Newspapers developing hyperlocal revenue streams

Posted by Savita Sauvin on February 11, 2010 at 4:31 PM

Newspapers have always been the go-to destinations for most in-depth local coverage, but with the digital revolution many fell behind in organising that hyperlocal content online. Other sources have picked up the slack, and today hyperlocal content is more valuable than ever before.

One new source is Outside.in, which is partnering with publishers to better aggregate hyperlocal content through monitoring news, blogs, Web discussions, maps and more, and to also serve targeted advertising to readers, MediaBuyerPlanner reported Tuesday. Publishers include Dow Jones Media Group, the New York Post, The Miami Herald, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and properties of the Tribune Company.

Outside.in has mapped to more than 50,000 neighborhoods in the United States, and then paired those areas accordingly with targeted advertising.

Partnering with a site like Outside.in helps publishers aggregate and categorise local news and information effectively, while also creating tailored local news sites. It also facilitates tagging news maps, social-media functions like reader comments and sharing via e-mail, and helps advertisers deliver audience-specific advertising at relatively modest prices, Media Post reported.

The Outside.in network currently serves 57,830 neighborhoods, aggregates and organises more than 40,000 unique feeds, provides information to more than 100 news Web sites and has recently added 4,000 local bloggers to its roster, according to MediaBuyerPlanner. The site has also seen an increase in Web traffic to more than seven million unique visitors monthly.

Estimated local online advertising is expected to reach US$16.4 billion by 2014, according to research from Borrell Associates. Mobile local searches are expected to make up 35 percent of all searches by 2013, while mobile local search ad revenues are expected to reach $130 million by 2013, according to BIA/Kelsey, MediaBuyerPlanner reported.

On Monday, Jeff Jarvis told the audience at Borrell Associates' Local Online Advertising Conference that while hyperlocal sites can attract thousands of dollars in revenue, they can do so with a very small support staff, paidContent reported.