News LTD Local
Is News Ltd doing local iPhone apps? I would like some sort of hybrid of the local newspaper with events calendar, roadworks alerts, local MP & Councilor contacts etc. Where are all the Christmas fireworks in your area this year? We have a large Hindu Temple near us and it would have been great to go to the Divwali fireworks. What’s happening in my local community is important to me but I don’t want to have to search through a newspaper full of catalogue inserts to find the news that may be of interest to me. I’d also like to connect with more people in the local community. It’s difficult to do that with a local newspaper these days.
News Ltd has a long history of giving news away for free. Given Rupert Murdoch’s recent protestations in which he referred to Google et al as content kleptomaniacs & plagiarists, I would have thought this would be a great opportunity to repurpose existing assets and capitalise on an existing customer base.
Google Local Search
This is a customer base that Google is having trouble penetrating.
The local fish & chip shop (fush & chups for our NZ readers) is unlikely to take out an adwords campaign or employ an SEO firm. However, if their brand is front of mind within a useful local community news & social networking environment & includes coupons etc then conversions will be high.
News already has the sales force that talks to the fish & chip shop owners. They know who the sponsors of the local footy club are. This sort of local knowledge Google doesn’t have.
They can’t go to the key movers & shakers at a local level because they don’t have the history of the local paper. News also have existing content producers with networks of local contacts.
Local iPhone advertising
The advertising options could vary from context keyword sensitive to branding sponsorship of things like footy clubs contact pages, gig guides etc.
I would love to go to a new town or even the next suburb and quickly get a feel for what’s happening in the community.
The key to an app like this is the local journos. The local content is what will promote discussion and involvement. Keep the content free Rupert. Provide the service and get local business to sponsor it. I’m pretty sure it’s a model you’re familiar with. Your model is right, it’s just in the wrong medium.
Jim’s been here for a while, you know who he is.
