northwestern university community media innovation project: cookbook

8/8/2019 Northwestern University Community Media Innovation Project: Cookbook

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1community media innovation project


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2 local fourth

When we asked Margaret Freivogel,editor of the St. Louis Beacon, a non-pro t,local news website in St. Louis, Mo., whatthe sites business model was, her responsewas markedly similar to what our class hadbecome used to hearing from hyperlocalnews entrepreneurs.

The revenue structure that we haveright now, she said, is not the revenuestructure that we aspire to have.

In other words, despite the sites suc-cess raising money from foundations andlarge donors with a budget of around $1million last year, the Beacon is one of thebest-funded locally focused websites in the

nation the staff was still searching for abusiness model that would make the site -nancially sustainable.

Its a problem for nearly every hy-perlocal news website. At the Block ByBlock Community News Summit in Chi-cago in September, it was clear that few hy-perlocal news entrepreneurs had gured outhow to drive revenue to their operation. Toour surprise, some of these site operators passionate about serving their communitieswith good journalism had taken few seri-ous steps toward making money at all.

But for those looking to build a pro t-able business out of a passion to cover localnews, here is a good place to start.

The Fall 2010 Community Media In-novation Project (also known as the Local Fourth team) brought together 15 graduatestudents from Northwestern UniversitysMedill School of Journalism to study the

challenges of publishing in the hyperlocalspace. We found ways to adapt traditionalmedia business models in the hyperlocalmarket while also developing other solu-tions that may help create revenue down theroad.

But most important, we developeda step-by-step process that can be used tocreate a business out of a hyperlocal newswebsite. In the end, it will be this pro-

cess, outlined here in this cookbook, tmoves a hyperlocal publisher toward nacial sustainability.

Based on our research and intervienot many hyperlocal start-ups are awarethe different approaches for generating reenue in a local market. In other wordsnot so much the what (selling ads, hing events, lobbying for donations, etas it is the how (what steps do I netake to learn which ways will be beste t my business?). Our experience at BlBy Block told us that hyperlocal publishhave been having some success creatirevenue, but its of secondary importance

many of them. Some have set up theiras not-for-pro t enterprises, relying on dnations and foundation grants; others hachosen to join ad networks or make limad-sales efforts of their own.

Still, it was clear that participants inBlock by Block event wanted to know mabout business strategies in the hyperlocspace. In a pre-conference survey, particpants indicated sustainability/revenue generation as the topic they most lookedward to addressing at the conference.

We de nitely do not want to breliant on foundations by the third yearexistence], urged Mark Katches, editoridirector of California Watch , a nonprocreated by the Center for Investigativeporting. Even though they love what wdoing, we dont expect them to supportwith the same level of commitment. Thwant to see us diversify [our revenues],

thats what were trying to do.In order to help guide the hypenews entrepreneur through this processevaluating a path to nancial sustainabity, weve created this cookbook, withparticular focus on local advertising saleSo start by following these steps, acceptwhatever challenges are thrown your waand adapting accordingly.

Introduction


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The process adopted by the Local Fourth Business/Revenueteam can be described in three major steps, best described by thefollowing illustration:

Learning the process: a How to guide

It all starts with the audience. Audi-ence is not only the key to getting yourgreat content recognized and appreciatedthroughout the community that you operatein, but its also the key component to rev-enue generation in the long term. Creatingdemand for your media product will attractadvertisers while also enabling supple-mental revenue approaches, such as seekingdonations and sponsorships, hosting events,holding classes, etc. Audience is the mostimportant facet of this business, and with-out much of it, making money is going to

become an even more challenging proposi-tion than you originally imagined.

This statement may sound like a duhpoint to any journalist or publisher, butagain, its the how of creating that audi-ence that the Local Fourth team discoveredhyperlocal publishers need guidance on.For each step in the process, we will pro-vide concrete examples of how we carriedout the tasks in the Evanston, Ill. market our case study to test our research andmethods.

Step One:

Getting to know your audience...really getting to

know them.


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4 local fourth

Part A: Ask everything.

The best way to start is by assumingyou know next to nothing about your audi-ence. For local journalists who have beenworking in the space for some time, it mightbe dif cult to abandon theidea that youunderstand what your users need, but itsimportant since audience research can gen-erate unique insights you might have other-wise missed.

The Local Fourth team came up with a

list of questions to ask Evanston residents.This was a long list of approximately 50-60 total questions, with none thrown outor turned down. Some seemed obvious(What do you like about your communi-ty?); others were more complicated (Howwould you describe Evanston in just threewords?). Then, the entire Local Fourthteam hit the streets to see how the questionstested with audience members.

The point of this step? To see whichquestions generated the most insightful re-sponses and which were downright confus-ing. Maybe a question seemed like a goodidea during brainstorming but made the in-terviewee uncomfortable when tested. Thisinitial step helped us gure out what to askand what not to ask, which proved to be im-portant for the next step of research.

Part B: Revise the question set.

This step was similar to the rst roundof audience research but had a more focusedapproach. The Local Fourth audience teamlooked at how the initial set of questionstested and narrowed the list to the questionswe felt were the best of the bunch. Thesebecame the questions all audience membersasked their interviewees. Why? To give the

process more structure and allow us to c

pare results.Next came the second round of qtioning; we did short, man-on-the-street iterviews in different parts of Evanston,ing our revised set of questions. If pewere particularly helpful and/or willing, wasked them for their contact informatiand added them to our list of contacts.

Part C: Go online.

We knew we wanted to conductdepth interviews with Evanston residento get a better feel of what they wanttheir local news coverage. But how tothem interested in our project without wing our time cold calling, or worse, offeing the people we wanted to target? Ouswer: An online survey.

TheLocal Fourth Audience team created a brief online survey and linkedthrough a marketed Facebook advertisment. We posted it on websites like Twand Facebook to drive traf c to the survWe suggest that you do the same in youdience research. We purposely designed tsurvey questions so they werent too psonal but still gave us useful informatiBill Smith, head of local website EvanstNow, also put up the link on EvanstonNowebsite. A week after our survey launchthe Evanston Community Foundation als

agreed to put the link in an email blast,ing another wave of traf c to our surveIn all, approximately 135 Evanst

residents responded to our online survThough by no means a random samplethe community, the online survey was sa signi cant contributor to our audienresearch process and greatly propelled ofourth step of research.

Step One:

Getting to know your audience...really getting to know them.


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The following is the list of questions we in-cluded in our online survey:

1. How long have you lived in Evanston?

a. less than a yearb. 1-5 yearsc. 6-10 yearsd. 11-20 yearse. 21 years or more

2. What is the main reason you chose to live inEvanston?

a. Born and/or raised hereb. Relocated for a jobc. Wanted a change from Chicagod. Good place to raise a familye. School systemf. Other (please specify)

3. As an Evanston resident, what concerns youmost? (open-ended question)

4. What would you change about Evanston, ifanything? (open-ended question)

5. Where do you get Evanston-related news andinformation? (open-ended question)

6. Agea. Under 18b. 18-24c. 25-29d. 30-34e. 35-39f. 40-44g. 45-49h. 50-54i. 55-59j. 60 and over

7. Gender ( ll-in)8. May we contact you if we have any follow-

up questions? Please enter your name andcontact info. ( ll-in)

Part D: Get personal.

Perhaps the most interesting researchcomponent was our in-depth interviewswith Evanston residents. We conductedthem over the course of about one week.They were done over the phone or in per-son and took approximately 30-50 minuteseach. These conversations, about 40 ofthem in all, provided us with very thorough

information regarding Evanston residentsconcerns and media use.

Some of the things we wanted toknow: Are they passionate about local news

coverage? Are they simply news grazers?What do they wish they saw more/less ofin their local news coverage? Maybe theydont care one bit about Evanston news.Whatever the answer, we wanted to know.

Most journalists know how to con-duct a good interview, but these discussionswere somewhat different. When writinga news article, journalists typically knowwhat information theyre looking for whenthey call a source. They know how to bestdrive the conversation to get the answerthey need. In this case, everything the in-terviewee said was important. Instead of jumping right to the point, these interviewsstarted with general questions and workeddown to the insightful details.

We also made sure interviewees knewtheir input was for a research project. Theyknew their feedback wasnt going to bepublished in the traditional sense, allow-

ing for a more candid conversation abouttheir news habits. Below lists the questionswe asked in our in-depth interviews:

Life in Evanston How long have you lived in Evanston? Why did you choose to live in Evanston? What part of Evanston do you live in? What do

you think about your neighborhood? What misconceptions do people have about

Evanston? What 3 words best describe Evanston?

What do you do for living? How do you spend your free time? What organizations or groups do you belong to? What concerns you the most about Evanston? /

What would you change, if you could? What places in Evanston are most important to

you? Tell me about your household (spouse, partner,

kids, any other relatives living with you).


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6 local fourth

Are your kids in school? Do they go to schoolin Evanston? Public or private? Why did yougo that route? What do you think about theirschool?

Buying Stuff Where do you spend most of your money in

Evanston? What Evanston businesses are important to you? What services/information do you pay for on-

line? (ex. subscriptions to websites, music, vid-eos, Net ix, etc.)

Media and Information Do you read any Evanston newspapers? How

often? What do you think about them? Or whatwould it take to make you read one?

Do you read any online Evanston news web-sites? How often? What do you think aboutthem? Or what would it take to make you readone?

Do you read the newspaper? Which papers?How often? Where (online, print, etc.)?

Do you read magazines? Which? How often(online, print, etc.)?

Do you watch TV? Which shows? How often? Do you browse the Web? Which sites? How of-

ten? Where? Do you access information on your mobile

phone? What type of information? How often?

Where?

Where do you go Where do you go when youre looking for a job

(e.g., print, websites, etc.)? Where do you gowhen youre looking for upcoming local events(e.g., print, websites, etc.)?

Where do you go when youre looking for ahouse/real estate (e.g., print, websites, etc.)?

Where do you go for money saving tips, cou-pons and/or other deals, etc?

Where do you go to nd out information aboutdoctors, dentists, childcare, mechanics, and/or

other goods and services?

Part E. Analyze it.

Once we gathered all of the informa-tion from interviews and survey results,we had to analyze the data. We identi edgeneral patterns and trends and looked forways we could intervene and make the local

news process easier and more bene cialEvanston residents.

Part F: Meet the personas.

The nal step in the process wasdevelopment of personas. The Local FourthAudience team started this by segmentinour potential audience pool into archtypes. Print publications (especially maazines) typically choose one ideal readpersona to make the development phaeasier. Everything the publication includein its pages is designed to target thatperson. If other people pick up the publtion and read it, thats just gravy. Thisof targeting a persona also helps differenate a publication from the ever-growingof niche periodicals in the market. Wthis in mind, the Audience team develoa pool of nine personas based on ourous audience research.

Paul and Patty Powers : Positive thinkerwho want their community covered inpositive way.

Samantha Price : The supermom whstays on top of all school-related issues

Carly Walters : News grazer who utilizsocial media to get information.

Dave Alexander : Minimal interest in toics unrelated to his daily life.

Stan Evans : News junkie who is inested in many topics throughout the comunity.

Charlie Johnson : Passive consumeneeds the news to get to him through p

or email blasts. Hannah Lewis : Cares about educatio

and health of local businesses.

The persona pool was helpful tobusiness/revenue team. We were ablegather information about what peopleEvanston want and where they spend thtime and money.

Step One


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But my website is short-staffed. What canwe do to better understand our audience?

Of course, a class of 15 graduate stu-

dents is more easily capable of conductingthis type of audience research; a single hy-perlocal journalist might not have the man-power necessary to conduct research of thisscale. Still, in many markets, its possible to

nd a college class focusing on market re-search or business that could help with au-dience research. For whoever conducts theresearch, weve come up with a list of thekey takeaway points shortcuts, if you will.The goal in all of this is to better understandyour audience. Having even the smallestinsight will only make your website better.

If youre short on time and personnel,we suggest skipping the man-on-the-streetinterviews (Parts 1 and 2) and going straightto the online survey. But, since you werentable to test your questions and weed throughthe not-so-great ones, really think hardabout what you want to know about youraudience members. Test the questions on

coworkers or friends to see if any of themcome off as awkward or make the subjectfeel uncomfortable.

For our research, we purchased a tar-geted Facebook advertisement. You canalso utilize social media tools like Twitter(and, of course, your publications website)to direct traf c to your survey. Make sure

people know the survey is for research pur-poses only they are more likely to partici-pate if they know their opinions wont be

published.See if there are any leadership organi-zations in your community who would bewilling to include the survey link in one oftheir scheduled email blasts. Present it as acivic duty you want to do a better job ofcovering the community to create a betternews experience for residents.

Our Facebook ad targeted users near Evanston.

The $193.24 we spent on our ad yielded 45 completed surveys, for a cost of about $4.30 per survey.


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8 local fourth

Hannah is an older African-American woman in her 60s. She is a liberal, holistic societal and issue-based thinker. When thinking about a topic or issue, Hannah doesnt just considerthe past 5 or 10 years; she goes all the way back to the very start of the issue and considersdecades worth of news.

Shes an active word-of-mouth communicator. Shes even friends with school board members,which helps her stay up-to-date with new information. Hannah gets her word-of-mouth newsin a direct way from the source itself.

In building a local website or any media product we believe the goanot be to please the entire community, but to select speci c audiences and aspeci c needs. As Ted Levitt, the Harvard Business School professor, oncePeople dont want a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter-inch hole. Your joessence, is to help themget a job done whether its providing information, givithem a space to sell their used car, etc.

After the survey responses come in,select some people to follow up with. Callor email them and ask if they could giveyou some more insight into their news hab-its, concerns, etc. Tell them any informationthey offer will help you do a better job re-porting the happenings in their community.

Once those two steps are completed,look over your data and identify the mostimportant trends. Are residents listingschool-related issues as the thing thatconcerns them most about their commu-nity? You might consider putting more ef-

fort into covering that particular beat. Apeople generally dismayed by the negatity theyre seeing in the news? Maybesome extra focus on pro le pieces that hlight do-gooders in the community.

In the end, its up to hyperlocallishers to decide how they use their aence research data and to what extentchange their practices to better incorporaresidents needs and wants. The mostportant thing is to at least have anunder-standing of what they need and want.

Step Two:Build a product - or adapt your existing

one - catered to your audience.

As an example, in Evanston, the Local Fourth team identi ed and decided to focus

on a few concerns expressed by Hannah, an example of the many different personas wecreated during our audience research:

Step One
http://hbr.org/product/marketing-malpractice-the-cause-and-the-cure/an/R0512D-PDF-ENGhttp://hbr.org/product/marketing-malpractice-the-cause-and-the-cure/an/R0512D-PDF-ENGhttp://hbr.org/product/marketing-malpractice-the-cause-and-the-cure/an/R0512D-PDF-ENG


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While some hyperlocal sites try to serve the community as a whole, we think it is

more bene cial to identify a speci c persona and build the content around the needs of thispersona. This way, news sites, which are already understaffed, can focus on a few topicsrather than many, allowing for more in-depth, audience-centered pieces. For instance, ahyperlocal site that caters to the Hannah persona may want to put heavy emphasis on theissues of education and local business development, written in a manner that includes thehistorical context.

Successful parents, whose children areachieving, dont want to get rid of the honors

classes because they dont want low perform-ing children of color in their classes. Theythink their children wont get what they need

that if youre serving the children of color, youre not serving [the white] kids.

Hannah

Step Three:Identify and

connect businessesrelevant to the

consumptionhabits of your

persona(s)

Hannah uses the web primarily as a reference. She likes it because she can read everything there is to know on issues that pique her interest.

Topics Hannah cares about: Evanston schools particularly, the achievement

gap between white and African-American students; school board meetings; Evanstons inability to successfully retain local businesses.

Functionality: Needs the full timeline for each social issue she is researching,dating back decades or more if necessary to understand the complete context.(For example: Evanston school integration in 1969; busing kids into schools.)

Business: Goes to Old Orchard mall for general shopping, but she would like toshop more locally she doesnt think Evanston does enough to retain local busi-nesses.

If your product successfully attracts your target audiences, the consumption

its of these users will determine a focused approach to selling advertisementsconsumption habits basically indicate where each persona spends his/her timemoney when out and about in the community that you cover. The idea is toproach the relevant businesses and connect them with high-potential customerspractice, when you can promise the businesses to deliver relevant customers,sales pitch will become more effective.


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10 local fourth

We started our research by compiling a database of the advertisers in the mboth in local print and online publications. We looked through print and online ptions serving the Evanston market and identi ed individual businesses and businessegories currently buying ads. After each member of the Local Fourth Business/Revenue

team identi ed and classi ed the advertisers into a shared document, we identi edmost frequent categories of advertisers:

Step Three

4. Community organizations5. Restaurants/cafs6. Professional services

After identifying the top advertising categories, we set out to determine the contion tendencies of the Evanston personas. We made the following observations:

1. Home furnishing/retail2. Retail3. Banking

As the responses indicate, the pres-ence of national brand retail stores in thehyperlocal setting presented challenges.While the Local Fourth team could developa hyperlocal product to attract the personas,

advertisements for local retail stores werelikely to be ineffective, as the personasclearly preferred national brands. On theother hand, selling advertisements to thechain brands can be dif cult as they are al-ready well-established and see no value inadvertising on a hyperlocal venue. Also, theadvertising decision-makers for these na-tional chains are not based in local markets,

and typically do not buy ads in mediaucts serving only one community.

Fortunately, there seemed to be ademand for local restaurants, despite tpresence of many chain brand restaura

in Evanston. Some local restaurants thwithstood the test of time came to becepted as a part of the community idenIn addition, there was an expectationhigher quality associated with the local rtaurants, as many chain brands are fast-forestaurants. Overall, our Evanston personashowed a sustainable demand for the lorestaurants, and the Business/Revenue tea

Local restaurants were frequently mentioned even by those who

said they did not otherwise shop at Evanston businesses. Theserestaurants are likely seen as a cultural hub for the Evanston com-munity.

Retail stores were also mentioned, but responses were mixed,with chain stores appearing about as frequently as local ones.Among different types of retail stores, however, local grocerystores seemed to fare better even among respondents who other-wise shopped at chain grocery stores.

Many of those interviewed did not consider themselves activeshoppers, and most of the retail stores mentioned sold basicthings, like groceries, miscellaneous household items, etc.

Evanston residents tend to patronize chain and online stores; thisseems to be a matter of convenience many interviewees are notinterested in going from store to store, and prefer to go to recog-nizable chain brands.


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concluded that there are feasible and imme-diate opportunities for effective advertisingin this category.

We should also mention that res-

taurants are often low-margin businesseswhose owners are wary of committing to along-term advertising investment. It is com-monly thought that restaurants are prone tofailure. According to a 2005 study by Cor-nell University, nearly 30 percent of inde-pendent restaurants end up changing handsduring their rst year of business.

Once we identi ed and isolated a spe-ci c category of business that would bene tthe most from advertising on our product,it was time for possibly the most importanttask of this entire process: talk to the busi-nesses and see what they think.

Though we isolated local restaurantsas the most relevant business category, forthe sake of research, we conducted compre-hensive interviews with retail stores, realestate agents, banks, community organiza-tions, and professional service providers aswell.

In the rst rounds of surveys, the fol-lowing questions were asked:

1. What is the background of the business? Howlong has it been in operation? How many em-ployees? How does it de ne success?

2. Who are the customers? Where do they live andwork? Is there a particular age, gender, or anyother demographic they target?

3. What advertising outlets do they use? (print, on-line, local cable TV, radio, outdoor, direct mail,etc.) Can they put a rough estimate - percent-ages - on how much they spend through eachoutlet?

4. What is their de nition of a successful ad, or asuccessful ad campaign? Which of their outletsmost consistently produces that kind of success?

5. Do they have a website? Are they on Facebookor Twitter or any other forms of social media?

6. In thinking speci cally about online advertis-ing: If they are using it, how long have theybeen doing so? What sites and techniques havebeen most successful? If theyre not, why not?

Does it matter to them if the sites they advertiseon are local, regional, or national?

7. In thinking speci cally about local informa-tion sites: How do they decide where to adver-tise? Have they compared results from multiplesites? What persuades them to choose one overanother? How do they measure the results,and decide whether to be a repeat customer, orswitch their dollars elsewhere.

In a second round of business surveys,we asked local businesses to rank the fol-lowing forms of advertising on a scale of 0to 10 (0 being useless, 10 being awesome).The following list shows both the types ofadvertising we asked them to rank, and the

average rank each form received:1. Sponsorshipsevents, full-page Web ads,

spread, etc. (4.8 rank, on overage)2. Coupons (3.8 rank, on average)3. An Events Calendar sponsorshipeither online

or in print newsletter, newspaper, etc. (3.4 rank,on average)

4. Email blasts (3.2 rank, on average)5. Single-text adsakin to Google AdWords (3.2

rank, on average)6. Direct mail (3 rank, on average)7. Twitter, Facebook & social media advertising

(2.8 rank, on average)8. Video or other multimedia advertising (2.5 rank,

on average)9. Pop-up Web advertising (2.4 rank, on average)10. Outdoor (billboards, etc.) (2.4 rank, on average)11. Audio/radio advertisements (2.2 rank, on aver-

age)12. Traditional print advertising (2 rank, on aver-

age)13. Cable TV spots (1.4 rank, on average)14. Online banner adsany size (1.2 rank, on aver-

age)15. Advertorialsan editorial written in the form of

an advertisement (1 rank, on average)

What is interesting about these resultsis that business owners in Evanston placedlittle value on most Web-based forms ofadvertising except for the concept of sec-tion sponsorships, in which a businesss adwould appear on a section of the website


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(front page, events listing, etc.) and receive greater prominence, either by being thesponsor on that page or having a larger ad spot. More interesting was what littleput on traditional print advertisements, a 2 rank on average, and the most commonpractice among local businesses in the Evanston market. It should be noted that w

asked businesses to rank these categories of advertising, it was under the assumptiothe business had an unlimited, hypothetical advertising budget. In other words, thereno nancial constraints they were simply ranking which forms were most valuathem if money was not an issue.

The surveys revealed to us that, in the hyperlocal setting, each category ofcan be further parsed into two groups with distinct needs:legacy businesses and growingbusinesses. They are de ned as follows:

Legacy business : A business that is recognized by the local res-idents as a community landmark. Such legacy businesses willoften target long-time residents of the community and enjoy an

established base of regular customers. Growing business : These businesses have recently opened or

moved into the area. Such businesses are especially concernedwith local advertising but many do not have enough experience,or the budget, to isolate and point out who their frequent custom-ers are.

Step Three

The needs of these two types of businesses are fundamentally different. Legacynesses are already well-established and are not easily convinced to buy further advefor the sake of branding. They have a suf cient budget for advertising, most of whgoes toward print. Furthermore, once they bought an ad in a print publication, they

had no systematic method or desire to monitor the performance of their ads. Froobservation, we found that their reasoning behind buying the ad space was rather scontinue to buy the same type of advertising rather than experiment with new form

The growing businesses, on the other hand, were more willing to advertise lothey were eager for exposure. However, they were rather limited in budget. For thson, they showed a higher interest in the performance of the ads they bought, buany systematic method of measuring the ads impact. Furthermore, for online admeasure of success that mattered most was the number of viewers, regardless of wthe viewers were relevant customers or not.


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supplemental revenue opportunities

Selling ads isnt everything in reality, it should only be part of your incomestream. Once youve developed a substantial audience base a task that could takesome time there are plenty of choices for supplemental revenue opportunities.Some of them are listed here:

Events: If a hyperlocal site has developed a substantial audience throughits brand and content, they can now put it to use! Use the leverage in thelocal market to host a luncheon or discussion panel at a local bookstoreto discuss a hot news topic that has been drawn upon. Get an advertiserto agree to sponsor the event and maybe foot a portion of the bill. TheSt. Louis Beacon does this well it hosts a weeklyBeacon & Eggs eventat a local spot in the community.

Donations: Sometimes the best ways to make money to just to ask for it.If a hyperlocal publication has done its job on the audience front, contentcreation and branding, than there will surely be a number of loyal read-ers willing to contribute.

Case study: MinnPost is good example of a news websitethat has found success generating revenue through dona-tions. In 2009, they sought micro-sponsorships of $10and $25 from readers of BrauBlog , one of its blogs cover-ing local media and politics. The campaign attracted 328donors who helped raise $6,595. A matching grant from theHarnisch Foundation in New York pushed the total dona-tions to $13,190.

Classes: If a hyperlocal publisher is short of editorial staff, expand by

offering classes in community journalism. Our research in the Evanstonmarket showed that there were plenty of local residents populating themessage boards looking to sink their teeth in on some issues. So teachthem. By offering a community journalism course, a hyperlocal publish-er can lead these passionate community members in the technical skillsof writing, editing and reporting on community issues. Once their train-ing is complete, send them out to report on various stories. This accom-plishes two things: First, it expands your reporting reach throughout thecommunity that you cover; it gives you more content to populate yoursite with. Second, it promote a healthy dose of community engagement a hyperlocal publisher is using his/her presence in the community topromote a noble causeand is making a little extra money along the way.Charge a small fee for these classes at rst, and as the demand increases,start to hike the fee up a notch. Oakland Local, based out of Oakland,Calif., has also had success in this category they recently helda $75workshop for small businesses teaching them how to market themselvesthrough social media.
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=171443106201968&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=171443106201968&index=1http://www.minnpost.com/http://www.minnpost.com/braublog/http://www.minnpost.com/braublog/http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=172227199454528&index=1http://www.minnpost.com/braublog/http://www.minnpost.com/http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=171443106201968&index=1


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Key Recommendations:

Condensing findings into a sales strategy

People have different reasons for starting a hyperlocal news site. For some, its

project that they enjoy or that they undertake to serve their community. Forits a full-time gig that they hope will provide them with an income. Either wamunities become better-informed and are better off for having a hyperlocal resoThe following is a list of recommendations meant to help hyperlocal sites ndpath to nancial sustainability so that, ultimately, they can continue servingcommunities.

The task of generating revenue, like writing or reporting, consumes both time and at-tention. To become nancially sustainable, hyperlocal publishers need to make

revenue a priority rather than an afterthought. Therefore, it may be worthwhile tohire someone whose sole responsibility is to focus on ad sales and business matters. Identify whos already advertising in your community by researching local pub-

lications, print and online. These business owners already believe in the idea of ad-vertising; you just need to persuade them that your site is worth an investment of theirad budget.

Talk to local businesses and gure out how to best serve their advertising needs.This meeting should be exploratory with a goal of learning about the businesss needs-- not making a sales pitch.

Advertising needs vary depending on the size and age of the business. Legacy busi-nesses, those that have been in the community for years, can spend less of their totalad budget by advertising online. (Ones and zeroes on the Internet are cheaper than inkand paper in the real world.) Growing businesses, on the other hand, need to build theirbrand recognition in the community. They are more likely to experiment with newerforms of advertising through social media and video.

Keep it simple. Its likely that local business owners wont understand Internet jargon,so avoid buzz words like conversion rates, click-throughs, and CPMs. You will nd iteasier to attract advertisers by avoiding long-term contracts and minimum buys.

Visualization is key.Print out handouts so local business owners can see how andwhere their ad will appear on yo ur site. Follow standard ad unit guidelines, whichcan be found at the website for theInteractive Advertising Bureau.

Most businesses will tend to gravitate toward simple banner ads, the static plain kind.But dont be afraid to offer more creative modes of advertising like Flash andvideo, especially if its a growing business willing to experiment. Plus, you can chargemore for multimedia ads.

Use f ree tools to manage, schedule and track your ad inventory. Googles Double-Click for Publishers service, formerly known as Google Ad Manager, allows smallpublishers to do all this, though there is a mild learning curve to get everything setup.
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northwestern university community media innovation project: cookbook

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