LMC Chief: Local News Pessimists Are Missing the Big Innovations
Is the outlook for local digital news as gloomy as a spate of recent reports indicates? Or are the forecasters looking in the rear-view mirror? We spoke recently with Rusty Coats, executive director of the digitally focused Local Media Consortium, about why the prognosis for local media might not be as bad is it seems.
Local Papers’ Love-Hate Relationship With Facebook Is Proving a Heartbreaker
What if local newspapers, instead of chasing after ever-bigger traffic numbers via platforms like Facebook, cultivated fewer but more receptive users — the kind that would be more attentive to advertising messages, especially if the messages had less blare and more flair. Could going deeper on community coverage result in higher CPMs?
Top 5 Exits in Local Tech of 2015
The local technology space saw plenty of M&A activity in 2015 and remains poised for another busy year in 2016. Rampant expansion of certain areas such as on-demand services and delivery apps makes further consolidation likely. The startup scene saw its share of healthy — if not billion-dollar — exits as well. Here’s a recap of the five of the biggest exits in the local tech industry in 2015.
Local News Media on Ad Blockers: ‘We’re Not Hemorrhaging Revenue’
Ad blocking on mobile has been in the spotlight since Apple launched its iOS 9 operating system in September. “The loss from ad blockers appears to be more of an opportunity loss for publishers than an actual revenue loss,” said Thomas Sly, E. W. Scripps Co. vp of digital revenue and chair of the Local Media Consortium committee established to respond to the ad-blocking threat.
Local Papers Unload on Viewability Bad Actors and ‘Garbage Inventory’
Ever since a 2014 Google study documented that 52 percent of ad impressions actually were not seen by users, viewability has been a front-burner issue for marketers and publishers alike. The digital platforms of local newspapers serve up billions of ad impressions monthly, putting these publishers right in the middle of the issue. To find out how they’re responding, Street Fight spoke with Tobias Bennett, the Local Media Consortium’s advertising expert.
The Struggle to Save Local News Is Not Doomed
The current state of local news in the technology-driven information age continues to be a hotly debated topic in industry circles. There’s more consensus around the grim prospects for local print media, and more debate about the outlook for independent local news sites. Understanding where the future lies for local news requires a thorough parsing of both positions.
Street Fight Daily: Google Tracks Calls Online, Yahoo Partners With Media Consortium
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Google Lets Advertisers Track Phone Calls Generated From Websites (MarketingLand)… Local Media Consortium Partners With Yahoo (NetNewsCheck)… As Google Builds Out Own Content, Some Advertisers Feel Pushed Aside
(Wall Street Journal)…
Street Fight: Uber Raises $1.2B, Apple Acquires Local Search Engine
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Uber Gets an Uber-Valuation (Wall Street Journal)… Apple Acquires Spotsetter, A Social Search Engine For Places (TechCrunch)… Jim Brady Plans News Org in Philly Called Brother.ly (Poynter)…
Can Renewed Coordination Prevent a Rollup in Local Media?
Last week Google made news when the search giant struck a deal with the Local Media Consortium to power a private advertising exchange . Yesterday, Christian Hendricks, the Consortium’s chairman and a McClatchy executive, pitched the plan to a room of media executives, and made the case why the new consortium could succeed where it failed nearly a decade ago…
Street Fight Daily: Google Courts Local Media, Billionaire Prince May Back Square
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology.… Google Helping Local Publishers Surf The Programmatic Wave
(Forbes)… Will this Billionaire Saudi Arabian Prince Back Jack Dorsey’s Square (Fox Business)… GoDaddy Will Take On Shopify With A Simpler E-Commerce Storefront Arriving This Spring (TechCrunch)…
Street Fight Daily: Andreessen Bearish on Local News, Google Bets on Location-based Gaming
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology.… Marc Andreessen: The ‘Problem with Local News is Most People Don’t Care’ (Poynter)… Google: Location-based Gaming as Popular as Virtual Reality in 10 Years (Polygon)… Will Facebook Build a Stand-Alone Local Search App? (Screenwerk)…
Non-Profit Indies, One-Time Successors to Local Media, Face Funding Woes
You think traditional broadcast media like TV and radio are struggling with depleted revenue models as audiences move to online screens? Consider those who were already depleted: Community broadcasters on cable access TV and local radio. These folks face even greater challenges with sparse audiences, a limited to non-existent revenue model, and funding from foundations drying up faster than fresh rain in the Mojave Desert.
BxB Recap: Is This the Future of Local News?
The passion with the group at Block by Block isn’t just about great journalism — it’s about turning online journalism into a business; it’s about leveraging existing tools and creating new ones; and most importantly it’s about working to collaboratively across these businesses to make an impact…
Hyperlocal 1.0 Heavy Bob Smith: ‘The Way It Was’
It’s difficult to pinpoint when online hyperlocal came into being. The idea was there with BBSs (electronic bulletin board services) since the early 1980s or even earlier, when local dial-up services allowed callers to access files, games, chat and so on. Long distance charges caused many to dial in to local boards. And thus local communities developed, with some system operators focusing on delivering local information and news. A few local newspapers tried getting into the game with bulletin boards of their own, or via Usenet Newsgroups…
Read the first in a series of interviews with leaders of what we’re calling Hyperlocal 1.0, as well as a bit of a response from a Hyperlocal 2.0 chief.
Why Top Newspaper Groups Are Pitching New ‘Solutions’ to the Ad Market (Part 2)
Christian Hendricks, the longtime leader of McClatchy’s digital operations who was recently promoted to VP of Products, Marketing and Promotion, talks about at NMS from the perspective of one of its four founding newspaper groups, and discusses its relationship to the 3-year-old Local Media Consortium.
Local Publishers: Take Back Control of Your Brand
The announcement of the Digital News Initiative partnership with Google is yet another step backwards for publishers. If they would just consider how they operated their own platforms before the 1990’s they will realize that Google, Facebook and other current tech platforms owe them nothing.