WWYD: Part II
Our first meeting about changing the face of local news was more of a discussion about what we need to do and how we need to being doing it.
@rickrogala started off by talking about the challenges we face; we didn’t need much of a reminder. Rick knows that we want to change. He knows that we understand change is long overdue. He also understands that it is important to drive change so it isn’t driving you.
We looked very closely at what we do as NBC 4. Basically, it can be broken down into three parts. In no particular order, we disseminate information and content, we provide a platform for marketers to connect with clients, and we build relationships (@wyliemac that one should sound familiar). This discussion went on for quite a while. What was clear is that we do those three things; what was next is how we do them.
In the interest of not giving up trade secrets, I have to be careful about how much detail I go in to in these posts about what we are going to do. Rest assured that if all goes well and we put a plan into action, you’ll soon see a different kind of NBC 4. In fact, I’d argue that you already have, just by the fact that you’re reading this blog… chances are you ended up here because of twitter (that’s where all of my friends are). Just kidding.
A big part of the discussion about what we should be doing was based on your comments to WWYD part I. What we know is that you want us to provide local information that YOU WANT, HOW you want it, WHEN you want it, and WHERE you want it. What does that mean to you? From every person that reads this I would probably get a different answer, and that’s awesome. Please let me know how you would answer that question above. I’ve received some answers already, and they’ve been great.
Next, cleaning out the closet. One thing Rick is really good at is providing parallel situations to make sense out of a sensitive or polarizing topic. Rick is fairly new to Columbus, still just moving in. He is looking at his closet and he knows there’s lots of clothes he shouldn’t have boxed, and certainly shouldn’t put in his new closet. We all have those. That’s why there’s spring cleaning. The problem is, he has so many old clothes in his closet that he doesn’t have room for the new ones that he should be wearing.
NBC 4 is no different. As an industry, we still do things that Ron Burgandy was doing. We haven’t changed. We never really wanted to admit that we needed to. Now it’s clear that we do, but in order to do the things that we want to do, to do the things YOU want us to do, we have to clean out the closet or stop doing the stuff we always have just because we always have. If it doesn’t help us provide local information that YOU WANT, HOW you want it, WHEN you want it, and WHERE you want it, it shouldn’t be in our closet. What are some of those things from your viewpoint?
I’ll continue to update this ongoing saga. Please continue to talk to me about your ideas.
