October 2008 News Now Update

news now update G A T E H O U S E

THE POST

REPORT

The top 15 most active Wicked Local homepages in New England*

1. SOMERVILLE Posts per day: 9.1 2. TAUNTON Posts per day: 9 3. BELMONT Posts per day: 7 4. ARLINGTON Posts per day: 6.4 5. GEORGETOWN Posts per day: 6.2 6. SAUGUS Posts per day: 6.2 7. CAMBRIDGE Posts per day: 5.3 8. MARBLEHEAD Posts per day: 5.3 9. MEDFORD Posts per day: 4.5 10. DANVERS Posts per day: 4.5 11. WATERTOWN Posts per day: 4.5 12. LEXINGTON Posts per day: 4.3 13. PROVINCETOWN Posts per day: 4.2 14. SHARON Posts per day: 4.1 15. HINGHAM Posts per day: 4.1

* SOURCE: Google Reader homepage post survey, 30-day average; single town Wicked Local sites only

M E D I A

N E W

E N G L A N D

OCTOBER 2008

TIP OF THE MONTH: KEEP AN EYE ON RANKING

Audit your site regularly - not just the homepage, but sections and subsections. Have you locked in old content as the featured story? If so, edit your content ranking.

TELLING STORIES IN

NEW FORMATS

2

Q&A

2

FOLLOW-UP

MOVER

OF THE MONTH

TONY SCHINELLA

Belmont Citizen • wickedlocal.com/belmont

1

1

NEWS NOW

PUBLICATION: Littleton Independent EDITOR: Betsy Levinson • PAGINATION: Framingham Betsy says this ASF, which ran on page 1, took very little time. The subject is a locally known author whom has been profiled in the past. This Q&A, says Betsy, was a good way to let readers know a bit more in a ‘fun and easily digestible’ format.

PUBLICATION: Braintree Forum EDITOR: Cathy Conley • PAGINATION: Marshfield Perfect for a quick update of any of the many ongoing stories in our communities. Cathy says the editing process, balancing word count for ‘past,’ ‘present,’ and the ‘future,’ takes some getting used to.

Belmont Citizen editor Tony Schinella’s analysis of the growth in his Web site’s traffic over the past year:

“Last week wasn't a huge week for us, meaning no override election, no huge budget story, no salacious headlines, etc. ... Uniques have gone from about an average of 700 when we started HitBox, to 1,500 this time last year, to 3,000 to 4,500 weekly now. “Page views are all over the map, from 5,000 when we started HitBox, 7,000 to 8,000 this time last year, to 10,000 to 14,000 now, with these huge spikes from 17,000 to 20,000 when we have "big" stories, like overrides, budget, salary listings, tragedies, etc. “What is really, really cool is that back in June 2007, the week of the two tragic deaths, we were at 3,551 uniques and 15,860 views, huge spikes over normal numbers. But now, our average weeks, 15 months later, are very close to what a "special" week once was. This clearly has to be from pounding it into people's heads that we are a weekly newspaper with daily updates on the Web.”

HAVE ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS ABOUT NEWS NOW? Chris Biondi: [email protected] • Sarah Corbitt: [email protected]