Blufftontoday.com

Blufftontoday.com seems to be the place to go if you live in Bluffton. It is very user-friendly and encourages their users to participate in the site and the news process. There are user posted pictures all throughout the site and users’ blogs are featured on the home page bigger than the Bluffton Today newspaper is featured. On the home page, the newspaper gives the user many ways to contact the paper with any problems and gives users the ability to submit story ideas and contact the paper’s staff. Also, if a reader is having problems with delivery, all they have to do is come online and let the paper know so they can fix it and get their paper out to that reader as soon as possible. If a reader has missed an issue within the past four months, they can also come here to find an online archive of all the issues for the past four months, click on a date, and have the newspaper pop up on their screen.

Blogs are a huge component to this site. Users, experts and even the Bluffton Today’s staff all have blogs on the site. I think that the blogs are an essential part to the site. It gives the users a real feeling of interactivity, and even the feeling that they can control the content of the site. I think that these blogs really give the users the feeling that their opinion is important to the newspaper and to the site. The blogs are given just as important a position as the newspaper itself has on the home page. They are right next to each other and gives two of the most popular blogs, no matter who wrote them.

Along with the blogs, users are able to submit their own photos and video to the site and the newspaper actually uses them. When a user comes onto the site, the first thing they see is a user’s picture right on the top banner of the page. I was somewhat surprised when I opened the page and found a picture of an armadillo foraging for food right at the top of the page. Then I saw that the picture was submitted by a user and the site also puts a link right there for other people to submit a photo. I think that it shows that the site believes that their users and readers have something good to offer the site.

Also, on the site, you can find all of the information anyone who lives in or is planning to move into the area could ever need. The site offers a community calendar that lists any events and gives users the ability to filter through all of the entries to find the events that cater to their interests and hobbies. Also, if you live in the area and are looking for a different house, or if you don’t live in the area and are planning to move to town, the site’s housing advertisements, “Click & View Homes,” gives users the ability to view videos of houses on the market. I think the best part of this feature is that it gives users the ability to look for houses either by their location on a map or by a simple directory. If someone is looking for a house and knows in what area they want to live in, this feature works really well for them, but it also works for people who just want to move into town who want a certain type of house and don’t care where it is located. My parents are selling our house and I’d love to have something like this for our area.

The content comes from a few different sources. First, the local content is provided by the newspaper’s stories and users. As you expand out from Bluffton, other news sources provide the news content. For local news, the site is a good place to go. For more regional and national news, the site serves more as a clearinghouse, acting more as a second-hand source with links to the primary source. But for almost everything besides the strictly news sources, the site is from the users. This is a site that values the people who use it and those people control the content.

However, I had a hard time trying to figure out where their money comes from. It’s possible that it all comes from advertising. The rates are pretty high, reaching from $2615 for a full page black and white ad and $4990 for a full page color ad all the way to $8.25 for the smallest ad in one paper only. Beyond the ad revenues, I can’t see any other way for them to make money. The Bluffton Today is a free newspaper, so they aren’t making money from there. Maybe they get donations from members of the community, but there’s nothing to show that on the website.

I think that, for a free daily newspaper, the Bluffton Today newspaper puts a lot of focus on their readers and really respects their opinions and participation. The site says, “This is a new kind of community website that joins with the Bluffton Today newspaper in a mission of helping Bluffton come together as a community. With your help, we will provide a friendly, safe, easy to use place on the Web for everyone in Bluffton to post news items, create a unified community calendar, and share photos, recipes, opinions. This is a place where you take the lead in telling your own story…We believe that Bluffton Today should be a conversation – both online and in print. We promise to be open, accessible, and easy to contact.” I really think that this newspaper genuinely put their readers first and care about what they have to say. I really like this site, and unfortunately, there aren’t many out there anymore.