Michael Shapiro’s Post

Help me celebrate the launch of TAPinto Gold Coast! 🚀 I'm thrilled to welcome veteran media executive Jim Lonergan to the TAPinto family as publisher. Serving the vibrant Jersey Shore communities of Brielle, Spring Lake, Spring Lake Heights, Sea Girt and Manasquan, Jim brings a wealth of experience and a relentless work ethic. His new weekly feature, "What’s on TAP – Your Weekend Planning Guide to the Jersey Shore" is already adding unique value to the local community.   👏 📩 🎉

I hope you'll join us this Wednesday to see what being part of the TAPinto Network is all about. We'll share real-world examples and answer all your questions. See you soon! 👋

This month, I make the case that collaboration should be a royal standard for local journalism outlets, and also share exciting updates from TAPinto and beyond.

There’s nothing like the power of collaboration. It’s the future for successful local news operations. With TAPinto.net - Local News and Digital Marketing and the Hyperlocal News Network license platform, working together and sharing are core to our success. We’ve seen firsthand how fostering collaboration among independent local news sites can increase revenue, drive audience engagement, and improve content quality. Here are 5 key ways our collaborative approach with TAPinto franchisees and HNN licensees is making a tangible impact: 🤝 Content Sharing: Our sites seamlessly share content, filling coverage gaps and enriching the news variety available to readers. This ensures comprehensive coverage, especially during major events, that no single site could achieve alone. 🛠️ Shared Technology and Tools: We provide a robust suite of tools to streamline operations. Our user-friendly CMS enables publishers to quickly and easily go to market, including full newsletter functionality. From providing a top CRM, to graphic design, to media liability insurance and many other services, we help publishers focus on quality journalism while reducing backend operational costs. 💰 Collaborative Revenue Programs: Our network offers successful revenue programs including sponsored content, email marketing, site advertising and video advertising. Our custom CMS allows publishers to sell ads across each other’s publications, creating a “network effect” that boosts revenue. This attracts regional companies and businesses seeking a larger, diverse audience. By pooling resources, our publishers offer competitive advertising options, enhancing revenue for all. 👩💻 Training and Support: We offer extensive training and ongoing support, ensuring our publishers thrive. This includes expert advice and responsive coaching, helping both new and experienced publishers navigate the modern media landscape. 💬 Community Engagement: By empowering local entrepreneurs to produce valuable news and providing an outlet for local organizations to share their stories, we ensure each community gets the news coverage it deserves. Our collaborative model works. TAPinto has grown to nearly 100 sites covering more than 125 municipalities, reaching millions of readers, and achieving long-term sustainability and profitability. Our advertising clients say working with us is “one of the best decisions we have ever made.” With the HNN license platform, we’ve extended the benefits of our collaborative approach to more publishers and places. I believe that by working together, we can upend the challenges facing local journalism and ensure trustworthy, high-quality news remains accessible to all. What collaborative effort is making the biggest impact at your organization? 🌟

TAPinto Summit has a new publisher: Christopher P. Wightman, a media veteran with a lifelong passion for community-focused journalism. A local for 25 years, Chris went on a listening tour around town to hear from local leaders and residents about their needs, interests and ideas. I believe he brings a strong work ethic and unique dedication to providing Summit's residents with the best in original local news reporting. Help me welcome Chris to the TAPinto Network!

I’m honored to be joining a cohort of veteran journalists and community leaders on the Foundation for Local News Board of Directors — designed to improve the local news ecosystem in New Jersey. In addition to bringing public awareness about the local news crisis, we’ll be focusing on: 🏜 Addressing News Deserts: Provide journalism to the 100+ New Jersey communities without a local news source. 📚 Educational Opportunities: Create programs for high school and college students to pursue journalism. ✍ Statehouse News Bureau: Develop state news content that impacts local communities, available to all NJ media outlets. 💲 Funding Goal: Raise $250,000 in the first year to support high school journalism programs and the Statehouse news bureau, with plans to expand local news sites in 50 communities over three years. We're eager to transform the New Jersey news landscape with your help. For more information on the Foundation for Local News Inc. and getting involved, tap the link below or reach out to me directly.

At TAPinto, we have a straightforward mission: to tackle the decline of traditional print media by empowering local entrepreneurs to build sustainable, community-focused news businesses. Our model is quick to launch — making it viable and sustainable to fill the void left by news deserts. The key components of this solution hinge on four strategies for both news and advertising. 1. Community-Centric Advertising We focus on the needs of local businesses in smaller markets. At TAPinto, we integrate advertising with content marketing, offering businesses a range of options to engage with their local audience effectively. This includes featured columns, press releases, event listings, and more—all tailored to the needs of the advertiser and the community. Our focus on providing value to advertisers has paid off: We have an 85% renewal rate across our network. With this symbiotic relationship, both the news site and the advertiser thrive. 2. Empowering Local Journalists Many of our franchisees are veteran journalists who have lost their jobs due to the decline of print media. Others are passionate community members with no prior journalism experience. Regardless of their background, we provide extensive training and ongoing support to ensure they can deliver high-quality, objective news coverage. Plus, we require each TAPinto site to produce at least one original local news story per day, ensuring a steady stream of fresh content. 3. Flexible and Scalable Model Franchisees can structure their operations in a way that makes sense for their specific community. Some work part-time and share responsibilities, while others hire full-time reporters or sales staff. This flexibility allows TAPinto sites to flourish in a variety of settings, from affluent suburbs to economically distressed areas. Even better, through our custom CMS, franchisees can seamlessly share content and sell advertising across the network, increasing revenue opportunities and enhancing the reach and impact of local news coverage. 4. Supporting Local At TAPinto, we handle backend operations like graphic design, billing, and tech support, allowing franchisees to focus on their core mission: delivering local news and supporting local businesses. We have so many wonderful success stories across our franchisees that show this model is working in a variety of communities. From economically distressed areas to affluent suburbs, TAPinto sites are profitable and thriving. I believe models like TAPinto are the future of local news. By addressing the unique challenges of news deserts and leveraging community-centric advertising, we are building a sustainable framework for local journalism. I am always eager to expand our network to even more communities in need of essential news coverage and effective advertising solutions. If you’re an entrepreneur with a passion for community-centered media, please reach out. I’d love to connect!

The Hyperlocal News Network is a complete and unique publishing solution that helps media companies drive audience and revenue. Explore the diverse suite of TAPinto’s operational and strategic solutions — from CMS to billing to fractional leadership — at the Hyperlocal News Network Licensee webinar this Wednesday, June 19th at 12 p.m. ET. Register here: https://lnkd.in/e7TQCgYn

This is a stark and unsettling reality: Partisan-backed outlets now outnumber real, local daily newspapers in the U.S. What's worse, many of these sites are designed to influence political outcomes in swing states. We in the local journalism industry have a responsibility to preserve our democracy. We have to make it simpler for objective journalism to succeed if we want a truly informed citizenry. At TAPinto, our publishers and journalists follow strict ethical guidelines and are active in their communities. All of our sites deliver high-quality, unbiased, trustworthy daily local news, helping to counteract the spread of misinformation. As a company, we’re dedicated to empowering local entrepreneurs to build sustainable, community-focused news businesses. A proliferation of partisan-backed news sites is bad for democracy — but TAPinto and many other tremendous journalism outlets are doing the real work of objective community reporting. We have to keep innovating and engaging with our audiences in authentic ways if we want to protect informed decision-making.