Allan Siegert's Blog (6)

Advertisers Waking Up to Hyperlocal

We originally started the discussion about finding a Hyperlocal Business model in the midst of great pessimism. The real problem was that advertisers weren't convinced that such sites were worth their money.

That's changing. At least for one of the original hyperlocal sites. We chatted with a publisher last week who told us that he's going to have to remake his site because he cannot provide enough banner advertising space to meet the demand. He's also started paying a repor

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Added by Allan Siegert on April 1, 2010 at 8:30pm — No Comments

Time for journalists to start selling (we didn't say it - listen to On The Media this week...)

The piece is called "Hard Sell" and it's at onthemedia.org. Host Bob Garfield interviews professor Jeff Jarvis. Continue

Added by Allan Siegert on January 17, 2010 at 3:49pm — 2 Comments

The Scarecrow

We were kind of hoping that Michael Connelly's main character in his novel The Scarecrow would start a hyperlocal site after being laid off from his newspaper job. Sadly, that doesn't happen. Jack McEvoy spends his last two weeks at the paper solving murders (I listened to the Audible version which is great by the way) and planning to earn his living writing novels. Ironically, some of the action takes place in a colo data center that perhaps hosts some hyperlocal sites - but that aspect is not… Continue

Added by Allan Siegert on June 21, 2009 at 6:46pm — No Comments

What worries Emily about J-School ...

Emily Sussman responded to our previous post (journalists thinking about revenue), "It's a little scary to me that the university where I'm getting my master's would have allowed me to graduate with a mere "magazine writing" concentration." She raises an interesting point about the role of J-schools during the decline of newspapers and magazines. As long as there are students willing to pay, J-schools will be increasing the supply of journalists. In this market, there could be more "classically"… Continue

Added by Allan Siegert on January 27, 2009 at 5:00am — 8 Comments

Reporters (journalism students) can no longer be above thinking about revenue. Your existence is at risk.

The RJI Talkfest with journalists confronting business reality was great. In years past, students entered J-School with the assumption that advertising dollars would support their reporting efforts (and objected to the one required advertising course). That model is broken. Journalists (like the dailies and weeklies) are in big trouble. They can work in all the new vehicles but ... Until advertisers believe their dollars are well spent on things like web based, hyperlocal journalism sites o… Continue

Added by Allan Siegert on January 22, 2009 at 4:39am — 4 Comments

Business Model for Hyperlocal Journalism

We love what we see here. What we urgently need help with is a profitable business model for online hyperlocal media. We have seen lots of creative efforts based on software to collect news. Clever blogs and mapping software are nice. But the random, non-professional, voluntary nature of these efforts lack a serious, journalistic edge. As yet, we haven't found a profitable business model to support online, professional, hyperlocal journalism. Continue

Added by Allan Siegert on January 20, 2009 at 3:00pm — 5 Comments