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Check out Cleveland.com! Is this what being sports journalist has come to?

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by sporty, Apr 15, 2019.

  1. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    It's the subscription phenomenon, at least until that bubble bursts. People can rationalize it as taking one less trip to Starbucks per month. Maybe the editor means "101" when he says "hundreds," but still, that's more money than they were generating through Twitter.
     
    wicked likes this.
  2. Pilot

    Pilot Well-Known Member

    Well, if they get 500 people to sign up, that’s $24,000 a year, so, boom, that’s a preps reporter right there and maybe a little left over for the bigwigs!
     
  3. SportsGuyBCK

    SportsGuyBCK Active Member

    Remove "a preps reporter right there and maybe a little left over" and insert "another bonus" and you'd be spot on ... :D
     
    Doc Holliday likes this.
  4. wicked

    wicked Well-Known Member

    This is the greatest revenue driving idea the industry has come up with since we started charging for proper obituaries.
     
  5. TGO157

    TGO157 Active Member

    Just hoping someone replies, "Sir, this is an Arby's."
     
  6. Doc Holliday

    Doc Holliday Well-Known Member

    What happens when you are sending a text to your late-night hottie, one such as "Hey babe, be over in 30 minutes, I'm ready to hit it hard again," and you accidentally send it to Joe 'Project Text' Subscriber?

    How's that going to go over?
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2019
  7. Fredrick

    Fredrick Well-Known Member

    Making reporters send personal texts out is a horrible infringement on a reporter's personal time. Of course the reporters won't be paid for this. Sad era.
     
  8. tapintoamerica

    tapintoamerica Well-Known Member

    I’d love to know the process. Will they use an app separate and distinct from the standard text app on the phone etc?
     
  9. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    If I was told to do this and, a month later, the boss could show that it's a direct moneymaker for the company, then I can't find fault with that. That's a lot more worthwhile than tweeting, which I think is a time infringement but has just been accepted over time by reporters despite few signs that it makes one red cent.

    And I certainly assume it's through some kind of independent app to avoid any embarrassments.
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2019
    Doc Holliday and wicked like this.
  10. justgladtobehere

    justgladtobehere Well-Known Member

    When you sign up to get texts from a company promotion, like Amazon Truck for instance, it comes from a number that you cannot reply to. I have a restaurant sending me texts with promotions and my doctor's office sends me reminders. It must be pretty easy to set up if they are doing it.
     
  11. MeanGreenATO

    MeanGreenATO Well-Known Member

    I'm not a company shill, but I also understand how business works. If you want to make that argument, you could argue my paper loses a ton of money on my bad tweets every day. Hell, I'm costing them money right now with this post.

    I don't understand how y'all aren't seeing this. Instead of a writer sending a tweet that drives no traffic to a website and brings in no money, Cleveland.com is seeing if sending out texts will make them some money and potentially save a few jobs. If it doesn't work, everyone goes back to sending more bad tweets.
     
  12. Doc Holliday

    Doc Holliday Well-Known Member

    My newspaper has been sending texts to readers for about 6-7 years. There's nothing new about this at all.

    People sign up, we send them breaking news, sports scores, etc. ... And it's a hell of a lot more successful and beneficial than Tweeting. We have several high schools with and a couple of universities that have upwards of a 500-1,000 recipients and our numbers continue to increase each year. Word of mouth seems to work best as when one reader gets a score or breaking story such as a murder or weather alert, they mention it to whomever they're with. Then that person signs up because they want the instant information delivered that way to them, too.

    Honestly, I thought everybody already did this.
     
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