As Thanksgiving is here, it is time to give thanks for what has been.
It is purely coincidental that Thanksgiving this year nearly lines up perfectly with ArkansasNewsroom.com’s birthday, which will be a healthy 4 on Saturday.
Well, it isn’t exactly a coincidence. The site’s launch four years ago was timed to be after the general election but ahead of the runoff between North Little Rock Mayor Terry Hartwick and Tracy Steele. This time around, Hartwick ran for his second consecutive, and third overall, term unopposed while Steele ran for the State House, and was also unopposed.
This time, there are no runoffs in North Little Rock, but Maumelle has one, for Council Member, and that keeps the news going as this election season comes to an end next week.
It has been the subscribers that keep the site going as we enter Year 5.
Those numbers continue to increase, as does traffic and page views and all the rest of the online metrics used to measure success.
In 2020, it was a bit of a gamble to see if readers would support a local news and sports site, and they have. Remarkably so even.
Sometimes the numbers are a headscratchers, like why is a Panda Express coming to Maumelle Boulevard still have legs year after it was first reported?
One of the things that you learn doing news, whether it is in print or online, is you can’t always parse out what gets widely read.
The big projects that take months to report out, maybe they hit and don’t leave a ripple, while a quickie on a fast food restaurant is read for years.
Anyway, the goal was to build and then maintain a local news and sports website that replicates the look and feel of a weekly newspaper. With a decade plus of experience at The Times of North Little Rock and Maumelle Monitor, among others and more than three decades of work experience in reporting and publishing, it felt like that there was a need for a spot for North of the River news that other outlets weren’t delivering.
Somehow, and someway, the current metrics exceed in terms of readership and subscribers for those former print publications and that’s been great.
That hockey stick of growth, always pointed up, has been extremely gratifying to see. Part of that has been a consistent publishing schedule, every week with a newsletter on Wednesday night or Thursday morning, with other stories going up during the week. There’s now been nearly 2,000 articles published since Nov. 30, 2020 or, on average, more than one a day.
There’s also been two candidate forums, in 2022 and earlier this year, and looking at ways to do even more in the coming years.
But that’s all because of ya’ll, so for that, I am extremely thankful and grateful for the support.
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Reasons to be thankful
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As Thanksgiving is here, it is time to give thanks for what has been.
It is purely coincidental that Thanksgiving this year nearly lines up perfectly with ArkansasNewsroom.com’s birthday, which will be a healthy 4 on Saturday.
Well, it isn’t exactly a coincidence. The site’s launch four years ago was timed to be after the general election but ahead of the runoff between North Little Rock Mayor Terry Hartwick and Tracy Steele. This time around, Hartwick ran for his second consecutive, and third overall, term unopposed while Steele ran for the State House, and was also unopposed.
This time, there are no runoffs in North Little Rock, but Maumelle has one, for Council Member, and that keeps the news going as this election season comes to an end next week.
It has been the subscribers that keep the site going as we enter Year 5.
Those numbers continue to increase, as does traffic and page views and all the rest of the online metrics used to measure success.
In 2020, it was a bit of a gamble to see if readers would support a local news and sports site, and they have. Remarkably so even.
Sometimes the numbers are a headscratchers, like why is a Panda Express coming to Maumelle Boulevard still have legs year after it was first reported?
One of the things that you learn doing news, whether it is in print or online, is you can’t always parse out what gets widely read.
The big projects that take months to report out, maybe they hit and don’t leave a ripple, while a quickie on a fast food restaurant is read for years.
Anyway, the goal was to build and then maintain a local news and sports website that replicates the look and feel of a weekly newspaper. With a decade plus of experience at The Times of North Little Rock and Maumelle Monitor, among others and more than three decades of work experience in reporting and publishing, it felt like that there was a need for a spot for North of the River news that other outlets weren’t delivering.
Somehow, and someway, the current metrics exceed in terms of readership and subscribers for those former print publications and that’s been great.
That hockey stick of growth, always pointed up, has been extremely gratifying to see. Part of that has been a consistent publishing schedule, every week with a newsletter on Wednesday night or Thursday morning, with other stories going up during the week. There’s now been nearly 2,000 articles published since Nov. 30, 2020 or, on average, more than one a day.
There’s also been two candidate forums, in 2022 and earlier this year, and looking at ways to do even more in the coming years.
But that’s all because of ya’ll, so for that, I am extremely thankful and grateful for the support.