratings when it comes to "minutes spent on site per user"!  Almost every major news site on the web has it's own video section and more and more video sites pop up everyday. Online video, and mobile video (phone and tablet) are way up and it seems like they are posed to continue up on this trend.  Google is now indexing more video than text, and YouTube has become the second biggest search engine......so why has nobody created a completely visual news site yet?

I understand the stigma of someone saying they would rather watch than read, but this is online news......you want the information fast and quick!  People today don't have time to sit around and read article after article of news, but they do have time to watch short clips that gives them breaking news, from there they can dig further into the stories that interest them.  I am not saying that we should get rid of articles and stories all together, but I think online publishers should start to focus more and more on visual media (images and video).

I know that online video is still new to people, but nothing is more popular than online video (well besides from games).  This is the future of online news.....and I would rather see this sooner than later!

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

Who can make Hyper-Local News work?

I have looked at many hyper-local news networks over the past few years and many of them had some of the same qualities and features.....but none of them really succeeded in their plan to take over the online hyper-local news space.  A lot of them either went out of business, re-vamped their idea, or sold the site to another hyper-local network.  There are some like Patch.com which are still operating, but have such a high operational cost that they lose millions each month!  So far nobody has the right answer, and hopefully that changes in 2012.

If the answer isn't found in 2012 it won't be for a lack of trying!  So many people are trying to build the right network and there are so many existing companies re-vamping their business model that I predict an online local news overload in 2012.  But the question still remands on what is the right formula on creating a huge hyper-local news network that is profitably.   I won't clam to know the formula, but I can tell you a few problems or issues that will need to be answered to get it done:

1) Local Ad Revenue

Many hyper-local sites are basing most of their revenue off of the sales of local advertisements and a lot of them are expecting way too much money and going about it all wrong!  The first mistake I see on most of these sites is when they divide up the areas, they do not take into account what a normal sales area would cover.  They have the areas split up into "hyper-local" news areas and then when they try to obtain local advertisements they usually cover too small of an area and do not reach enough people to satisfy the local business owner.

Another huge mistake is they predict too much money out of the sale of local advertisements.  They don't take into account that when selling on such a local level that the ad prices go way down compared to a regional ad.  So they do not set up the right budget per town or area within the network causing them to lose money even though they might be making good progress. 

Some how the local ad revenue model has to be figured out and fast or none of these sites will be turning a profit anytime soon.

2) The Hyper-Local Network Staff

This is a huge issue with many of the hyper-local new sites and networks....who runs the sites, how do we pay them, and how do we find them!  It is really important to get the right people writing the stories and covering the local events, but how to you find them?  Also, once you have found the right type of people what is your model for paying them (keeping in mind how much you can have as overhead cost compared to what you hope to make out of each site)?  These are really important questions because you can keep your cost down, but you might not find the right people.  But then if you find the right people and they cost too much your site loses money no matter how good the content.

Then comes the question of once you have your writers, local editors, site editors, etc. who will sell the local advertising or national advertising?  Some have tried to have the local editor sell the advertising or even  be in charge of getting leads and neither have worked out.  Some have tried have a sales team based in other cites to call into the local communities to obtain advertising and they hasn't worked either.

Once you figure out what the correct staff is and the correct cost of the staff in comparison to the income of a site you will finally have the winning combination.


I think that once those two main issues are truly solved then someone is going to have a real shot at creating a hyper-local news network that will work and be profitability.  Until this happens you will see many hyper local news sites appear and disappear overtime along with many underwhelming sites.  I know OurTown is working in a new "formula" this year to try and figure out these issues, but it is going to be interesting to see who wins this race!

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris 

Year End - OurTown.com

We only have a few more days until the new year and I wanted to wrap up this year with a look back at OurTown over the course of 2011 and our focus on the future!

This year was a rapid year of change for OurTown.com!  We have added many features, many local editors, expanded our reach (to the UK!), had many site changes and so on.  I just want to highlight the major changes, additions, and departures.

New Features:

Over the course of the year we added and changed many features to keep our local editors with the best possible features to help them produce great content.  Below is a short highlight list of some of these changes:

- New "upload" feature which allows our local editors to upload PDF's, PowerPoint's, and any other type of document that would not be considered a news article.

- New "Comment Counter" to help show our local editors and viewers which stories were popular and held a great conversation.

- New "Manage Islands" feature that allowed our local editors to curate their pages faster and easier.

- We changed our video feature from a "YouTube Insert" option to a "in-house" build full video feature that allows our local editors (and viewers who submit video) to upload many different types of video and to properly SEO tag every individual video.

- New "Social Media Bar" which allows our users and local editors to connect their stories and content to many different social media sites including - Facebook / Twitter / and Google+.

- Also, we added a new "Language Converter" which allowed our users to select from many different languages across the world to view our site with!

Site Changes:

Also, during the course of this year we made some major changes to the structure of OurTown and how it operated.  Below is a short highlight list of these changes:

- OurTown expanded its reach and area listings to the United Kingdom!  We have sites now in Seaford, Newhaven, Peacehaven, and Lewes within East Sussex. We plan on continuing to put our main focus on the expansion of sites within the United States, but will also concentrate on building our presence in the United Kingdom!

- OurTown also went back to its business plan of an 80/20 split of the local ads between the local editors and OurTown Media.  We had talked about many different plans that would help build a true revenue stream (to help sustain a hyper local network, unlike Patch.com), and we felt that this split would be the easiest and most fair to everyone involved.

- Also, at the end of 2010 we were building a completely new site for OurTown, which took a lot more time than expected and ran into a lot of "road blocks".  We still plan on putting out a new design in the new year and also to continuous work on feature and site changes that will benefit OurTown, the local editors, and the viewers!


People Changes:

I also just wanted to briefly touch on the fact that we have added many new local editors, but also had some departures do to many reasons.  Our goal during 2011 was to figure out the true definition of the person who can run their own OurTown site.  We focused on keeping our good local editors who built and maintained their sites within our guidelines and who also shared the same goals.  As for the rest we slowly deactivated their sites and returned to recruitment to add local editors who would help the site! 

The Future:

OurTown.com has come a long way since we put the site live at the end of 2007 and we have learned many things throughout our journey.  This coming year will be no different!  We have much to do and to learn and plan on introducing new changes to the site within the first couple of months in 2012.  Are only hope is that you join us through our adventure in 2012 and we believe that it is going to be a great year!

We hope everyone had a good Holiday and hope that everyone has a great New Year!

Thank you!


From Everyone at OurTown.com !