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by Peter W. Wagner
Community newspaper publishers shouldn’t worry that social media will force them down the road of last century’s buggy whip factories.
Buggy whips were manufactured for just one purpose. There was little demand for them when automobiles replaced the horse-drawn buggy.
Community newspapers, however, serve many needs and provide their most essential service far better than any independent website or social media page.
Hometown publications are credible. All the information published in a hometown paper is carefully researched, written and edited by committed professionals who put reporting facts ahead of being popular influencers. Those newspaper reporters and editors are local community members who are easily accessible walking down the street, in the coffee shops, at Friday night’s high school game and in church on Sunday. They interact with their readers every day and cannot afford to purposely make a misstatement or draw a wrong conclusion. Readers of the newspaper are fast to point out any errors, omissions or half-truths.
That accessibility is not always available with the blog writers and paid influencers pouring their words and undocumented ideas into the community. They often color their so-called news with personal opinion, misdirection or information favorable to their sponsors. Fortunately, many progressive, profitable, hometown publications operate in communities too small to have any serious social media information sites.
Still, in December’s e-mail I suggested four reasons weekly newspaper might not survive if the larger metro publications fail. In this edition of “Get Real” I’d like to offer four different reasons why community newspapers and shoppers should and could exist through any number of future digital revolutions.
- Hometown newspapers create community.
History, scripture and human experience have proved that man was never meant to live alone gazing at a computer screen. Life can be best enjoyed and effective when members of a community interact face-to-face visiting, working, relaxing, worshiping and achieving together as one body. Community newspapers encourage that face-to-face involvement by keeping readers updated on the important local happenings that are discussed each morning around the office water cooler.
More notably, local newspapers promote interaction by drawing attention to the efforts of the local high school teams, sharing what will be new and exciting about an upcoming city celebration or perhaps through the announcement of the opening of a new business. Social media, with its multitude of competing messengers can’t do those things. Only the local paper, lovingly nurtured and published, reaches a broad enough audience to accomplish such magic.
- Community newspapers assure consistency.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to retrieve a message once heard on the radio, seen on television or discovered on the internet. But finding something earlier read in the hometown paper is easy. Many homes keep their copy up to two weeks after it is published. School and public libraries keep file copies anywhere from a month to a full year. Most newspapers still archive copies in bound volumes that are made available to the public at no charge.
Got a question about a city motion, huge fire or big game 10 years ago? It isn’t easy to obtain the information at the radio or television studio. It is possible to find it online, although it might require hours of searching. But if it was printed in the hometown paper, and just about everything that happens is, the details can quickly be found in a saved clipping in a desk or file drawer or by obtaining a photocopy from the newspaper.
- Newspapers provide encouragement as well as criticism.
Newspaper don’t just report the news, they support ideas that are good for the community. They also question ones that seem to fall short. Those comments are published on the editorial pages which often endorse and cheerlead wise decisions as well as question those that appear bad. It’s those opinions and editorials that help drive community thought and consensus.
While some single-idea blogs and websites work to split the town apart, the newspaper, of all media, is the only one committed to bringing all citizens to having one mind regarding the making of the best decision for the majority of the community.
- Newspapers follow a story to its completion.
Unlike most other media which focuses on breaking news and hot topics, the community newspaper follows a story to the very end. Subscribers get the what, where, who and why from the newspaper even if the final chapter doesn’t happen for months. Radio, television and the internet sites don’t do that. Their news jumps from hour to hour like a child’s balloon in the wind. With the electronic media, breaking news often becomes old news before another hour passes.
So, what do those who still believe in the printed newspaper do to improve the current situation and to secure a positive future?
The truth is it is going to take a great deal of work. Overall, the publishing industry has let the naysayers shout their untruths for too long without making an adequate response. Television networks, most especially CBS, have boldly reported the decline of print numbers while hiding their huge loss of viewing numbers under a bushel basket. The newspaper industry lacks a national voice like “60 Minutes” to shine a light on the traditional network viewer’s deflection to a still growing number of cable channels.
Advertising on Facebook is limited by Facebook to as few as 25 percent of those who have “liked” that business.
Only newspapers can provide a certified list of what homes actually receive a client’s message any specific day or week.
Still, sharing that message with the local community is not enough to save and grow the newspaper industry. The competition in local communities has grown immensely since newspapers had an exclusive lock on local advertising in the 1950s. Publishers are going to have to invest more in their news, creative and advertising sales teams to succeed. No company has ever saved itself into success.
Advertising managers are going to have to create more fresh and unique promotions, packages and special sections to get their share of local advertising dollars. Salespeople are going to have to stop selling by sending out e-mail and get back on the street where big decisions are made, and it is possible to sense a shift in the local marketing direction before it happens.
Newspapers aren’t dead and they never will be. There will always be proud grandmothers who appreciate clippings of their family to hang on the refrigerator. There will always be fans who want all the details of Friday’s game. There will always be watchdogs who want to know what is happening at city hall and the schools in an organized, edited package.
It is true newspaper can’t compete with Google and Facebook in their bigger world. But it is also true Goggle and Facebook don’t have the connections or influence of hometown papers in their market.
