NBC 11 In California Experiences The Digg Effect
No, not this kind of Digg effect – their site is up and functioning well. Their web traffic is what I’m talking about:
NBC 11 reports on Bay Area local news, entertainment, weather, traffic, etc. along with relevant national content – just like any other local news station. So how exactly is their traffic recently spiking to these tremendous numbers? They’re not a national news outlet, nor did the Bay Area recently experience a huge jump in population. The answer is actually quite simple: they learned about packaging news for Digg and social media.
I’ve recently noticed a pattern on Digg: stories submitted from NBC 11 are consistently going popular. They are taking advantage social media in a huge way, have a look at all the stories from the site that have hit page 1 of Digg.
This is definitely the local news outlet that is experiencing the most traffic from Digg – sure I see other local news outlets getting a story or two here or there on the site, but no others are consistently getting stuff on page one. And the traffic benefit, as illustrated above, is huge.
The user, jboitnott on Digg is the one who has been submitting most of the recent stories. He either is someone working at the station that showed them how to tap into national potential for their stories and their news, or is just a fan of the content.
NBC 11 has realized the power of packaging ‘stories in pictures’, as their slideshows are the ones that are continually submitted and make page one. Check out an example of one of these slideshows.
Many local news organizations are afraid of the web because it’s drawing traffic away from them. The actual situation is the reverse – the web presents an unprecedented opportunity for them, or anyone really. NBC 11 has been smart enough to take advantage of packaging national stories in social media friendly formats to gain traffic from people globally, not just in the Bay Area of California. And with these huge traffic spikes undoubtedly comes a rush of ad revenue.
If you compare your local news stations numbers to NBC 11 in the Alexa tool, you’ll see your local station’s traffic isn’t even close. Really though, it’s anyone’s game to do this properly – a blogger, a local news affiliate, or any kind of content producer. That’s the beauty of social networking news sites, all users who present the right content in the right way have a chance to win.
Not familiar with Digg? Here’s an introduction.
Further Reading:
Social Media And Artists: A Natural Fit
April 9th, 2008 at 11:05 am
“rush of ad revenue.”?
Disagree. Advertising on these local news Web sites is about meeting a forecast of clicks after agreeing on a CPM. These clicks are used to meet advertisers’ targets for campaigns — not set a price. For this traffic to turn into revenue, you have to promise more clicks and increase the CPM, which means you have to maintain this traffic. Do you think NBC11 can keep this up, and if it can, do you think a car dealership in San Francisco wants to pay for users in Philadelphia who will never buy a car at their dealership?
April 9th, 2008 at 11:14 am
Looks to me like the ads on the slideshow pages were nationally based, not locally. And if they aren’t setup to make extra revenue off increased bumps of traffic, then they’re missing out.