The most common response we heard from our readers who replied to our 2019 reader/subscriber survey: We want more local news.
When it comes to our premium subscription content tier, the news was good. More than half of the people who responded (56%) said they feel as if the price they pay for the service ($6 a month or $65 a year) is a fair price for the value they get.
And the overwhelming reason why they subscribe? The majority of respondents said it was “because I care about local news and how it affects my community.”
A majority of the respondents have been subscribers for over one year. Potomac Local News launched its premium subscriber news tier in January 2018 to offer our readers a deeper dive into local news and local government issues. Today, we have about 400 paying subscribers.
And it is those local government issues that survey respondents want us to keep reporting on. When asked what topics should we focus more attention, respondents said local government issued, followed by police and fire issues, transportation, schools, real estate and development, features and lifestyle news, and reporting from the local a courthouses.
On a scale of one (very dissatisfied) to five (very satisfied), we scored a majority of fours (satisfied) as many of you told us you like our coverage of local governments, businesses, and transportation, and features and lifestyle reporting.
Our morning email newsletter received high marks from survey respondents. That newsletter for its ease of use, and for providing a quick summary of the day’s local news.
An awful lot of you also said you wanted more local news content delivered online and in that email newsletter. We’ve listened, and have begun posting more local news with the intention of featuring more of our readers and the organizations in our community they support and, in turn, support all of us.
Many respondents also said they would like to see our premium subscriber news tier go away and for us to revert back to a time when all news on Potomac Local News was free. While I understand it’s never easy or fun to be asked to pay for something that was once free, in the changing world of online content consumption in both news and entertainment, giving our readers an option to choose to pay for deeper reporting, and higher-quality content will continue on Potomac Local News.
Finally, through our annual reader survey is over, it doesn’t mean you won’t have a chance to tell me what you think. I’ve reserved myself to the fact that when many of our readers think we do a good job, the majority of them are silent about it, and move on to the rest of their day. And that’s perfectly fine by me.
When we screw up, our readers are always the first to tell us. For this, I am always grateful.
Please know you may contact me anytime to drop a line, news tip, or anything else.
We’ve added two new sections to our morning email newsletter.
Starting today, you’ll notice the weather forecast at the top of the morning email. We make it easy to see what Mother Nature has in store for you for the next seven days. Our weather forecast is sponsored by OmniRide.
Also newly added to our email newsletter is an obituary section, which shows the most recent posts to Potomac Local’s obituary section. In our recent reader survey, as well as over the course of the past six years after the closure of the News & Messenger newspaper in Prince William County, obituaries are one of the most-requested sections of our local news website.
We automatically pull obituary listings from funeral home websites in the Greater Prince William County area, and in Stafford County and direct our readers to read those obituaries on their original websites. It’s a public service I’m happy to provide a no charge.
Don’t get our morning newsletter? Let’s change that.Â
The newsletter additions come after we incorporated “NEW” tags that appear next to our headlines, so you’ll always know what’s news today.
We’ve also dusted off our Potomac Local List newsletter that is sent periodically on Thursdays, where you’ll find fun events for your upcoming weekend.
And, we’re still sending our Sunday Profile email newsletter sponsored by The Fauquier Bank, where you can read the stories of the people who make our community a better place to live.
Have a story idea or a bit of community news? Got a news tip? Email Us.
Raising a child in our community shouldn’t be a thankless job.
Many parents are working to raise strong, responsible children who will one day be the leaders of our community. With all the talk of “millennials” and the troubles of the world today, this fact is easily overlooked.
Last year, Potomac Local did something very fun and rewarding: We featured stories of parents in our area, and we talked to them about what it takes to raise a family here.
We asked about their children, about their morning routine, and their challenges.
We even asked them to tell us what animal they would be, and why. No subject, it seemed, was unreasonable. Our readers loved it.
If you know someone who is doing this — moms, dads, grandparents, legal guardians — I need to know. I’d like to feature them, as we have Kristina, Michelle, and Carrie in future Potomac Local Parent post.
Please email us and tell us why this person should be our Potomac Local Parent and be sure to include a contact email address so that we may contact them.
Thanks for helping us recognize those who don’t get enough recognition for what they do every day.
Previous Potomac Local Parent posts:
It is one of my favorite days of the year — Christmas Eve — a time full of wonder, magic, and memories.
For so many, so much is possible on this day. Reuniting with family and friends, making new ones, serving your neighbors, and giving to the less fortunate are just some of the things that spring to mind on this day.
And there is a lot of uncertainty for many in our region facing furloughs with a Federal Government shutdown. The National Christmas Tree on the Ellipse in Washington, a symbol of peace not only for our region but around the world, has gone dark in the wake of the shutdown.
But we’ve been here before, and we all hope for quick resolution for the hundreds of thousands of government workers in our region, as well as business owners and non-government employees impacted by the shutdown.
And, I hope that just for a moment this Christmas, you put fear and politics aside and enjoy the sights and sounds of the season, the music, and forget about your woes and do everything you can to bring a smile to the face of the person standing next to you.
Merry Christmas.
We’re about to say goodbye to 2018 and hello to a brand new year.
And as we do this time every year, we’re getting ready to take a look back at the biggest stories of the year based on the number of views each story received on our website.
From covering floods (it’s the rainiest year on record in Washington, D.C.), new toll lanes coming to Interstate 66, business expansions like Micron (Virginia’s largest economic deal ever) and Amazon, or the debate over how to best develop the last remaining rural pieces of property in our community, it’s been a busy year for local news.
This year also marked a change for us at Potomac Local, too.
- We listened to you and made an improved email newsletter that delivers local news you where you are.
We hired a team of new reporters in an effort to expand the types of stories we cover, to deliver more trusted local news that matters to you. - We invested more than $6,000 in a new website (a big investment for a small company like ours).
- And we launched a new premium subscription tier of content and now have more than 400 paying subscribers.
In the era of “fake news,” Potomac Local plays a vital role in strengthening the local news ecosystem by providing reporting on the local issues that impact us here at home. It’s what our subscribers trust us, and pay us to do.
In turn, a better-informed community is a stronger community. And our subscribers make Potomac Local stronger.
Right now, as of this writing, 20 more people can take advantage of a special offer to save 30% on an annual subscription to Potomac Local by using the coupon code STRONGER.
This offer, which started out at 30 coupons at the beginning of the month, ends Dec. 31, 2018, or whenever the remaining 20 coupons are claimed, whichever comes first.
We value your support and look forward to serving you as a paying subscriber in the coming year.
I believe email newsletters are the future of our local media business.
At Potomac Local, we’ve had a morning email newsletter since 2011. Two years ago, we renamed it “Breakfast Links” and its popularity skyrocketed.
Many tell me they can’t wait for it to land in their inbox each morning to catch up on local news.
In recent weeks we’ve launched new email newsletters like “Sunday Profile” and “Potomac Local List” to add to our offering of local features and events reporting.
We’re not the only organization that has embraced email. Many of our clients and others have asked if they could place their email newsletter content on PotomacLocal.com and in Breakfast Links.
Today that answer is yes, with a Boosted Email Post.
We’re very excited about this because when Potomac Local readers click the link to your Boosted Email Post on our PotomacLocal.com homepage or from the Breakfast Links email, they go right to your newsletter.
The user experience is great because they see your branding, in your environment, the same as if they are reading your newsletter from their inbox.
The Boosted Email Post is a great way to expand your reach to our 150,000 monthly readers, grow your subscriber list, and give a second life to your email newsletter content.
As an added bonus, we track the number of Potomac Local readers that click to view your content and email the information in an easy-to-read report directly to you.
You can see an example of a Boosted Email Post from the city of Manassas by clicking here and then clicking on the headline on the page “In Manassas, office rates are nearly half of the regional average while flex space demand is booming.”
It’s effortless to do a Boosted Email Post if you’re using Constant Contact or MailChimp.
To place your Boosted Email Post, I’ll need the campaign URL.
Here’s how to get it:
From Constant Contact
1. In your Constant Contact email campaign, click MORE ACTIONS at the top
2. Click “SHARE URL”
3. Copy the URL in the pop-up window
4. Paste the URL in an email and send to us
From MailChimp
1. In your MailChimp email campaign list, click the drop-down button to the right of the campaign name
2. Select VIEW EMAIL
3. Copy the URL that appears in the new browser window displaying your email content
4. Paste the URL in an email and send to us
Potomac Local will charge $99 per Boosted Email Post. If you already have an advertising agreement with us, ask me how we can incorporate this into your plan.
Please let me know if you have any questions. Thanks for reading and supporting local news in our community.
In this day and age of social media, if you would have told me 10 years ago that email would still the most trusted form of online communication, I would have laughed at you.
Well, you would have been right.
Every weekday morning we send out Breakfast Links, a collection of the most up-to-date news stories, features, events, and obituaries from our website PotomacLocal.com.
In a few short years, it has become one of the most important things we do all day. You’re probably reading this post right now after you saw it in your email, clicked the headline, which brought you here to PotomacLocal.com.
Breakfast Links is a reader favorite, and it’s an easy way to stay connected and to keep up with local news in our community. For a guy who used to work at a newspaper, I consider our weekday morning email a digital publication that lands on your phone next to your bedside each morning instead of your doorstep, or in a plastic bag at the end of a driveway.
And because our readers value the Breakfast Links so much, we want to make it the best experience possible. That’s why, starting Monday, we’re going to update the look of Breakfast Links.
The email will still feature the day’s news, but it’ll be easier to read. New sections of the email will better organize content around subject matters.
Plus, we’ll begin to include new local advertising from local businesses who both support our work and need our support from the community. All of the information will continue to be locally focused because that is what you’ve come to expect from us.
I hope you will find the new Breakfast Links easy to use, and a valuable read. I always welcome your feedback, and thank you for reading, subscribing, and supporting local news in our community.
I want to thank Experimac Manassas for sponsoring this series of posts and allowing a guy to reflect on using his first Macintosh computer as a child, and to write about using my new-to-me Mac, my first in more than 20 years. See them for all your Mac, iPhone and computer needs.
I remember it like it was yesterday.
I slowly walked down the stairs and saw the glow of Christmas lights on the large box in the corner.
When I saw the Apple logo, I knew this would be the Christmas present I had hoped for.
Some boys my age wanted BB guns and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles playlets. But in 1993 all I wanted was a home computer. And it had to be a Macintosh.
And that year, I was blessed to receive one.
My parents decided that the Kiser’s were going to join the information age. And because they didn’t work at jobs that required heavy computer use, their 11-year-old son was going to take them there and show them how to use a home computer.
I asked for a Mac because Apple products were all I knew. I remember when they used a cart to roll in the first Apple computer to my elementary school classroom, an Apple IIe. I played Number Munchers, and later Oregon Trail on an Apple IIgs machine. These were Apple Computers, not Macs.
I remember the IIe had a five-inch floppy disk drive, and so did the IIgs, but it also had a desktop screen and a mouse, something its Macintosh cousins made famous.
When I got to Beville Middle School in Dale City, my favorite classrooms were computer labs each stocked with Macintosh computers.
There I learned how to use word processing programs — I didn’t know at the time I’d be using those programs every day for the rest of my life for work — and drawing programs.
In the days before the broad adoption of the internet, I learned about modems and how to use them to dial up and talk to the school’s weather station. That was infinitely cooler than turning on the TV and waiting for the weather report.
I would tell my parents about how much I was learning about using these machines, and I would try to convince them how a Macintosh and all of the fun CD-ROMs with encyclopedias and other educational tools that came with the device would help me with my school work.
In those days, Apple made the computer for education, and I got one. I was thrilled.
I tore into the box to find a brand new Macintosh Performa 550. It was a white shiny new with a Sony Trinitron screen was beautiful to look at even when it wasn’t turned on.
It’s distinctive Apple mouse and keyboard plugged right in and were easy to use. They were just like the ones at school.
I took the machine and placed it on the desk in my room, where it would sit through my high school years.
It came with a book of CD-ROMs, and when I placed each disc into the pop-out tray, a video encyclopedia would pop up. I learned about animals and watched and listened to videos President Kennedy’s speeches. The video quality was grainy, but hey, it was cool.
It was also the first time I used CDs. Later, I saved up my allowance and bought music CDs and the Mac was my first stereo.
I spent hours creating drawings on ClarisWorks, and writing journal entries. I made a list of all of my friends’ phone numbers and called it PAL — the personal address list.
The computer had Mario Teaches Typing, as well as a game called Spectre where you drove a tank in virtual reality world in a game of capture the flag and shoot-em-up battle.
I never used this Mac to go online on a service like America Online or Prodigy. It was the days before the web browser, but it did everything I needed it to do and more.
Considering what computers cost back then my parents probably paid a fortune for the thing. Heck, new Macs are expensive today.
But for a child like me who was — and still is — a bit of a nerd, it was the best Christmas present I ever received.
Until I got my Apple ink-jet printer, which changed everything again.
Uriah Kiser is the founder and publisher of Potomac Local.
First of all, thank you to all of you who subscribed to Potomac Local and trusting me to continue to provide local news for the community where I grew up.
Your subscription shows that you value our service. From our exclusive reporting on traffic and transit, our coverage of local government, or insight into the local business community, it tells me that you want essential local news that makes an impact — not just stories you can get on any other news website.
Here is just some of what our subscribers are saying:
You are doing a great job in reporting on local news in Prince William County. I am glad I paid for the subscription. I like the Breakfast Links in general, and your daily featured news in particular.
Thanks!Eric Fagerholm
Montclair, Va.
For the first time ever, I’ve signed up for a monthly news subscription. I GUARANTEED myself this day would never come. But, all credit to @PotomacLocal for truly providing great LOCAL news content consistently for #StaffordVa, #fxbg & on. Give ’em a couple bucks yourself! pic.twitter.com/P5pUfdHVcY
— NickZ (@nickz) March 16, 2018
You can continue to count on us for this kind of reporting as I am indeed working for you.
When adding a subscription service became an option, I spent the majority of 2017 studying local news websites across the U.S. and Europe with subscription services.
I examined business models and studied what types of news readers would pay for and how they wanted it delivered.
I thought about what reader revenue would mean for us, and what new products and services, like or new personalized weekday Breakfast Links email and new podcast, I could offer our subscribers.
And, I agonized over the prospect of losing readers once we added our subscription service.
However, since our subscription service launched in January, I’ve seen the number of subscribers continue to rise steadily. This must mean we’re doing something right.
But I’ve also heard from some readers who have two common concerns.
1. Our subscribers see the value in our news but they’re shy when it comes to sharing our stories on social media because they’re afraid others won’t like it when they’re asked to subscribe to read.
2. They’d like to try us out before committing to a monthly or annual subscription.
To the first point, I say sharing our news with your friends who may or may not be subscribers is no different than going to your favorite restaurant, taking a photo of an amazing dish, posting it to social media, and then telling your friends “you gotta try this place.”
The second, free trials are good (hey, even I like a free trial when I’m using new software for home or my business) and that’s why I’ve added a 14-day FREE trial option that will give you full access to our site for — you guessed it — 14 days.
Afterward, you’ll be charged $6 a month for full access to our reporting. Should you wish to save some dough and upgrade to an annual subscription, you can do that, too.
Your support is vital to our mission of bringing you local news and is always appreciated.
