Do you frustrate your viewers in an attempt to send them to your website? If so, you’re not alone – I see this huge mistake made in newscasts across the country. This ill-advised practice was spotlighted in a recent article in the New York Daily News.  New Yorkers were frustrated by commuting problems with the Long Island Railroad – and the local TV newscasts made a bad situation worse.

The article cited numerous examples. WPIX telling viewers, “We have a full list of all the delays and cancellations at WPIX.com.” Huh? And, WNBC told local news viewers, “Before you head out, you do want to take a look at the MTA website.” Huh? I’m sure viewers were saying, “Why in the hell am I watching this local newscast when they aren’t giving me the important information?” And we wonder why viewers keep saying local TV newscasts are not relevant to their lives.

I was watching a local TV newscast recently when they teased a story on the worst places to live in America. I sat through the commercial break, and they came on and gave the one worst city – and said, “For a complete list go to our website.” Huh? You owe it to your viewers to at least give them a top ten list, before sending them away. This kind of gaffe is committed by stations that have a poor strategy – or no strategy at all – for sending viewers to their websites.

So let me outline a solid, basic strategy for meeting your viewer’s needs while also trying to drive traffic to your website. First off – viewers come to your newscast to get COMPLETE information and you must give it to them in a clear, easy to follow manner. It is also important to drive traffic on your website – but the BEST way to achieve that is to promise deeper, richer content that is IN ADDITION to your complete newscast report. You must also be very specific in what they’ll get if they check out your website. Unfortunately, many stations still say, “For more information visit our website.” That does not work. Give them very specific information instead, “To read the complete search warrant,” OR “To see a list of all the suspect’s felony convictions over the years” etc.

Here is an excellent litmus test. It was offered by New York Daily News TV News Editor Richard Huff, “When local stations push viewers to find other avenues to answer their basic questions, well, they’ve failed.” Amen brother!

Jim

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 5th, 2010 at 10:27 am and is filed under Willi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.