Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Variety is the spice of life















Buffalo.com photo by Sean Rudyk.

I had a talk with one of my managers yesterday and we agreed that there is some staleness settling into some of our content recently. Not that the work is stale - it's just that we seem to be going to the same places and covering the same things over and over again.

In the interest of jazzing things up a bit, I am challenging everyone to try picking some events that they may not normally cover - something that maybe you've never been too, or someplace you've wanted to visit but have not.

Also, we will not be booking events for some of the "same old, same old"-type places, unless you can pitch a fresh angle on it...so keep that in mind, too.

Here's to creativity!

8 comments:

djruggiero said...

Boss, I thought the point of all this was "hits" or views? on the galleries am I wrong about this? Some "Ole stand byes" seem to drive Traffic to the site. I know I would appreciate a Numbers breakdown of what constitutes a good Number of hits, a great Number of hit and an outstanding number of hits, of traffic. for example. 1000 views is this good great or outstanding? maybe this type of gauge would be more beneficial to all of us.

djruggiero said...

Yes I know I am Guilty of the same old, be it Maryvale sports or HNR. Do I need to Move on from my thought process? Of what I choose? to cover.

Ben said...

well traffic is important, but we also want to be inclusive. i think the worry is that we're going to come off like we're endorsing certain businesses or organizations. i think that we are fine to cover some subjects repeatedly as long as there are fresh angles - hits are important, sure, but if it's the same 100 or 1000 people who come to the site over and over again because everyone else is bored, then the hits become less valuable. unique user visits are equally important, if not more important, than the raw "hits" category.

Ben said...

and that being said, i don't want to to discourage you or anyone else from pursuing a particular interest, especially if it fits into the overall vision of the site. my feeling, though, and i am willing to have a debate about this, is that there are areas of life in WNY that aren't being covered while others are being, perhaps, hyper-exposed. no offense to maryvale sports, by the way! you do a nice job on those...but maybe we should be balancing that with some coverage of other high schools, too (which is something for ME to deal with).

Erica M said...

Ok, me going to a cheerleading competition is going WAYYY outside of my box...and then I want to do a motorcycle run. What if you try to add a rank or notation on certain events that would be "out of the ordinary" so people recognize to pick those ones up?

djruggiero said...

Boss one thing I did notice. We seam to fall short in minority gallery events. Even when we (I) Covered Will Holton The response seemed dull. agree? I think we lack a presence in the minority community.

Ben said...

Dan I agree 100 percent. We do not do enough to cover the African-American or Latino community in the city. That is something I want to change this summer and I will take the lead in this myself.

Ben said...

And when I say "we" I am not trying to put the onus off myself and onto the photographers in the program. I take full responsibility and want to move to make Buffalo.com more diverse and more representative of the entire region.