It feels like everywhere I turn there is yet another media company paying writers to crank out search engine friendly content, in thinly veiled attempts to please the google bots.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the years looking into the content gaps in converting local to an informed and useful shopping experience. The quest for deeper local content is on the order of a holy grail epic challenge.

The standard by which most publishers currently seem to be approaching their content strategy is “whatever the google bot rewards”.

the inch deep dilemma

I REALLY get the business case for hiring cheap writers and blogging and writing the heck out of a category or place.  I’ve done it myself.  Having “been there” however, I also know that this kind of writing rarely drives community OR anything but transitory, tactical commerce actions.

Fact of the matter is, bots are dumb, people are smart.

For the most part, what I’ve seen scattered throughout local media sites is disingenuous and obvious content that rarely informs a consumer shopping decision.  To me, this runs a real risk that it will works against the (increasingly urgent) brand development needs of the media business. Authenticity is something consumers are seeking, and rewarding with loyalty and social media “juice”.  Conversely, gratuitous content diminishes the appeal of a site/brand.

If this is simply treated as “air cover” while a real hyper local or vertical content strategy is executed, than I’m ALL FOR IT.  However, to make this “THE content strategy” for a local media publisher is a dangerous and problematic approach.

At the end of the day, this is at the heart of a real core business identity issue for many local media companies.  It’s time to think like a consumer publisher, not (just) a traffic hungry sales channel.  Chasing consumers through the lens of a Google bot will blur your vision and stunt your growth in the long run.

image credit: motherjones.com

Somehow, the time feels right for some fresh/absurd, Hail Mary thinking when it comes to evolution in the troubled Local Media landscape.

When I look at the problems infecting two major sectors of local media  – newspapers and yellow pages – an idea springs to mind.  Try it on…

Slam them together into one integrated local media business.  Collapse redundant distribution and operations, re-align and trim the sales forces. Infuse the newspaper’s strength with promotion and retail into the scalable SEM/search infrastructure of the YP channel.  Construct a true local consumer portal and promotion channel that has local search and promotion embedded throughout.  Trim out the low-value display ad junk and create real local shopping applications that generate leads and solve consumer problems.

In the off-chance that you’re still reading, perhaps I can explain my thinking a bit more.

Newspapers have a deep infrastructure for collecting and publishing local content for consumers. Sure, there are increasing content challenges, but consumption of online newspapers continues to rise, their share of local usage is deep, and the brand is still meaningful to mainstream consumers.

The problem with newspapers is their defunct revenue model.  Newspapers simply don’t have the business foundation to sustain a position in the future local media landscape.

Yellow Pages print and distribute a publication whose relevance to consumers is systematically deteriorating. Yet, they are fundamentally succeeding in becoming a dominating agent for hundreds of thousands of local advertisers in commercial search, and are beginning to execute on the key growth segments of mobile and video.

If you take the traffic generating foundation of the newspaper industry, and combine it with the revenue and sales engine of YP, you may just have a sustainable ecosystem that can invest more in local online publishing, make commercial use of scads of truly local content, and actually sustain a viable local media publishing empire.

The Newspaper Picture

Newspapers have a terminally ill business model.  Feel good placebos continue to be dished out, but the effects of the disease have become so apparent that it’s not worth discussing anymore.  The classified ship has sailed, and the remaining ad math simply does not compute.

Newspapers missed Search, and the resources/effort required to catch up is fantasy league fodder – investment capital is non-existent.

The Yellow Pages Picture

Yellow Pages is not, and never was, a true consumer publishing business.  It is an amazing engine for selling, placing and distributing local advertising.  The utility and performance of the websites owned and operated by YP businesses is floundering, and long-term sustainability carries very real risk.

YP publishers did not miss the search shift.  The channel and tools are being systematically constructed for selling ad products into a scaled network of owned & operated properties, partner sites, and SEM-based distribution.

The Combined Business Case

The newspaper publishing infrastructure is something to build on. Yellow Pages has a viable business model as a scaled local sales channel, but their future as a consumer publisher is open to debate.

The improved margin that comes with owned/operated consumer traffic is critical to the composite business case. If YP cannot sustain this role, it risks a continued margin erosion to “channel-only” margins.

Add to this the fact that newspapers have the best current ad position in retail and promotion-based ad spending.  As these budgets are morphing into lead gen packages in online and mobile media, working from the newspaper’s pole position further sweetens the synergies.  Newspapers have the relationship, but lack the products/distribution infrastructure; YP fills in the blanks.  In a down economy, measurable promotions will be one of the most promising elements of online advertising.

Could this effect happen any other way? Sure, in theory, but I think you have to look inside the fabric of these organizations.  The DNA of a newspaper is editorial and promotion centric, and the DNA of Yellow Pages is sales and distribution based.    The pressures on both of these business make it enormously difficult to be championing reinvention investments from the inside.

Hey, isn’t it more fun to read wedding announcements than obituaries?

So….is this scenario really THAT far-fetched?