Got news? Let 'em have it!

Denis Finley's Nov. 5 memo was one to make an online coordinator glow.

In case you missed it:



Staff:

Friday's front page story by Marisa Taylor on the third phase of the Town Center in Virginia Beach was a great piece of reporting - and a great example of how we expect to approach all news stories in the future.

The story was ours alone, and it created a conversation about how we should handle it online and with LNC. Our dilemma: do we post it on PilotOnline right away and give it to LNC, thus scooping ourselves and helping the competition get the story? Or do we ignore the journalistic convergence opportunity so we could have it first in the morning paper?

We decided to put it online at 6 p.m., and provide it to LNC for Pilot/13 News at 10. The reason is that The Pilot, PilotOnline and LNC are, in many ways, one and the same. We want to become THE place where readers of all stripes can go for news and information. No longer is The Pilot just the printed version of the paper that lands on your doorstep in the morning. The Pilot is print, online and TV. It's the future of our business, and it will increasingly become the way we break stories. Yes, it goes against our journalistic souls sometimes to “give up” a story before it’s published in newsprint, but times are changing and we need to adapt, otherwise we will go the way of the dinosaur.

So, please think of PilotOnline for every story you write. Offer stories, especially breaking-news stories, immediately to Kerry Sipe. You would be amazed at how an online story can generate intense interest in a topic. Kerry reports that Marisa's story got 200 hits during the first 15 minutes the story was online. Nothing can replace that kind of urgency and recognition for us. It's how we can beat TV at its own game and regain the ability to be "first" with a story. It's an invaluable way to help build The Pilot's reputation in the community as the source for credible news.

Remember: we don’t have to put the entire story online. We can run a few inches or a “bulletin’’ early, update it later and then provide the entire story in the newspaper.

LNC and our partnership with WVEC work that way, too. They report broad overviews on some of our stories, or focus on a key piece of a story.....then they promote the complete story in the next day’s paper.

We will know we have succeeded when three different people who got their news from each of our sources all say they got their news from The Pilot that day.

Thanks in advance for your help with this.

-- Denis