OurTown Update!

Listeners of the World,

It’s OurTown “news time” again! We are making more changes to the site that will allow OurTown to continue to enhance and add new features while also improving our overall local editor support. These changes are not as exciting or flashy as our usual changes / enhances / or new features, but they are just as important when you think of OurTown.com as a whole.

We are going to an 80/20 percent split on all local ads entered into the ad-bot system starting September 1^st, 2011. This change will not affect any current ads that were added under the 100/0 split era, and this change will also not cause any delays to the new ads being shown on the sites. The new ad-bot system will still have the regular pages you love and know with the addition of a few new steps that will allow the split to take place. These new steps are straight forward and easy, plus we will be standing by to answer any questions, issues, or comments!

Now along with this change is a new licensing change which will not affect current local editors who are grandfathered in with their sites. This change is due to OurTown coming out of Beta and starting to live up to its original plan (thanks in part to all of our current local editors which is why they are grandfathered in). Starting on September 1^st, 2011 we will begin charging a monthly fee to all new local editors who will be given a free 90 day license to get their site up and running. After the 90 days the local editors will be asked to choose from one of our licensing packages ranging from a Free limited license to either a $29.95 or $49.95 monthly package. Now along with this we will be offering current local editors a 10% referral payout for any new local editors you refer who stay on after their first 90 days. This means if you refer someone and then after their 90s days they pick the $49.95 package you get 10% of that for each month that they continue their licensing agreement!

These changes are very important and will allow OurTown to continue to grow, improve and to compete with other local news sites. This will also enhance your ability to sell more ads at higher prices, because along with these changes are new features, enhanced support, and better metrics.

Now I know that there will be questions, concerns, and comments and we here at OurTown Media are happy to answer and address all of them. Please either email Chris Burnett – Cburnett@OurTown.com, our support line – Support@OurTown.com, or call 513-381-0777.

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

New Features

Listeners of the World,

Technology is always evolving, and with this comes new ideas, features, tools, apps, and more that can be integrated into your favorite sites. Here at OurTown Media we believe that because of this evolution we must always be looking towards the future with constant updates, and adding new tools / features to our site. Today we are rolling out two brand new features:

OurTown Video - We have always had the capability to display YouTube videos on OurTown via our "YouTube" island, by coping a certain part of the video URL. Now we have enhance this feature to now being able to copy any video URL from any of the top online video sites (YouTube, Hulu, Dailymotion, etc.) and pasting it into our video section. We have also enhanced the section so that you are able to enter in a title, description, keywords, and have the ability to see a preview before you place it on the page. This allows our local editors to keep a library of videos on their sites, without worry of losing the videos once they delete the specific island (video widget).

As well as the addition of the new video section is the addition of Video Pages to each of the local OurTown sites. Each individual site will now have a main video page that users can access to browse through all the videos that are on that site! This will allow for a much better video experience on OurTown! We will also be rolling out a Main Video Page for the entire OurTown site which will be able to be access from our Homepage and show all the videos across the entire site!

New OurTown Page Layouts - We have also rolled out new layouts for our local editors to be able to explore different set ups and curating options. This will allow for more visual stimulating and pleasing layouts that will give a much better reading experience to our users. We previously had 9 layouts and have now added 5 more. We will continue to improve and enhance our layouts over time and will eventually get to the point where if you can think it up, you can lay your page out like it!

We are always updating and adding features to the site and still have many more features coming in the near future. If there is a feature that you would to see on the site, let us know by contacting our team at Support@OurTown.com.

Your OurTown Superhero,

Chris

OUR TOWN GOES TO THE UK

Our Town Media has announced the creation of its first Ourtown.com site outside of the United States. The www.ourtown.com/seafordeastsussex/ site serves a population of approximately 23,000 residents in the town located on the southern coast of England. Our Town Local Editor, Dennis Lewendon, a Seaford resident, will be bringing local news of Seaford Town to its residents and visitors.

"Whether in the U.S. or elsewhere around the world, people are essentially the same. They all want to know what is going on in their town, or village. OurTown will fill that gap left by other news sources as we expand our reach across the United States and through Europe during 2012," said Carol Meinhardt, OurTown COO.