
Ask HN: What would you do with a newspaper-dot-com's built-in audience? - freejoe76
I work dev for a newspaper-dot-com that gets ~5M monthly uniques. If you were at a (local) newspaper-dot-com, and you had that built-in audience, I'm curious: What would you do with it?
======
fleitz
Write an article system that allows for multivariate A/B testing, performs
multivariate regression and "decides" upon the version of the article that
converts best. Then use that data for subsequent articles to suggest changes
that convert better.

eg. {Wall Street Lays an Egg|Stock Market Crash 1928}

Today, {Chief Economist|Fed Chief|Money Czar} decided...

The system would randomly pick changes to the article and as it had more data
it would more often pick the options that convert better. So lets say it found
that "Wall Street lays an egg" and "Money Czar" converts best, then in the
future when it sees Chief Economist the software could suggest that using
Money Czar converts better and automatically add it as an option.

eg. Chief Economist -> {Chief Economist|Money Czar}

If you can get demographic information, lets say from facebook, then you're
really golden as you can offer a service that will tailor an article to a
demographic, or conversion goal. eg. articles that convert for car ads, or
articles that convert for teenagers. With 5 million uniques you would probably
have enough facebook connect users to get decent demographic data. Heck, if
you had the facebook data you could tailor the article to the demographic
profile of the user, so the system would use the general profile for unknown
users and once demographic info was available would re-tailor the content. Put
an API on the service and then charge a cent per milli "tailorized" articles.

~~~
nostromo
Would you mind defining conversion?

~~~
fleitz
In general from a lower value activity to a higher value activity. eg. from a
reader of the paper to someone who clicks on an ad

------
aresant
Build a local deals engine a la groupon.

Yah this is obvious, but the reason that this works so well for newspapers:

a) Newspapers have a built in sales force to sell local merchants on the
concept.

b) Newspapers attract a hyper-local audience and building a list of people
interested in local deals is a money printing asset.

c) Newspaper execs, consumers, and merchants are familiar with the model so
it's not a hard sell to anybody.

~~~
timmaah
Our local TV station has done this and has promoted it heavily via on air
commercials. It looks like it has given a good boost to their floundering
local craigslist knock-off.

<http://www.wcax.com/>

~~~
aresant
Just FYI that local deals engine is supported by
<http://secondstreetmedia.com/> which does white label deals sites - very
cheap and easy way to test.

~~~
prawn
There would probably be room for multiple start-ups in this field if they
worked quickly. Likely one per country with a few in the US too.

------
DevX101
Newspapers have a huge amount of unrealized value. They are probably one of
the most trusted sources of relevant local content available, even today. But
if newspapers maintain business as usual and don't fully leverage this
advantage, this power will continue to slowly erode with ocassional landslides
when revolutionary tech companies emerge.

But I'm not here to bash newspaper, we're here to talk about how to fix it.

One of the hardest things about getting any business up and running is getting
early users and visibility. Newspapers by default have the distribution
platform built in. My recommendation is that newspapers move away (not
completely) from relying exclusively on classified to make others money. And
use their INCREDIBLY VALUABLE distribution platform to promote locally
relevant services which they have equity in.

Andrew Mason from Groupon stated that the only real competition he'd really
have is from newspapers or local radio stations. And he's right. But I haven't
seen newspaper really doing this. (I believe Boston Globe did a deal with
BuyWithMe but I haven't been in boston in a while).

The failure to really innovate on approaches like this is partly a function of
the expertise of people who work for newspapers. You've got reporters, who
know their city inside out, ad managers that know the local businesses and
sell ad space, web devs who do layout for stories and awesome infographics,
but you don't really have a "product development" team. Folks who's
responsibility it is to create marketable products FOR the newspaper. I guess
this is where you come in, but from your post, it looks like this is a side
project for you.

I've thought about this some, and really think this is the way forward for
them. There needs to be a big structural change in how revenue is generated
and how the business is run. Classified alone won't cut it.

I've got one largely developed project and several early stage plans that I
think would work well with a newspaper partnership, so if you'd like to talk,
drop me a note (email in profile).

------
thetrumanshow
Don't just sell ad-space, resell white-labeled products to your advertisers.
Give them tools to improve the conversion from leads generated by your
newspaper. I have ideas here. Sent you an email if you're interested in
chatting.

------
jcnnghm
There are three major benefits presented by the internet to traditional media.
First, the ability to offer far greater depth and breadth of coverage than
could reasonably be offered in print. Second, the ability for the media to be
instantly interactive. While letters to the editor did allow some
interactivity, they aren't nearly as interactive as what can be done online.
Finally, along the lines of interactivity, digital display should allow the
media the ability to offer content that doesn't necessarily have to appeal to
everyone; it should be much more feasible to target niche markets and offer
content tailored to them, while profiting from the greater ability to monetize
a niche market.

Having said that, my company, Barhopolis (check out
<http://barsannapolis.com>), is currently looking to partner with newspapers
to more easily reach an audience. This gives you a great breadth and depth of
information, in the form of hundreds of local events updated daily.
Interactivity in the form of reviews, comments, and photos shared by visitors.
And, most importantly, it gives you access to a niche market that is easy
monetizable. We'd also be able to incorporate current and future editorial
content, as well as customize the branding. I'd love to talk to you more about
it, my email is justin@bulletprooftiger.com.

~~~
talbina
By any chance, did you found a tax software company that was acquired?

I feel like I've met you after seeing Barhopolis.

~~~
jcnnghm
That actually may be us. One of my business partners was involved in a company
that produced tax and accounting software for Wang Mainframes that was later
acquired by ManTech International.

------
dotBen
Enable your local audience to become part of your news-gathering operation,
perhaps even hosting citizen journalism pieces (clearly marked) that help
bring hyper-local news that the newspaper wouldn't carry/couldn't resource.

Depends on your Metro, but take San Francisco - I rely on local blogs to tell
me what is really going on in SoMa because the San Francisco Chronicle does
such a poor job. I'd love to see those blogs get some distribution on
SFGate.com (SF Chron's website).

------
jaspalsawhney
Engage them in one of the following ways 1 a. Urge them to become citizen
journalists sending you video's etc on stuff which they observe or come
across. 1 b. Run a column showcasing some of the work done by such citizen
journalists. e.g. NDTV (Indian channel) runs a similar thing.

2\. Call for people interested in helping local community building.

3\. Ask for feedback on what can be done to improve the paper. for e.g. if
Toronto Star would ask me this I would urge them to slim their Saturday paper
from 200 pages to 10 pages so that I do not feel bad about not being able to
read it even when its free

------
pragmatic
Improve the classified ad system.

Our local paper has _horrible_ system. Make sure you take all major credit
cards and paypal.

Improve the rummage sale finder. My wife loves rummage (garage sales) and the
system is not good.

Our local paper is owned by a large syndicate and I can see the content
management system is used by several other local newspapers.

Generally bring your paper into the 21st century. And for Zeus's sake, don't
do those stupid pop unders that make me want to ban you in my firewall. It
takes more CPU power to view to the paper's website then running a game!

------
adw
In all seriousness, if you've got a local-business section you think might
benefit from statistics, we need to talk. (No, I'm not trying to sell you
anything.) Email me: andrew@timetric.com.

------
brudgers
Extend the content of the print version rather than duplicate it. Conceptually
this is what NPR does with their website. The Daily Show website extends
broadcast content similarly for their interviews.

Audio is an excellent medium for journalism and today is nearly as portable
dead trees for many people. It's potentially salable and suitable for longer
news stories.

Have an advertising policy which respects your readers as readers. The biggest
asset of newspapers is trust. Highest bidder ads about my credit score destroy
it.

------
milkshakes
leverage the userbase. build a social network around local news, and let your
readers do most of your work for you. they'll bring you leads, distribution,
etc.

host your own reddit? submitting all of the articles to it, and letting users
crowdsource the headlines, as well as the comment curation. you can offer a
more interactive experience and can engage readers beyond hit and run comments
or avoid the youtubeish free for alls that sadly seem to dominate the
discussions on most news articles. put the power in your reader's hands,
because frankly you guys need all of the help you can get.

i really love the way comments sections works in the new york times, for
example. it would be really interesting to try take that even further.

------
holychiz
newspaper readers is a natural social network. please build tools to allow
them to easily communicate and expressing their views with each other. For
example, letters to editors should also be a topic that others can contribute
also. Ads should be voted and/or comments upon. News items can be submitted
and voted on. etc...Good luck, I'm cheering for you.

------
damienhoffman
Get more embedded with adding value related to experiencing the local
community. Let the barrier between online and offline fade.

------
hxrd
Leave them alone?? Why would you want to DO something with them?

------
johnconroy
tl;dr a glorified affiliate merchandiser.

One tremendous asset papers have left is trust. They should leverage this
trust to offer deals on high-quality products to their readers. If they vet
the products to ensure they are high quality, they retain trust. If they
retain reader trust, the goods producers benefit from association with the
newspaper. Thus, they can offer good deals.

Papers already do this, inn a half-assed way. But leveraging their history of
goodwill, built up over decades with readers, has to a great way forward for
them.

------
noverloop
I would start crowd-sourcing articles and pay the authors a small amount when
they get published.

