Thursday, January 5, 2006

Why do people spend money researching the obvious? (To generate publicity and get mentioned in places like Poynter Online, perhaps?) Here's another study that falls into that camp: Traffic to news sites spikes when there are big news stories.

As reported today by MediaPost Communications, "A recent release by Hitwise concludes that trends in visits to news and media sites are driven by major events. Significant spikes were seen in the past year during the 2004 elections, the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, the death of Terry Schiavo, the London bombings, and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita."

Well, now. How much did they spend to figure that out? Any reader of ratings at the 24-hour news cable channels, or newspaper circulation charts, or radio audience books, or anything similar, could have told them.

But there is a serious point to be made here. Newspapers that stop updating their sites at 6 p.m., or update only once or twice a day, will permanently damage their "news" reputations if and when a big story, like a mine disaster, breaks in their back yard. Conversely, great coverage can lead to a permanent increase in traffic and improvement in reputation.

Every newspaper -- in fact, every news site -- needs a strategy for 24/7/365 coverage on major stories. They don't just happen in large markets. They can also happen in small towns. Like Shanksville, Pennsylvania (where United Airlines flight 93 crashed on September 11, 2001). Or Sago, West Virginia, where a coal mine disaster killed 12 people this week.

TV stations have a "disaster plan" on the shelf in the newsroom. Newspapers should, too. Chances are most newspapers do -- but chances are, too, that most newspapers haven't included extensive coverage online (and on other media channels) in that disaster plan. They should.

Blogger Tim Porter raises the point in more detail than I can here, which is worth reading.
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