Community

Just a short tip today. … Allow your readers to post comments on your content. (And yes, I mean all of it.) That’s hardly a new idea. Many news websites allow users to post comments on their content. Surprisingly, some still do not. (Which is pretty sad; allowing user comments is the base level for online media interactivity. There’s just no reason not to allow it.)

A recent article by Miami Herald executive editor Anders Gyllenhaal confirmed the wisdom of allowing user comments. In the Letter to Readers, he wrote:

“In the six months since The Miami Herald began publishing comments at the end of online stories, the response has been like nothing we’ve seen before. Hundreds of thousands of readers are posting comments or following along with them each month.”

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When some news people think about “citizen journalism,” the inclination is to think of encouraging (and perhaps teaching) non-journalists to act like journalists. For example, my hometown paper features something called MyTown, which announces:

“Post news, events and photos. Blog, create your own groups, set up RSS feeds, and build your own communities and web spaces. It’s up to you to provide the nitty-gritty details that make your community special. No news is too small — from Little League to college scholarships, professional accolades to pie-baking contests, volunteer opportunities to neighborhood watch programs.”

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I encourage you you to check out the American Press Institute’s new report: “Newspaper Next 2.0: Making the Leap Beyond ‘Newspaper Companies’.” There’s some great advice in this free publication, and this week I’ll be pulling out a few tips and featuring them here.

Principal author Stephen T. Gray’s primary message is that newspaper companies need to stop being “newspaper companies” and start being “local information and connection utilities.” It’s an important and optimistic message — that newspaper companies needn’t be pessimistic about their futures, but rather should look at the incredible range of opportunities spread before them. But to have a positive future, they need to stop being “newspaper companies.” Continued

Today’s tip is, perhaps, a bit bizarre. But don’t dismiss it out of hand! There’s some serious logic to why newspapers and local news organizations might want to open up coffee shops. Seriously.

Credit for this idea goes to Greg Harmon, a media consultant with Belden Associates. He’s pushing the idea to some of his newspaper clients that they should turn some unused space in their buildings into Internet cafes open to the public, as a way to connect with readers more directly and openly. Harmon explains: Continued

Does your news organization have some celebrities on staff? Perhaps a star columnist, a sports reporter who’s well known, celebrity stringers (athletes, politicians), etc. Maybe the editor or publisher is a “star” in the community.

Today’s tip will put those people in what may be an uncomfortable position: Have them dive in to discussion areas and article comment threads on your website. Get them to engage directly with the online audience — regularly. They should answer questions; express opinions alongside users … just “mix it up” and start talking. Continued

Have you thought about why social networks (aka, social utilities) like Facebook and MySpace quickly attracted tens of millions of users, and got them addicted? No need to think too hard. It’s because 1) people like to talk about themselves, and 2) people like to talk to their friends and know what’s going on in their friends’ lives. The social networks serve those needs. Bingo! Multi-billion-dollar businesses are formed.

It’s about the people

News organizations need to take some clues from this. I’ll write plenty of future tips covering lessons that can be learned from social networking, but for today I’m going to focus on one small thing you can do… Continued

I’m getting requests to include more marketing advice on this site, and I’m happy to oblige. Here’s a marketing technique that people in traditional marketing and traditional media often overlook: Establish and work on having a relationship with your audience. Ask them to talk about themselves, and stop talking so much about you.

Let’s face it, it’s human nature for most folks to want to talk about themselves. Journalists may be in the business of talking mostly about what they know, but the opportunity with the Internet is to get the audience talking too. So to build and grow the modern audience, you need to give them — at every reasonable opportunity — the ability to talk about themselves, share what they think, and ask you questions. Continued

So often I see Internet entrepreneurs doing things that traditional news companies should be doing, but don’t most likely due to cultural issues that prevent thinking and acting outside the box. An example comes from Outside.in, which collects, filters and publishes links to local news from a variety of sources (including but not limited to local mainstream media websites).

If you choose, you can receive a twice-weekly e-mail summary of content that Outside.in has found specific to your location. (You give Outside.in your zip code.) Here’s a screen grab of the local-news alert I received this morning:

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In line with recommendations for news publishers to publish outside of their own website, it’s also important to engage on the “outside.” Here’s what I mean:

If you have a news operation, you probably (I hope!) have reporters engage in comment threads and conversations on your site. If you’re an independent blogger, you no doubt do likewise. That’s a good first step. But you should also be watching for conversations involving you or your reporters on sites and blogs all over the web. Join in those conversations! Respond!

The reasons this is important should be obvious… Continued