SEC Country/Land of 10 shutting down June 30

Fredrick · May 25, 2018

wicked said: ↑

For the love of God, news outlets need to stop with those Facebook Lives. If I want to see hideously shot video, I’ll turn on the local public access channel.
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You speak the truth. It was/is the flavor of the month and it's inane, asinine, whatever word you described. My guess is they don't get a lot of views. It truly is just another way to over-work the staff, make sure you get your 70 hours from them while paying for 40. You tell me anybody but a suit who thinks Facebook live is valuable. I think it's just a way again to exert power. For editors to show corporate how innovative they are while bragging about how hard they work their staffs. Newspapers so badly want to do the work of all media and it's not working. Writing, sure we have a story. TV work? Sure, we shoot video you know? Chat? Hey you don't need talk radio, we'll do it with our facebook lives. We'll do it all and overwork our folks until we lay them off or they enter a new line of work or escape to a Website like The Athletic.

Fredrick · May 25, 2018

daemon said: ↑

Facebook charges about $10 per thousand impressions for ads. Average CPM for a digital ad on a website is under $5, I believe. Even if you have a web page with three ads, at a total of $15 per 1,000 impressions, a full-time writer would need to generate 15,400 pageviews of traffic per day just for a company to break even on a $60,000 salary. That's salary alone. No benefits. No office rents. No server fees. If the cost of employment of a $60,000 employee is really $90,000, then that employee suddenly needs to generate 21,000 pageviews per day, for five days a week, for 50 weeks a year. Just to break even on the cost of the labor.

Like @Alma said, the ad-supported business model is no longer viable unless the content is being produced for free. It just isn't.
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this is a helluva good post. Eye opening. Thank you.

Fredrick · May 25, 2018

MizzouBrave said: ↑

This might be a bad idea to chime in, but here we go...

I've worked as an editor for SEC Country/Land of 10/DieHards for the last two years. I understand why journalists from the outside looking in focus on the aggregation portion of our business. But the decision for our shutdown yesterday wasn't because of a lack of growth, Facebook changes, etc. It wasn't because of management issues with our editorial staff. It was a decision made at the very top of CMG to focus on their local markets that already had broadcast/radio affiliates, and in that view, I guess we didn't make sense. It is what it is.

Again, I'm an editor there, first as a team editor (overseeing beats we staffed like Florida, Kentucky, Arkansas, South Carolina for a time) and also as the recruiting editor, in charge of our network-wide recruiting coverage. I truly believe we produced fantastic original reporting. We broke a lot of news, especially on the recruiting front. Yes, writers didn't always see eye-to-eye with strategy, but I do believe that's common.

But we've had some really meaningful, impactful coverage from our writers. If you just consume our news via social media (or Facebook), yeah, of course you're going to see more clickbait-y headlines and angles. That's going to be true for most outlets, just based on the beast of social media itself. But if you are consume our content via direct traffic — and our direct traffic was growing substantially and that's been our biggest area of focus over the last 18 months — you'll see the great stuff our writers produced.

Our writers, along with our editorial staff, produced far more fantastic content than we're getting credit for.

There's always going be second-guessing, and I understand that. Believe me. But I'm just tired of people saying this was because of poor editorial management. You can certainly disagree with content decisions, but that's not why we're being shuttered. It is very unfortunate.

On a final note, if anyone that reads this board is looking for talented beat writers and recruiting reporters, please feel free to message me. A ton of talented people just hit the market and I want to do anything possible to make sure no one is overlooked.
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You folks did a fine job. Congratulations and sorry you had the rug pulled out so to speak. Again, best wishes to you and the good people of your company. You did a super job in my opinion.

Fran Curci · May 25, 2018

"We'll just have to work smarter." Yes, 98 percent bull.

SportsGuyBCK · May 25, 2018

Fran Curci said: ↑

"We'll just have to work smarter." Yes, 98 percent bull.
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Only when the people running the place start working smarter ...

tapintoamerica · May 25, 2018

While I do not root for anyone to lose a job and a future -- I'm a victim-- there is a part of me that believes anyone who no longer has to cover recruiting has received a blessing in (obviously considerable) disguise.

studthug12 · Jun 4, 2018

I think there are some times where FB Live can be valuable but it's few and far between. Say when a kid battling cancer becomes an honorary firefighter and sprays hoses, gets behind the wheel of a fire truck etc. But it doesn't really make any money or do anything other than get a few shares I suppose. For the most part a waste of time.

Hopefully reporters at Land of 10 etc. find a good spot going forward.

Marvin · Jul 1, 2018

It's July 1 so I guess the sites have shut down. Mike Griffith has a new job with the same company, with DawgNation.com (that's going to be some serious coverage of the Bulldogs).

Anyone else hear of where anyone else might have landed?

Sports Barf · Jul 1, 2018

I heard Cameron Daggett landed with a cushy PR firm in Chicago. Good for him, always liked his work on Land of 10

studthug12 · Jul 11, 2018

Jesse Temple is at The Athletic.

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SEC Country/Land of 10 shutting down June 30

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SEC Country/Land of 10 shutting down June 30

Fredrick Well-Known Member

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