Bakersfield Californian leading social networking

By Marcelo Duran
Associate Editor

For newspapers, social networking is slowly becoming the little user-generated content feature that could.

This was evident in the Newspaper Association of America’s June report, “Engaging Users: User-Generated Content and Tools for Newspapers,” which found that interest in newspaper-based social networking features was high among respondents who have used social networking in the past. About 45 percent of those respondents indicated interest in reading or posting reviews on local businesses and services.

Yet while many newspapers are still trying to determine how to package social networking, one paper, The Bakersfield Californian, earlier this year marked its third anniversary as a social networking pioneer.

The newspaper’s Bakotopia, introduced in early 2005, came about as a preemptive strike against sites like Craigslist before they hit the Bakersfield area, said Dan Pacheco, The Californian’s senior manager of digital products.

Outside of newspaper

“At the time, the company identified several different audiences and I think we were one of the first newspapers in the U.S. to come out and say we need to grow audience one way or another and it doesn’t have to be through the core newspaper,” he said. “The idea was that Bakotopia would be a center for anything about the alternative Bakersfield.”

Six months after Bakotopia’s launch, the paper began adding more features to the site, including the ability for users to create profiles, upload photos and list events, all of which struck a chord with the local music scene.

“We had lots of bands show up to post their events and once we started having bands in our community we started thinking the bands should have profiles and add their music,” Pacheco said.

Bands post songs on the site through a feature dubbed Bakotunes and content is made available under a creative commons license. Users can listen, download and use the music in any way as long as it’s not for commercial purposes.

Pacheco said Bakotopia’s impact in the local music community was further cemented after a radio station provided The Californian with 46 radio spots as part of a co-promotion between the station and the paper.

The Californian invited bands to fill the spots. It received a lot of response and Pacheco said that a number of groups even created original songs about the Web site. The songs produced for the radio spots can be found at www.bakotopia.com/home/user/bakotopianews.

“What that experience showed us is that we were getting something from the musicians being on our site and the bands were getting exposure from us by getting on local radio,” he said.

Thousands of users

Californian Vice President of Audience Development Mary Lou Fulton said that Bakotopia now has more than 500 band profiles and 5,000 registered users on the site.

“You can tell from these numbers that we have become the local place for bands to connect with their fans and post their music. That has helped with our marketing because bands are out there in the community performing all the time and letting people know that they are on Bakotopia and that (fans) should check it out,” she said.

Fulton said newspapers should capitalize on aiming their social networking sites at already established special interest groups rather than attempt to create communities from scratch.

Over the past three years, The Californian added social networking features to all 11 of its Web sites and has seen how users are exploiting the tools on each of the sites, Fulton said.

Case in point: The paper’s Bakersfield.com flagship site, which attracts more than 2,000 bloggers. “What’s fascinating is that we put the exact tools on a Web site focused on a particular community with a different product manager and get completely different results,” she said.

Bakoproducts

Most important, The Californian found ways to leverage the popularity generated by its myriad sites and experiment with ways to earn some money.

To that end, the paper released a CD compilation of the best of Bakotunes, showcasing local bands.

“They sold it for $5. It didn’t make a lot of money but paid for the CD,” Pacheco said. “Even though (readers) listen to Bakotunes on the Web site, they loved to get the CD when it was offered at events.”

The publisher rolled out a bi-weekly magazine as well, which is also called Bakotopia, and contains user-generated stories, photos and other content generated on the site.

The popularity of the ink-and-paper publication indicates to Pacheco that younger people remain interested in print.

“They use the Web site and magazine together, a hybrid experience, because they know the magazine includes posted content and know that if they are involved in the community online it increases the chances their content will show up in the magazine,” he said. “They love that idea because their content, pictures or profiles are out there at all the local clubs and they become a celebrity.”