Local v. National

[DanOregon]

How has the shift away from national coverage in favor of local news affected your section? What are readers saying? Do you think it adds value or detracts from the overall impression of your section?

 

[Breakyoself]

i think you need to have a mix. there are some people who don't give two ****s about local preps, but by the paper for the overall coverage, including national.

primary focus on local is important, but i don't think you can all together boot out national.

 

[JBHawkEye]

You have to have a mix of local and national, with local being the top priority.

One day we ran an abbreviated baseball page, with only box scores from the teams of local interest, because we were short on space. I took 10 phone calls the next day from pissed-off people.

 

[DanOregon]

I asked it because it seems to me by having some national stuff on page side-by-side of a local story it subliminally elevates the importance of the local story. But conversely, putting out a page with nothing but local lessens the impact of each local story.

 

[Walter Burns]

It's kind of fascinating...I work for a Gannett paper, and they're pushing hyperlocal coverage (the previous editor in chief was almost fanatical about this, wanting rec sports and the like).
That said, the publisher said she understood that people pick up the paper for wire news.
On the one hand, I've gotten the phone calls about "Why didn't you cover this game?" and an e-mail from a local athletic director about how bad our paper's gotten and how much is wire copy.
But on the other hand, when we put all local agate in, the baseball/NASCAR/whoever fans call and *****.
We actually had a letter to the editor a couple weeks ago complaining about our PGA coverage or lack thereof.
I have the greatest job in the world...everyone seems to want to do it for me.

 

[ADifferentOkie]

My place is like Walter's. I hear complaints about not enough local, and I hear complaints about not enough national.
Of course, people don't understand spacial constraints.
We try to strike a pretty fair balance, but if it comes down to one or the other getting in, the local is going to win almost every time.

 

[SCEditor]

You can't make everybody happy. I field calls both ways. I have a guy, my first week on the job, tell me we need to do a better job covering soccer, beach volleyball, tennis, hockey and off-road racing. His e-mail came right after somebody e-mailed me about getting more local stuff in the paper. I had a guy call me yesterday saying he was canceling his coverage since we didn't have any LeMans coverage in our Sunday paper. Nevermind that AP didn't move anything until Sunday morning. You can't make everybody happy. Just aim to make the majority happy.

 

[Trucha]

I'm convinced that to survive and thrive we have to focus on what we can do better than anybody in the world. That's local. Everything else, somebody -- another paper, ESPN, the Internet -- will do better.

Our community of 50,000 has made it clear that's what it wants. We quit running MLB, NBA, NHL and Top 25 roundups a couple years ago. We've had maybe three complaints.

We still get a few complaints about not enough national coverage about specific sports, but we get far more from readers who think we're lazy when we use wire "filler." Most of the complaints come from older readers who still haven't learned their way around the Internet.

Those folks are important, too, but I'm sure of this: We're not gaining readers who look to us for national news, only losing them because there are so many other places to go that can and will always do it better. Just my 2 cents.

 

[Mystery_Meat]

I'm convinced that to survive and thrive we have to focus on what we can do better than anybody in the world. That's local. Everything else, somebody -- another paper, ESPN, the Internet -- will do better.

Our community of 50,000 has made it clear that's what it wants. We quit running MLB, NBA, NHL and Top 25 roundups a couple years ago. We've had maybe three complaints.

We still get a few complaints about not enough national coverage about specific sports, but we get far more from readers who think we're lazy when we use wire "filler." Most of the complaints come from older readers who still haven't learned their way around the Internet.

Those folks are important, too, but I'm sure of this: We're not gaining readers who look to us for national news, only losing them because there are so many other places to go that can and will always do it better. Just my 2 cents.

So what happens when websites start gaining ground for local? Where I am there's a website that's putting money into increasing coverage of high school sports, another is apparently thinking about doing likewise, and there's statewide sites that hit a lot of the recruiting and major sports. Do we stand down there as well and focus on youth sports and kids riding bikes in the park?

Never let call-ins dictate your coverage. That's like electing a president on a 1-900 poll.

And never underestimate the readers who don't throw a hissy fit. We're so conditioned to capitulate to the squeaky wheel that we let them set the agenda. But there's a large group of readers who don't want to have to go to multiple websites or TV stations or newspapers to get all the information they want. No matter what hyperlocal evangelists might tell us, I still firmly believe the daily newspaper should be as much of a one-stop news shop as possible. That doesn't mean blowing off high school playoffs for America's Cup takeouts, but it also doesn't mean putting the NBA Finals on C5 so you can deify the JV girls volleyball team that finished fourth in its district.

Like the unicyclist riding a wire across the mouth of an active volcano, balance is what's going to save us.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

We've been wrong about a heck of a lot over the years and we are wrong about this whole hyper-local thing today. For the most part our readers are mall and superstore people, they expect one-stop shopping.

I disagree that the Internet does a better job with non-local. What most Internet sites, including the major sports sites, give them is the AP wire, basically unedited for length, thrown into a trough with a few staff-produced pieces, mostly commentary, added in. How does this compare with a sports section tailored to the unique needs of a specific market? What mental patient would prefer to read every full-length AP baseball gamer on espn.com as opposed to the Cliffs Notes version we give them in a roundup, coupled with staff coverage of the pro teams in our market? I think we give our readers a better national product that doesn't waste their time -- what they need to spend 20 minutes on with us would take them all day on the major Web sites.

 

[shotglass]

And never underestimate the readers who don't throw a hissy fit. We're so conditioned to capitulate to the squeaky wheel that we let them set the agenda. But there's a large group of readers who don't want to have to go to multiple websites or TV stations or newspapers to get all the information they want. No matter what hyperlocal evangelists might tell us, I still firmly believe the daily newspaper should be as much of a one-stop news shop as possible. That doesn't mean blowing off high school playoffs for America's Cup takeouts, but it also doesn't mean putting the NBA Finals on C5 so you can deify the JV girls volleyball team that finished fourth in its district.

Exactamundo.

There's a term for newspapers which blow off national sports completely. They're called "weeklies."

 

[wisportswriter]

Never let call-ins dictate your coverage. That's like electing a president on a 1-900 poll.

And never underestimate the readers who don't throw a hissy fit. We're so conditioned to capitulate to the squeaky wheel that we let them set the agenda. But there's a large group of readers who don't want to have to go to multiple websites or TV stations or newspapers to get all the information they want. No matter what hyperlocal evangelists might tell us, I still firmly believe the daily newspaper should be as much of a one-stop news shop as possible. That doesn't mean blowing off high school playoffs for America's Cup takeouts, but it also doesn't mean putting the NBA Finals on C5 so you can deify the JV girls volleyball team that finished fourth in its district.

Like the unicyclist riding a wire across the mouth of an active volcano, balance is what's going to save us.

Best post I've read on SportsJournalists.com in a long time. Well done.
(And obviously I agree 100 percent.)

 

[SoSueMe]

When I'm on pages, I try and choose national/international stuff that is feature-ish. Most people already who won, how and where it happened, etc. We have three all-sports networks up here in Canada. And of course there is the web. Plus, we all have our agate pages.

So I get something more in depth, but still makes mentions of the major players and plays. But I try to avoid straight gamers off the wire - unless that's all there is available. I don't fill space to fill space.

I also try and run a local story on every page, rather than go with an all-local front. If we have a local baseball story, it's on the baseball page, hockey on the hockey page, etc.

 

[expendable]

I have the greatest job in the world...everyone seems to want to do it for me.

I love that line.

 

[Bob Slydell]

We go roughly 75 percent local, more on some days. So if we went more national, it would have a negative effect on us.

 

[buckweaver]

And never underestimate the readers who don't throw a hissy fit. We're so conditioned to capitulate to the squeaky wheel that we let them set the agenda. But there's a large group of readers who don't want to have to go to multiple websites or TV stations or newspapers to get all the information they want. No matter what hyperlocal evangelists might tell us, I still firmly believe the daily newspaper should be as much of a one-stop news shop as possible. That doesn't mean blowing off high school playoffs for America's Cup takeouts, but it also doesn't mean putting the NBA Finals on C5 so you can deify the JV girls volleyball team that finished fourth in its district.

Exactamundo.

There's a term for newspapers which blow off national sports completely. They're called "weeklies."

I agree.

You have to have it in there. Somewhere. If you're a decent sports section, no matter your size or market, you have to include sports that people pay attention to, which is pro and/or major college, in addition to preps/local/niche sports with a niche audience.

And then you cater your balance to your priority level, which depends on your audience, your market, the season, and a host of other factors specific to your paper.

But there's no balance if you have a dozen of one and none of the other.

 

[melock]

I'm convinced that to survive and thrive we have to focus on what we can do better than anybody in the world. That's local. Everything else, somebody -- another paper, ESPN, the Internet -- will do better.

Our community of 50,000 has made it clear that's what it wants. We quit running MLB, NBA, NHL and Top 25 roundups a couple years ago. We've had maybe three complaints.

We still get a few complaints about not enough national coverage about specific sports, but we get far more from readers who think we're lazy when we use wire "filler." Most of the complaints come from older readers who still haven't learned their way around the Internet.

Those folks are important, too, but I'm sure of this: We're not gaining readers who look to us for national news, only losing them because there are so many other places to go that can and will always do it better. Just my 2 cents.

So what happens when websites start gaining ground for local? Where I am there's a website that's putting money into increasing coverage of high school sports, another is apparently thinking about doing likewise, and there's statewide sites that hit a lot of the recruiting and major sports. Do we stand down there as well and focus on youth sports and kids riding bikes in the park?

Never let call-ins dictate your coverage. That's like electing a president on a 1-900 poll.

And never underestimate the readers who don't throw a hissy fit. We're so conditioned to capitulate to the squeaky wheel that we let them set the agenda. But there's a large group of readers who don't want to have to go to multiple websites or TV stations or newspapers to get all the information they want. No matter what hyperlocal evangelists might tell us, I still firmly believe the daily newspaper should be as much of a one-stop news shop as possible. That doesn't mean blowing off high school playoffs for America's Cup takeouts, but it also doesn't mean putting the NBA Finals on C5 so you can deify the JV girls volleyball team that finished fourth in its district.

Like the unicyclist riding a wire across the mouth of an active volcano, balance is what's going to save us.

Amen! Why make people go other places to get their news? Sure, if you're an East Coast paper chances are very few of your circulation give two ****s about the Cardinals-Brewers game, but does a 3-inch blurb inside somewhere about the game really take up that much room and keep something local out of the paper? Of course it doesn't.

Back at the beginning of the year our managing editor, who shortly after became our editor, actually said NOBODY gives a ****ass about national sports. I mean other than the millions of people that watch the Super Bowl, the 250k that are at Daytona for a whole week or the 108K that crowd into Beaver Stadium to watch Penn State nobody gives a ****ass.

If you work at a small-town paper local should be your bread and butter, but you can't ignore national sports. Doing that makes you as dumb as someone who says nobody gives a ****ass about national sports.

 

[Trucha]

Nobody running a daily sports section of any size is suggesting that national sports be ignored. Of course, that would be foolish. The daily is a great place to collect boxscores for readers. But your 3 inches on the Cardinals-Brewers also means 3 inches on every other game, too. That's a ton of space -- especially if the NBA or NHL is happening at the same time. I see plenty of papers that have almost nothing but roundups, and they're boring as hell.

Moreover, with more and more readers perusing their sports section AFTER they get home from work, they're getting their 3 inches -- especially on the West Coast -- after their team's game has already started that night. By then, I'm fairly certain they already know what that 3 inches will say, thanks to SportsCenter or even their 6 o'clock news. Not exactly fresh. And finally, I have my teams that I follow, and I go to the newspaper web sites in those towns for information on them.

Point is, we're not recruiting any new readers with Scoreboard pages, national gamers and roundups. But we're sure losing them.

And just because millions watch a sporting event on TV doesn't mean my (or your) small town is dying to read about it the next day in the Daily Planet.

JV volleyball? No. Ignore national sports? Not a chance. But I haven't seen a compelling argument yet against focusing heavily on local, especially for sports sections under 40,000. Our circulation rose 10 percent last year. I guess if we were still running national sports roundups it would've been more.

 

[shotglass]

If your 3 inches on the Cardinals-Brewers is in 11-point, that IS a waste of space. More like 1" of 9-point. There are many, many ways to skin a cat.

 

[melock]

The point I'm making is you can't say, 'Oh we don't have to run that because they'll go to ESPN.com for that.' Why make your readers go somewhere else to get something they can get from you? The next thing you know you're saying that about everything that isn't local.

What I do for baseball roundups (or any other roundup) is run as much as possible on teams of local interest and then one paragraph about the other games. Do some games get cut completely? Yes, but we try to get a box in on those. Sometimes with limited space (district playoffs, big feature package, ect.) you can't and that's just how it goes. But if we have the space we try to get in as much as possible even if it's just briefs or what have you.

I'm with you Trucha that local should be the focus of smaller, hometown papers. That's where I'm at and for the most part we have all local fronts (unless something important nationally is going on and even then sometimes that goes inside). My argument is to give your readers something on as much as possible. Don't make them go to four different web sites and two other papers to get everything they want when you can give it to them. If they want to go somewhere else for more in-depth coverage that's their choice.