Shopping "marketplace" posts $400,000 in new revenues
Customized shopping sites developed by the Evening Post Publishing Company include elements of business directories, coupon sites and dining guides. Each is a standalone site, but relies heavily on newspaper site promotions, including a front page widget promoting featured listings. Together four sites generate $400,000 a year, and growing. Here's a close look at ShopBrazos.com:
Site: Shop Brazos.com
Market: Brazos Valley, Texas
Traffic: 20,000 UV’s, 40,000 page views monthly
Company: Evening Post Publishing
Key executive: Mike Albin, President of Evening Post Interactive: Zachary Payer, Interactive Business Development
Summary: Customized shopping/directory sites include elements of business directories, coupon sites and dining guides. Each niche site has a standalone site, but relies heavily on newspaper site promotions. Together four of these directory sites generate $400,000 a year. Here's a close look at ShopBrazos.com.
Challenge: In 2006 the Evening Post Interactive sales were flat and the company hired Mike Albin, as president of interactive. A core strategy for Albin is developing independent niche sites. The team wanted to develop a local business directory that would be more of a local marketplace with:
• More flexibility for locally driven initiatives
• Ability to accommodate print to web advertising
• Customization for each of four daily marketplaces.
Because of the customized needs, the group chose not to partner with an IYP affiliate.
Strategy: Albin’s team, including head of Interactive Business Development, Zachary Pay, leveraged existing staff and local information to execute the directory:
Platform: The directory was built by inhouse programers on their open source Mediaspan platform. The company already employs three programers who worked on the project (were consolidated from "part-timers" at different locations to full-timers in the central office). The inhouse team can now deliver a unique platform per paper every 90 days.
Components: ShopBrazo, like each of the directories, has a unique “skin” to provide a look and feel, plus the following elements:
• Search box to access businesss lising (origintally purchased from Axiom)
• 16 categories, with about ten subcategories each, actively sold and promoted on the home page.
• The home page also promotes a row of national coupons, from partner Couposinc.com
• Garage sales and open houses, one of the most popular traffic drivers, are included from feeds from the daily site.
• A daily deals section, also on the home page, offers discounts, mostly from restaurants, compiled by the niche site manager with help from the retail staff
•Ad positions for ROS ads, including one that will be used for a Groupon-style offering.
Staffing: The site is managed and sold by one full time person, with help from retail reps. There are no self-serve paid listings as yet (an upgrade on the road map).
Pricing: Claiming a listing is free, then the first $25.99 per month upgrade includs a microsite. Upgrading to the next level, $49.90, allows advertisers to have a photograph taken by The Eagle staff at their location, and gives them 11,000 impressions as a 'featured listing" on the home page of TheEagle.com. For $90 a month the advertiser also receives a long form page with a video of their business.
Marketing: Site marketing relies on heavy integration on the home page of TheEagle.com:
• Placement on the navigation bar
• Salon and Beauty is a featured channel
• One rotating business from the directory is featured in a key right hand location
Results: While ShopBrazo.com has about 40,000 page views and 20,000 UV's, the largest site, lowcountrymarketplace.com is up to 100,000 page views. Most of the traffic is generated from the front end rather than search. The team is working on SEO to move these numbers up, and plans to double traffic in the next year.
Revenues are impressive. With 2% of about 7000 listings sold, ShopBrazos.com has about 140 paid listings. Since the typical averages $49.99 per month, this one marketplace delivers about $4800 a month or $60,000 a year. Albin says the marketplaces for the four dailies totals $400,000.
The author, Alisa Cromer is publisher of a variety of online media, including LocalMediaInsider and MediaExecsTech, developed while on a fellowship with the Reynolds Journalism Institute and which has evolved into a leading marketing company for media technology start-ups. In 2017 she founded Worldstir.com, an online magazine, to showcases perspectives from around the world on new topic each month, translated from and to the top five languages in the world.
Keywords
theeagle.com, shopbrazos.com, albin, payer, zachary, evening post
