John Wilpers gave a presentation about how newspapers can leverage high-quality local bloggers to increase their content, reach, relevance, and revenue. He argued that partnering with bloggers is a win-win, as it provides newspapers with great content at no cost, while giving bloggers exposure and prestige. Wilpers presented data showing how blogs can significantly increase website traffic and Google ranking. He acknowledged some editor concerns but argued newspapers remain the gatekeepers and can vet bloggers. The key, he said, is for newspapers to "be found" by delivering remarkable, shareable content from both staff and bloggers.

1. Good
afternoon!
John Wilpers, Senior Consultant
INNOVATION Media Consulting Group
617.688.0137 / johnwilpers@aol.com
Twitter: johnwilpers; Blog: johnwilpers.wordpress.com

2. Presentations
should start
with
something
memorable
So let’s
try this:

3. I took this this
morning on
the Pier
here...
... But this
next slide is
probably more
memorable

4. That’s me (the big gal). I’ve played “Mother Ginger” in The Nutcracker in Boston for 15 years.

5. STRETCHING YOUR NEWS
BUDGET WITH OUTSIDE
CONTENT SOURCES
Becoming the SOURCE of all the best
content about your turf, not just the
CREATOR of the best content.

6. NEWSPAPERS WERE ONCE THE SOLE
SOURCE OF QUALITY INFORMATION
Not anymore.....

7. MILLIONS OF
EXPERTS ARE
BLOGGING
EXQUISITELY
ABOUT THEIR
NICHE
1) They are professionals
2) They know more about
their niche than your
staff writers
3) They can write as well or
better than your writers.
4) They can spread the
word about you to their
hundreds or thousands
of followers

8. WHAT DO
READERS
WANT?
1) Local Information
2) Information &
community
around shared
interests
3) Variety of
viewpoints
4) Chance to participate
5) All the best information in
one place to save time

9. What can newspapers
do to OWN their
niches and attract,
retain, involve, and
leverage these new
information creators
and consumers?

10. THE ANSWER?
No surprise, there is
no ONE answer
There are lots of
answers
And most involve
“being found”

11. “BEING FOUND”
With thousands of people in
your market needing
information and asking
questions every day, you want
to “be found” as:
• THE source of local
information in as many niches
as possible, and
• THE place with the answers to
as many local questions as
possible.

12. “BEING FOUND”
You want to deliver ongoing,
useful, valuable information
about exactly what readers
need exactly when and where
they need it.

13. “BE FOUND”
BY BEING
“REMARK-ABLE”
Deliver content that is so good
readers “remark” about it online,
causing it to spread virally, attract
links, and thus improve your Google
rank, making you all the more
“findable.”
— “Inbound Marketing,” Brian Hallagan/Dharmesh Shah, 2010

14. HOW DO YOU
DELIVER
“REMARK-ABLE”
CONTENT?
You can’t create it all by yourself.
You need help.
Find people creating high-quality content in the
areas you want to “own” and partner with them.
Bloggers

15. BLOGGERS?!
OMG!
Relax.
And let me explain.

16. THE BLOG
FLOW IS
NOW A
TSUNAMI
• Twelve new blogs every minute
• More than 100,000 new blogs by day’s end
• Nearly 1 million posts/day
• 41,600 posts every hour
• 700 every minute
• 12 every second
Technorati, State of the Blogosphere Annual Report, Sept. 2008

17. BLOGS ARE
EVERYWHERE
& ARE ACCEPTED
• 184 million people worldwide
have started a blog
• 346 million people worldwide
read blogs
• 77% of active Internet users
read blogs
(COMSCORE MEDIA MATRIX/August 2008, eMARKETER/May
2008, UNIVERSAL MCCANN/Mar, ’08)

18. THEY ARE WRITING ABOUT
A WIDE VARIETY OF TOPICS
Technorati, State of the Blogosphere Annual Report,
Sept. 2008

19. THEY DO IT FOR LOTS OF REASONS
Money is not the top reason, it’s not even in top five!
Technorati, State of the Blogosphere Annual Report,
Sept. 2008

20. AND THEY ARE REAPING REWARDS
• Becoming semi-famous
• Getting promotions
• Changing professions
• Getting more executive visibility
Technorati, State of the Blogosphere Annual Report, Sept.
2008

21. HARNESS THAT ENERGY & TALENT
High-quality local bloggers: A great bet to increase your
• REACH • RELEVANCE • REVENUE

22. SOME DISAGREE
One Brazilian newspaper compared local bloggers to
monkeys banging on keyboards. It was a funny PR
campaign, but it ignored a legion of high-quality local blogs

23. EVEN IF 50% OF BLOGGERS
ARE MONKEYS…
That’s still leaves a TON
of good LOCAL content
that you CURATE to
increase your content
offerings.

24. INCREASE REACH AND RELEVANCE
With high-quality local bloggers,
readers see your paper and website as
being created by them and for them.

25. THE NEWSPAPER MAGIC STILL EXISTS
Bloggers are thrilled to be asked
to be part of your paper & website:

26. YOU JUST
HEARD
POWERFUL,
VIRAL,
GRASSROOTS
MARKETING
Word of mouth: the
most effective, most
trusted means of
marketing. Publish
local bloggers and
unleash a legion of
cost-free marketers!
Photo by looking4poetry on flicker, CC

27. YOUR BRAND
STILL RESONATES
Your brand = the best in
information; Extend that
brand to blogs & vlogs
Be THE source of all the
best info in town, even if
you don’t create it!
Curate and point off
Or host the blogs.
Who could resist
a blog address like:
www.papername.com/myname?

28. IT IS A WIN-WIN:
You get:
• Great web content
• Great print content
• Increased ad inventory, and
• Viral grassroots PR from happy bloggers
The bloggers get:
• Big-time exposure in your newspaper and on your website
• Increased traffic
• Increased income
• Prestige and fame!

29. BLOGGERS BRING TRAFFIC,
LINKS, INCREASED GOOGLE RANK
• The Christian
Science
Monitor
TRIPLED
traffic on its
Money in
just two
weeks when
it introduced
bloggers.
• One post,
published
just after
midnight,
got 25,000
PVs by noon

30. BLOGGERS BRING TRAFFIC,
LINKS, INCREASED GOOGLE RANK
• Almost
three-
quarters of
the more
than
100,000
visits to
GlobalPost’s
outside
bloggers
were new
visits.
• Visitors to GlobalPost’s
non-staff blogs stayed on
site an average 02:49.

31. BLOGGERS BRING TRAFFIC
• BostonNOW hosted
3,900 bloggers; 900 of
whom posted regularly
• Four of the top 13 page
view URLs were blogs
or the blog home page
• Our longest time on
a page was a blog
• Our highest unique page
view page was a blog

32. BLOGGERS BRING TRAFFIC
• Between 12-20% of
BostonNOW’s site
traffic was to blogs;
much of the classic
“long tail” variety
• In less than 12
months, we attracted
773,000 unique visitors
to a completely new
product with no
promotional budget

33. blank
5 free papers, all the same -- but we,
YOU GET RESULTS! BostonNOW (the top line), had bloggers!
Paper closed April 2008
BostonNOW
Launch dates: MetroBoston (’00) Denver (‘01) Dallas (’03) TampaBay (’06) BostonNOW (‘07)

34. SO, WHAT’S ONE OF THE
BEST STRATEGIES TO
ACHIEVE YOUR MISSION?
After the previous 30
slides, do you really need
time to think about that?

35. ANSWER:
HIGH-QUALITY BLOGS
USED STRATEGICALLY
Vetted blogs
written by experts
in their niches.
Blogs covering every
niche you want to own.
Published on your website,
AND in your paper.
In the theme-appropriate section,
NOT in a “blogger ghetto”

36. THAT’S ALL VERY COOL, JOHN
But
show us
the MONEY

37. EXAMPLES OF SALES RESULTS
• After the Christian Science
Monitor’s success with our
economy blogs, Smuckers
signed up to sponsor the
food blogs a month
BEFORE we launched.
• BostonNOW did a $90,000
deal with a large regional
bank mixing web and print
budget to reach young
college grads with text
and video content,
and banners

38. BUT EDITORS ARE NERVOUS
Are we risking our
hard-earned credibility
opening our pages to
outsiders?
O!
N
ou are still
Y
the
gatekeeper.
Don’t publish ALL
the blogs, only
the BEST blogs.
Photo by CayUSA on flickr/CC

39. THEY WORRY ABOUT THE UNKNOWN
How can I take
responsibility for
authors and content I
know nothing about?
EASY!
ou vet them like you
Y
would any columnist
or freelancer…
And pull them
if they err.
Photo by SarahFelicity on flickr/CC

40. THEY WORRY ABOUT PROFESSIONALISM
Don't you see any
difference between
blogs by journalists
and by readers?
ABSOLUTELY!
Reporters are trained
to collect and check
facts; bloggers aren’t.
While many bloggers are
excellent, you should
brand them graphically
to make the distinction.
Photo by Reinvented on flickr/CC

41. THEY FEAR NEFARIOUS ULTERIOR MOTIVES
Isn’t it just a
clever way for
publishers to
cut costs?
NO!
Most bloggers are
not reporters. We
still need reporters
Bloggers are an
addition to your
local news products.
Photo by St Stev on flickr/CC

42. THEY WORRY ABOUT THE FUTURE
Will community
bloggers will be
willing to produce
their content for
free in the future?
ES
Y
Traffic, exposure,
and brand
extension are
currently more
valuable than a
Photo by Red5StandingBy on flickr/CC freelance check.

43. THE ALTERNATIVE?
Do nothing and
the competition
will eat your lunch
“Newspapers are going
to see the relentless
emergence of new forms of
media that might not even
be … positioned as
competition, but which
have the potential to siphon
off audience.”
— Andrew Nachison, Co-founder
iFOCOS, a media think tank

44. A NEW VISION: INCLUSION
"Stop pretending your
organization is an
oracle. It's not. You
don't know everything,
and even if you did, you
couldn't publish as
much as you'd like to.
Pointing to outside
sources of information
— especially local
blogs and other media
— is a great start …

45. A NEW VISION: CREATING TOGETHER
“… It does not mean
that you endorse what
these folks are saying or
vouch for it, but it does
mean that you
recognize that others in
your community are
creating media with at
least some information
other people might want
to see."
Dan Gillmor, Director, Knight Center
for Digital Media Entrepreneurship,
Arizona State Univ.

46. SO, THE KEY TO SURVIVING
AND THRIVING?
BE FOUND!
You canʼt be found if youʼre not REMARK-ABLE
If you ARE remark-able, youʼll spread.
If you spread, youʼll rise in Google ranking, authority
If you rise, youʼll be found more often and youʼll
increasingly own your market, and the future will
look a LOT brighter than it does today...

47. BOTTOM LINE?
High-quality non-staff blogs
can help you succeed in,
many, many ways.
For free......
TODAY

48. Thank you!
Now go
home and
find some
great
bloggers
John Wilpers, Senior Consultant
INNOVATION Media Consulting Group
617.688.0137 / johnwilpers@aol.com blank
Twitter: johnwilpers; Blog: johnwilpers.wordpress.com