Main Street’s Need for Speed
The single-best deal, assertion, investment or other strategy this week.
Who: Main Street Connect
Why: For its plan to scale up to 6,000 hyperlocal sites across the country in a few short years
Advertisers typically want to reach more than a single town. If independent community news site proprietors are making good dough, why aren’t they propagating, sharing their news prowess with neighbor towns? That’s what we’ll be doing with our profits — reinvest, reinvest, reinvest, so our products and processes get more and more excellent.. — Carll Tucker, Main Street Connect CEO
It’s not very popular to say when it comes to hyperlocal publishing, where “community” and all its touchy-feely connotations reign, but scale does seem to matter. Patch.com hasn’t made a lot of friends pursuing this aim, of course, and Tucker doesn’t seem too concerned about rankling the indie hyperlocals, either (see our interview with him, the comments that ensued, and his response).
Main Street may not be backed by a major media company, like Patch is, but it plans on moving just as fast. This past week, it rolled out 32 more hyperlocal sites, bringing the total to 51. It will take some massive hiring and resources to hit Tucker’s goal, but it’s a worthy aim—as long as it is done without careering off-course by all that speed.
Do you think Main Street Connect is right to scale so fast? Post your view in the comments.