On the slowest day in the short life of Last Best News, just 131 people visited the site. That was on Saturday, Feb. 15, two weeks after the site launched on Feb. 1.
That depressing day was followed by a few more slow Saturdays, which convinced me that people simply don’t spend much time on the Internet on that day of the week.
That theory was exploded on Saturday, April 26, when 5,101 people visited the site, making it the busiest day in the short life of Last Best News.
My own feelings about what I had done — abandoned a 34-year newspaper career that brought in a decent paycheck every two weeks, to start an online news business with uncertain prospects — have varied just as wildly.
Ed Kemmick
Some days this feels like the best idea I ever had, other days like the worst. I hate allowing my outlook to be governed by Google Analytics, which provided the statistics mentioned above, but it seems to be an inevitable consequence of running a Web-based operation.
I bring all this up by way of noting that Last Best News turned 3 months old on Thursday. When I worked for the Billings Gazette, we always heard quarterly reports from the managers of each division of the newspaper — the newsroom, advertising, circulation, etc.
So consider this the first quarterly report from the combined divisions of Last Best News.
The first thing I would like to bring to your attention is the “Sign up for email updates” box on the left side of the home page. We were a little slow in getting this going, but the updates are now being sent out to a few hundred subscribers every Thursday.
This is an excellent way of keeping up with Last Best News. You just give us your email address — which we won’t use for any nefarious purposes — and we’ll send you a weekly recap of the top stories from this site.
Whether you subscribe to the email update or not, please keep in mind that access to Last Best News is always free — no expense, no hassle, no online surveys, no pop-up or pull-down ads. And because all our advertisers are real businesses from around these parts, your eyes will not be troubled by looking at those awful ads you see everywhere else — you know, hideous cures for a beer gut and mind-blowing “revelations” about Obama.
Also, please note that we have done away with the Letters to the Editor box and replaced it with a listing of entertainment and other events provided by Billings365.com. Letters to the editor seem meaningless when the publication is strictly online, and a listing of community events seemed vital. It was an easy call.
So, besides our busiest and our slowest days, how are we doing? Quite well, thank you. We’ve been averaging about 750 visits a day and we’ve hosted a steady stream of reader comments on the site itself and on our Facebook page.
It’s probably worth noting, too, that last week we surpassed 2,000 “likes” on our Facebook page. It’s still a bit bewildering for someone who began his career on a manual typewriter, but in a world increasingly measured by Facebook likes, I have to say that I have been pleased and honored by all that Facebook attention.
Other statistics: By my count, in three months I have written 59 stories, columns and book reviews, in addition to 22 Last Best Blog posts, and I also published a couple of my stand-alone photo essays. In that same time, various other people have contributed 20 stories, columns and guest editorials.
If you’re wondering what brought in that record number of readers last Saturday, it was my story about plans to build the biggest house in Billings. On that very slow day in February, I posted nothing.
So, what we learn from this is that people love stories about big houses and don’t like nothing. I should set up shop as a newspaper consultant, eh?
Regular readers of Last Best News and the Billings Outpost, an independent weekly newspaper published by David Crisp, will have noticed that David and I have formed a partnership of sorts. I run his Editor’s Notebook column whenever he writes one and he publishes anything of mine that he wants and has room for.
It has been a rewarding partnership. David and I worked together at the Gazette for a few years before he left to start the Outpost 16 years ago. I always imagined working with him again someday, but I couldn’t imagine how, until Last Best News was born.
It’s been just as rewarding to work with photographer John Warner, who left the Gazette years ago and has now worked with me on half a dozen stories. And that’s his photo on top of this quarterly report.
John was also responsible for the spectacular photo of the fellow surfing in the BBWA irrigation ditch on April 1. I had hoped the date would have been more of a tip-off, but let me formally say it now: The picture was Photoshopped and the accompanying story was entirely fabricated. It was April Fool’s, people! But if you were sucked in, don’t feel bad. John’s photo was that good.
Among the other contributors I will note two, Peter Tolton and Stan Parker. They are young, talented and ambitious and I hope to bring you more of their work.
Pete wrote the story about chef Jason Corbridge’s comeback plans, which was one of the most-read stories we’d published to that date. Stan, who has also done some fine writing, produced the video that accompanied my story on the record February snowfall. He combined new footage with clips from an amateur documentary made during the biggest snowstorm in Billings history, back in 1955. That was similarly popular and was widely shared on Facebook.
I also need to thank Matthew Struck, my Web host and designer and go-to guy on all matters technological. It’s a little embarrassing how ignorant I was and remain about the inner workings of this computer and of the Internet, but Matthew is so knowledgeable, so fast, so dependable and so pleasant to work with that I couldn’t see spending hundreds of hours of my time in order to obtain, maybe, 5 or 10 percent of his skills.
And what else? Well, allow me to mention one more time that donations to Last Best News are always appreciated. We have lots of advertisers and we’re bringing in enough money to keep the site going, but your donations will help us expand our stable of contributors, and to pay a lot of talented writers and photographers what they’re worth.
Without climbing out too far on a limb, I will say that your donations could also bring us closer to that hoped-for day when Last Best News consists of more than one full-time employee. I’m willing to continue flying solo, but it would be damned fun to have some help. (And if you don’t do Paypal, checks will work: Box 1351, Billings, 59103.)
Enough begging. All I really ask is that you keep reading. I will continue doing my best to think of my readers as live, thinking human beings, not data points on a Google Analytics chart.
And don’t worry. I won’t do this every quarter.
