My second ideaLab project - SEO Toolkit

At our first official ideaLab meeting last month, I proposed an SEO Toolkit for my second ideaLab project. Using some quick and easy search engine optimization tools, the SEO Toolkit is meant to help our newspapers' community bloggers drive and measure traffic to their blogs (which will ultimately increase traffic to our newspaper sites).

The SEO toolkit also includes instructions to set-up a free Google Analytics account to measure the results of their SEO efforts. So the question is - how to you measure the success of a project that is based on metrics?

SEO Toolkit

Thoughts on Newspaper Mobile Websites...

I've put together some ideas on what features would be beneficial for our newspapers' mobile websites. Please add any additional features/thoughts/comments below.

Newspaper Mobile Website Features:

• Weather Updates by Zip Code (also a great way to gather geographical
information for mobile ad targeting)
• Link to Breaking News Feed “Top Headlines” with short teaser on Main Page.
• Articles should have the option to leave comments/feedback from registered
users. “Registered” users would have to indicate age, location, and gender. Once
we gather a large enough database of “registered” users, we can begin offering a
more accurate targeted advertising option for the mobile site.
• Main Page should have links to Entertainment Page, Blog Page, Sports Page,
Contests, etc. with teaser of 20-25 characters from most popular/recent post in
each category.
• Needs option to sign up for text alerts on local breaking news stories, ideally
delivered by zip code/region relevant to individual users (default to link to userentered
zip code or automatic location updates when GPS is enabled).
• Local/National Sports Scores
• Ideally, the site main page should have the option to be customized to individual
registered users (would also like to work on this option for main sites) to act as a
sort of mobile home page, featuring teasers and quick links to the information
that is relevant to each user.
• Also needs to include the option to view the full site as well. I’ve been on a few
mobile websites that include limited access and do not offer the option to view
the main site (yes, I’m talking about you Chase.com).

Revenue Opportunities:

Based on the Smartphone user demographics, we could market
the new mobile advertising opportunity as a semi-targeted campaign that can reach our
higher income, higher educated, young “executive” readers (I’d also like to look into
options for more accurate targeting through user registration).
Since many Smartphones still don’t have the capability to view flash, we would need to
review the types of ads served through the mobile site and determine whether it could
be incorporated into the impressions sold through current banner ad packages or if it
would have to be sold separately. We’d also need to consider how this may affect the
products that we currently sell as 100% Share of Voice (ie. Sponsorships,
Pencil/Billboard ads, etc.), since our mobile readers would not be able to view those
ads.
It also might be beneficial to sell the mobile site advertising on a pay-per-click basis
rather than by impressions since the ads themselves will be smaller, simpler and
consequently less effective on the “branding” side.

My First ideaLab Project - the "Virtual Resource Center"

For my first ideaLab project, I wanted to start with something that would benefit the advertising team to help reaffirm the support they've given me. 

I came up with the Virtual Resource Center as a way to digitize the sales process for outside sales reps to spend more time on the road selling and less time in the office picking up sales resources, filling out paperwork and turning in ad proofs. Using entirely free tools like Google Apps, Google Docs & Crocodocs, the VRC combines all of the major sales resources necessary to make the sale, turn in order logs and turn around proof corrections for your customer.

The Oakland Press' VRC can be viewed HERE.

You can log in with our view-only user: testuser@oakpress.com, password: oakpress

For a step-by-step guide to building a Virtual Resource Center, click HERE.