If you haven't checked out TPM Media's Golden Duke award presentation, you ought to. It's a hilarious snark fest, featuring, among others, good ol' Larry Craig.
And for any media types who might happen across my tiny blog, I commend the TPM site to you as an great example of new media. I think it's a good model for how a print newspaper could keep itself relevant, and profitable. TPM isn't print, but it is a good blend of media, including solid investigative reporting. Print media could use its reportorial assets in a similar blend and presentation, drive traffic to its website, and at least generate web income.
And another bit of advice; don't link only to yourself. Most newspaper web sites just link to their own web sites and pages. Interesting sites link to other sources. Don't be afraid that you'll drive traffic away from your web site. You might as the person explores the link, but they'll come back because of your content and links you provide. Huckleberries Online does a good job at linking to non-SR sites, and it's page views are climbing.
2 comments:
The reason a lot of newspapers link only within the paper is ads. They get paid for people viewing them, clicking them, not for them going somewhere else.
Of course, a big blog like TPM linking to someone will increase traffic for the blogger getting linked and lead to a link back and a lot of incoming links to TPM, but a newspaper doesn't work like that.
I rarely see a ton of incoming hits from newspaper articles linking and I doubt they see many back.
Right. The papers are trying to keep up their page hit numbers. However, I think it is shortsighted. I like sites that are gateways to other interesting information and sites, and those that give me that are the ones I go to frequently. I'd probably go to the Statesman more if it linked more.
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