Baristanet.com is a leading independent news site in NJ. Many news media experts consider Baristanet to be a whopping success in a sea of general interist news site and blog failures (traditional and nontraditional). Business is good at Baristanet and they are enjoying a growing community presence. At O’RIELLY Tools of Change 2009 Future of News panel discussion, Jeff Jarvis went so far as to suggest that New Jersey’s largest newspaper, The Star-Ledger, enter into some kind of partnership with Baristanet to share resources.

Following the TOC 2009 event I wanted to learn more about this hyperlocal hero.  What follows is an email Q&A between metaprinter.com founder Robert Ivan and Baristanet.com Co-Owner Liz George. Enjoy!

RI- Introduce yourself and tell us what you do on a daily basis at Baristanet.

LG- I’m Liz George and I’m the co-owner and editor of Baristanet. My partner and the site’s founder Deb Galant started Baristanet in May 2004. Her initial partnership did not work out; we started working together in August 2004 and soon after became partners.

On any given day, I’m either writing for Baristanet, editing the stories from other writers and contributors, assigning stories, updating the site with breaking news, answering requests from readers, community organizations, businesses, etc., and working on developing new aspects and features of the site, new projects and alliances. Some days, Deb and I will meet, but typically we do most of our work virtually and fill in with phone calls and emails. Deb handles more of the ad sales end of things.

RI- You didn’t start off as a general interest news blog or did you? How did this evolve?  Were you filling an unmet need?

LG- Baristanet was started as an experiment, with an aim to deliver local news to three contiguous towns in Essex County in a hyperlocal and humorous way. In this area, the local coverage was limited to newspapers for these towns that published on a once a week basis, and some additional coverage a couple days a week in the Star Ledger. Baristanet began covering both the big and small stories, and covering them 24/7. Once we gained an audience, our readers began bringing us the news – tipping us to happenings, everything from car crashes to falling trees to home teardowns to crimes. Instead of linking to newspapers for coverage of these stories, we began breaking these stories and our readers began to get their local news immediately, rather than waiting for the weekly newspaper. Since then, some of the local papers in our area are stepping up their web presence.

RI- When you run an announcement that a commenter named “mike” had a baby and over 40 people respond with congratulations it is clear to me that there is a large, growing community on your site. What drives that relationship? Or did I just answer my own question?

LG- I think what drives the relationship for our site is its intimate quality. People who visit the site on a daily basis and read the comments on posts get to know their neighbors, albeit by pseudonym in many cases. Some commenters even get together to meet and socialize on their own; many share personal stories and major events in their lives (link to a long-time commenter who got married and ran a marathon). Their stories and opinions are part of the site’s flavor; we’re not just a place to read the local news, we’re an interactive community and we’ve become a daily habit for the people who visit this site, much like a local coffee shop. Personality is a huge factor – without it, a local site is vanilla and bland, something I touched on here in this PressThink article.

RI- NYT has David Carr, BoingBoing has Xeni Jardin, MetaFilter has Ask.MetaFilter, for someone who’s never been to your site, where should they go? What is your most engaging feature?

LG- I’d probably tell them to click on comments on a post. Each post is different and sometimes commenters go off on wild tangents that have nothing to do with the original story. Having said that, there are some pretty funny commenters and the back and forth can be very interesting. Often, people add information in comments that we then explore and add to the story, if we can get confirmation. So the comments can add a lot to the site.

RI- No one ever wants to talk revenue numbers, so I will. You started in 2004, when did you become cashflow positive? Is it realistic for laid off journalists to start a news blog and make money?

LG- I think it took 18 months before we started to make money. It’s definitely a smart idea for out of work journalists to consider doing something like Baristanet. We’ve been approached by a few people already; in response to that we’ve started Baristanet Incubator, where we help hatch new local sites. Interested parties can contact us about this at partners@baristanet.com.

RI- Cruising around the site I see advertisements all over the place, in the stories, in the sidebar, sponsorships, Classifieds, Google Adsense, etc. Is display advertising your biggest source of revenue? What is growing in importance?

LG-Display advertising is our primary source of revenue. We get some money from Google ads, but it’s an afterthought. We also have people who want to buy our classifieds, which is amazing when you think that Craiglist is available. People have gotten a good response with these ads and the intimacy of the site plus the traffic combine to make it attractive for people to use our classifieds.

RI- How challenging is it to sell display ads and sponsorships to smaller local businesses? Is it challenging? Do you have someone in-house to help them create ads?

LG-We have a terrific salesperson who knows our product inside and out. It’s become a lot easier to sell ads to local businesses now that these businesses see the kind of excitement and interest advertising on our site can generate. At least a third of all our ads have come in over the transom, from advertisers who have found the site and our ad kit and want to buy an ad. We have a talented in-house designer who makes ads for business who can’t provide their own; she can also help them create a web presence with a splash page.

RI- I’ve read too that you as a company are now branching out to consulting serves… what’s that all about? Have traditional newspapers approached you for advice?

LG-We’ve been approached by a variety of people to consult, but most have been individuals who are interested in doing something similar in their area. Deb and I have both spoke at conferences where the audience was traditional newspaper editors and publishers who wanted to learn more about hyperlocal sites like ours. Additionally, we’ve partnered in the past with the Star Ledger to create a special, co-branded section with them.

RI- If newspaper websites put up a paywall would it hurt your business or help it? What is your opinion on paywalls?

LG-The pay firewall was a bust for the New York Times. In general, I think paywalls are not smart. They go against the spirit of the Internet and they drive people from your site. As far as how it would affect us, I don’t think it would hurt us, and it might actually help.

RI- Some statements have been made that blogs are not real journalism and that if newspapers die, so does journalism. If traditional newspapers went bankrupt would it hurt or help your business? How would you adapt?

LG- I certainly don’t want to see traditional newspapers go under, but I don’t think journalism dies if they do. I’m an NYU J-school grad, and I think newspapers that survive will find a new identity in response to the Internet. As far as blogs not being “real journalism,” I think a lot of blogs, including ours, commit random acts of journalism on a regular basis. There are many instances both locally and nationally where blogs are breaking stories before “traditional journalists.” Still, covering all the news a traditional newspaper might cover isn’t always the full-time job of the blogger. In the case of our site, in addition to reporting news, we are looking for ways to entertain, elicit comments, link to national or state stories but with our own local twist, create and build a community, incorporate social networking tools, reunite lost dogs with owners, deal with offensive commenters, solicit our readers for opinions with polls and other interactive features.

RI- Where do you see The Star-Ledger and The Asbury Park Press 3 years from now?

LG- I don’t have a crystal ball, but where I’d like to see them three years from now is having evolved to meet the needs of their readers. That might include building relationships with sites like ours that are mutually beneficial.

RI- Where do you see Baristanet 3 years from now?

LG- I see us partnering on other local sites as well as adding to our existing site in terms of content and expanded back end operations.

RI- If you were me, what should I be asking you about right now?

LG- Do you have fun doing this? The answer is yes. It’s a lot of work, but ultimately running a business in your own community that touches the lives of people and gets them talking, arguing, interacting or even just eating at a restaurant we reviewed, can be very rewarding. Now that we’re making money, that helps, too.

RI- END of Q&A.  I want to thank Liz and Baristanet for their time in sharing this information.  Everyone go check them out and read through some comment sections!

Key Takeaways:

· The Baristanet online community has transitioned offline. This is one of the things Matt Haughey mentioned happens on Metafilter. Having a community around your site like this builds the brand even stronger, something severely lacking on big impersonal newspaper sites.

.      Contact Baristanet to see how they can help you launch a local news site:  partners@baristanet.com

· People pay to advertise on the Baristanet Classifieds section even though Craigslist is a free option in the area. Again, the value of a community and strong brand here adds value where without it there would be none. If newspaper sites had such strong community ties, perhaps those people would also pay for their classified services as well, no?

.      The Baristanet website doe not use any fancy coding or voodoo trickery to accomplish its goals.  The biggest attraction is news and community interaction.  NYT article skimmer take note.

“I think a lot of blogs, including ours, commit random acts of journalism on a regular basis.” –my favorite quote

Related posts:

1. Top 5 News Destinations Not In Danger of Going Bankrupt in 2009