What is your paper's approach to the web?

And advertising rates are largely based on circulation. Let's not forget that.

 

If you don't have a website, circulation won't just magically increase by a significant number. Let's not fool ourselves.

 

I wouldn't dream of it. Didn't suggest it. Just don't want to see print products that are still viable -- and those still exist, believe it or not -- forget where their bread is buttered. Why kill something prematurely? I happen to work at one of those places where the print product isn't facing increased circulation -- but it isn't dropping either. So at a place like that, you can't forget what's paying your salaries: ads based on circulation that you're cultivating, not ignoring.

 

Promising model here of letting readers see a few stories a month for free, then imposing a subscription:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/18/business/media/18brill.html?_r=1&ref=media

What I like about this is that it gives you the advantage of the occasional big-ticket item that goes viral without hiding it in search engines or making readers pay. Even if you have only 30,000 subscribers, you can have an occasional page that gets 100K or more. Then you get the ad revenue and the name recognition that might turn a couple of your visitors into subscribers.

 

We post all calendar items/schedules, briefs and local columns for free. Otherwise, I put up smaller versions (usually 200 words or less) of stories on the website, most without photos. Each story includes a mention of buying the print paper for the full story and a reminder of where the paper can be bought. I try to update the site daily, even if that means taking a story already up and labeling it our top story. We're a weekly, so at the end of the week I post on our facebook page telling what the stories are, telling people to go to our website for brief summaries or the print version for the full stories. Lately I've been posting something on our facebook page every day and have seen a jump in both impressions and feedback.
We have multiple issues. Mainly, we're a small weekly going against a 70K daily and three TV stations. The daily posts all local stories for free each morning and the TV stations post all local stuff for free as well. We only subscribe to the daily because my wife likes the ad circulars. I'm fine with checking the site online for free and canceling the subscription since the model seems to encourage that.

 

Just did a two-day experiment. Put individual links to each story on our facebook wall. We increased pageviews by 42 percent on our website while getting a lot more comments on the facebook wall as well. Haven't told the ME about his yet, but I have a feeling this may become a standard. It took me about 3 minutes to upload the links, so it's not a killer to do.

 

Spike, there are free web services out there that will post individual stories to Twitter and Facebook automatically. Your site hopefully makes use of RSS feeds, which is what they draw from.

The one I use is http://twitterfeed.com/

 

I'll look into it. Thanks.

 

Yes, spike, and you'll find those #s grow quickly if you stick with it for 3-4 weeks...once friends of friends connect via Facebook your page will get plenty of hits.

 

In our area, all the metro newspapers and suburban newspapers put everything on the internet for free.
Which begs the question: Why would anybody with half a brain purchase the print product? My gosh, that is stupidity. It's on the internet for free and everybody has a computer nowsadays.

 

Doctor and dentist offices, the elderly and the technology-inept middle-aged person. If anyone else gets the paper, it's for scrapbooking.

 

Just got a nice thank you from a senior football player, who mentioned how much he and his friends enjoyed picking up the paper each Saturday to see the football wrap-ups -- it was something he had done since he was a middle schooler -- that was refreshing