The news online: How community newspapers can develop a dynamic digital presence

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T E X A S C E N T E R FOR COMMUNITY JOURNALISM

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Let’s See Some award-winning sites from   around the country

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Aurora Colorado Sentinel

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Leadville Herald Democrat

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The Daily Gazette, Schenectady NY

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FOLLOWUP to last night’s INPUT

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scorestream scorestream.com Provide email address Receive html code Place code on your website

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SAVE50 Valid for 2 more days enviragallery.com

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NOVEMBER 2019 SURVEY

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COMMUNITY PAPERS Survey responses from weeklies & small dailies

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Small Non-Daily  & Small Dailies

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & Which best describes your readership? * *

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & Which best describes digital/online presence? * *

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & Which best describes your digital/online presence? * * Let’s key on these two responses

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & 1 2 3 with a proﬁtable digital presence

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Sites with NO PAY WALL * NO PAYWALL = FREE SITES, NO SUBSCRIPTION NEEDED

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites Without charging a subscription for your digital/online site, how do   you proﬁt from the site?

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites Which of the following generate appreciable revenue from your digital/ online presence? (select all the apply to your business)

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites What is your very best revenue generator from your digital/website?

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites How does most of your digital content get online?

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites thepostsearchlight.com/

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites greenvilleadvocate.com/ From Mark Rogers, Greenville (AL) Advocate

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites mtexpress.com

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Pam Morris, Idaho Mountain Express Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites mtexpress.com Dear Pam, Thanks so much for completing my survey over the weekend. It looks like we’ll have approximately 1,000 newspapers responding (we’re approaching 800 right now). I’m writing to about a dozen of the respondents, based on your survey answers - guessing you might have some information that will be helpful to the community papers gathering in Texas in two weeks to discuss digital newspapers. Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions: 1. What percentage of your newspaper’s total revenue would you estimate comes from digital sources (ad revenue, digital subscriptions, etc)?

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Dear Pam, Thanks so much for completing my survey over the weekend. It looks like we’ll have approximately 1,000 newspapers responding (we’re approaching 800 right now). I’m writing to about a dozen of the respondents, based on your survey answers - guessing you might have some information that will be helpful to the community papers gathering in Texas in two weeks to discuss digital newspapers. Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions: 1. What percentage of your newspaper’s total revenue would you estimate comes from digital sources (ad revenue, digital subscriptions, etc)? Four Percent 2. How is most of your digital advertising sold (part of a print/digital combo, digital only advertisers, other)? Digital Only 3. How is your newspaper website created (either an application like WordPress, Wix, etc - or a vendor who creates a template you use - or something else)? If you know the name of the application or vendor used, please let me know. BLOX by Town News 4. What quick advice would you have for newspapers who want to create a proﬁtable digital presence? Don't give up your print publication.

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Free News Sites thedanielislandnews.com/ Suzanne Detar, The Daniel Island News

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Sites with a PAY WALL * PAYWALL = There is some type of subscription or fee

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites harveycountynow.com

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites harveycountynow.com Joey Young, Newton Now 1. We sell a large chunk of our print subscriptions online, but I am not sure if that is ease of an online portal or because they want online access. Because you can't get the online without the print, this makes life hard. Digital advertising sales account for less than 1 percent of overall advertising revenue, but like I said we use our website to generate subscriptions which we do a healthy amount of. 2. The digital advertising is sold as a combo with print and almost exclusively as such. We have one or two clients who only want to advertise on our website and we have allowed it, but generally, don't want to make such deals. 3. We built our websites on Wordpress almost exclusively. I built Newton Now myself and my partner has helped me update and build some of our other sites. They really aren't hard in wordpress with the right theme. 4. Focus on content. Sell that content and don't worry about the rest of it. If you put good stuff out on your website and then push it through social media you will drive traffic to your website. It will be slow at first because people don't like hitting a paywall, but I urge you to stick with it despite the few trolls that will be angry about having to pay for content. Your content is your money maker and it can generate excitement in your product and drive subscriptions if you let it do it's thing. Joey Young

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites harveycountynow.com Advice from Joey Young: The best way to sell online is to sell your content. Use social media to push stories that are behind a paywall. Not all readers will be happy about hitting a paywall, but that is okay. When they want to read story after story they eventually buy a subscription. Don't sell online only subscriptions unless they are out of state subscribers. Make sure they get the weekly print edition as a digest version. This is the best way to use the web, in our opinion. Joey Young, Newton Now

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites pikecountynews.com

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites gaffneyledger.com/

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites We put a lot of extras on our website not found in the print edition. Image galleries, videos, breaking news, state and national news, etc. Cody Sossamon, Gaﬀney Ledger gaffneyledger.com/

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Non-Daily 0-20,000 Circulation Circulation Daily 0-15,000 Circulation & with a proﬁtable digital presence Paid News Sites bakercountypress.com

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The subscriptions we were losing in print the last 5 years we have slowly regained either in online or dual subscribers. It has been a way to retain mail subscribers who get annoyed with USPS and their inability to deliver papers out of the county in a timely fashion. Plus, since we adjusted the price structure on our print/online combo we are doing a lot more upselling on the print subscription for local readers. The other reason we have the website is providing an easy way to connect with potential advertisers. Whether placing a classiﬁed or looking for display advertising information, you can ﬁnd what you need on the website. Saves some time once they contact us because they have a better understanding of what they are looking for. bakercountypress.com Jessica Prevatt, Baker County Press

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Kentucky Publisher who has found a niche.

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greenupbeacon.com Greenup Beacon

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Recorded videos on Facebook Greenup Beacon 15:25 mark

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Live Sports on Facebook Greenup Beacon 18:15 mark

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Kevin discusses digital sales with Ryan Dorhn

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Getting Online Some options to get your paper online

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Do It Yourself 1. WordPress 2. Wix 3. Weebly 4. Others 5. Drupal Newspaper using WordPress: pe.com

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Heather Graham Daily Gazette The Daily Gazette Schenectady, New York

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Do It Yourself 1. WordPress 2. Wix 3. Weebly 4. Others 5. Drupal

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PDF Pages to Website Newspaper using eType: fayettecountyrecord.com

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HTML Generator Newspaper using Muse: yourcommunityshopper.com

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Content Management System Newspaper using TownNews: bgdailynews.com

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Template-Based System Newspaper using Bondware: observer-review.com

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ADVICE from newspaper publishers throughout the United States

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ADVICE I threw in the Comic Sans … just for fun. Don’t do that. Ever. I mean it. From our November survey of newspapers

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Be sure to keep your site updated. With smaller staffs and a faster market, it can be challenging. It's really helped us more from out-of-town subscribers, who   get their print editions delayed through the mail. We place obituaries on the web as soon as we receive them. Bundle print advertising with online advertising. One price advertising includes in print and online placement. Keep content fresh and ﬁx any issues with links etc. immediately or people will not come back.    We offer a $7 up-sell for our print ads to be uploaded as a   display ad to the web which seems to work well. We also   have banner ad pricing that offers exclusive space and a   second space that has rotating banner ads. ADVICE

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We put a lot of extras on our website not found in the   print edition. Image galleries, videos, breaking news, state   and national news, etc.    We work with 12 other newspapers in our region on a digital platform that provides kind of a one-stop shop for all regional news. It not only displays the headlines, news and photos of important stories from our newspaper, but also displays this information from their papers, as well. This widget allows us to give our advertisers up to 700,000 page views a month instead of the 7,000 pages views a month we would get on our own.