30/10/2013

Alexa Rankings 30/10/13

Below are the most recent figure taken from www.alexa.com. 
I have used a mix of other student journalism websites, as well as other competitors in the local journalism world. When looking at our UK ranking, we are far ahead of our student competitors East London Lines, JMU and WNOL who both don't even have a UK ranking. In relation to local newspapers, we are far ahead of The Hampshire Chronicle however the Basingstoke Gazette and the Daily Echo are slightly ahead of us. However, it is important to remember, in student terms we are producing the best student Journalism around. Globally, we have a long way to go when comparing it to statistics from the beginning of the year (23/01/13) when WINOL was 460,940 Globally and had a UK ranking of 33,950. I am hoping over the next month, we can improve on this global ranking, by social media strategies i.e. making the most of Twitter and Facebook. Also, using our website to our advantage and keeping up to date with text stories and features. 


28/10/2013

Monday 28th Circulation Statistics


Below is the circulation statistics for the past week on www.winol.co.uk. For the past few weeks the circulation has been fairly low in comparison to what we are used to. However Sunday evening the circulation stats peaked at 95 which is the highest viewings we have had this term according to Google Circulation. 


In the next week I plan to not only take over WINOL's circulation, but also the circulation for each magazine. Not only this but Shona Race, WINOL's promotional editor and I are planning a Twitter Takeover where we allow someone (a professional) to take over our twitter for an hour and people can send in questions that they want to ask. 

23/10/2013

Week 4 Wednesday Debrief

This weeks guest editor was Graham Bell who is a previous Journalism student from 4 years ago. He now is the boss at Omnisport and has employed people who have also graduated from this Journalism course over the past few years. Along with advice from Chris and Brian, we had Ian Anderson and Angus Scott, helping out with each journalists packages and giving their own personal advice on packages and the bulletin as a whole.

Below is some advice and opinions from Angus on this weeks bulletin and particular packages.
- Do not use excuses. Whether you choose to use excuses on why things didn't go a certain way, your viewers will not hear those excuses. They will only see the final package and that is all that matters.
- In general we are extremely picture light. Stories are led by pictures and need to be picture led.
- Ben's Steve Brine package; interviews with no covering shot are not ideal. A 2 shot or walking shot would of been much better to use. Set up shots are one of the most important things to use with all interviewee's!
- If there is a big story to tell then get the opposing point of view. Then it becomes an actual story.
- If you are asking a question, make sure you move the gun mic towards you instead of keeping it on the interviewee. It is still important for the audience to hear the question.
- When you are presenting the bulletin, look down and back up when finishing one story and going into another. This will then portray the change of a story.
- Callum's Police statistics package had no facts and no sign off. In general it was not a whole story. Always always use a microphone, without one the sound is poor. By not having a microphone it is nearly as bad as not having a camera.
- The mental health story done by Zeena this week was a difficult topic to cover as most people with illness etc do not really want to talk about it. When filming the interviewee, the backdrop of white walls could be seen to have a bad connotation to the story itself. Therefore it is important to keep the scenery of each shot in mind when filming. This story in particular is a good example of a human interest story.
If you are doing a story such as this, make that person the centre of the story.
The group shot used by Zeena was very effective and is a good technique to use. It is much more interesting than focussing on one particular person for a long period of time as that can get boring.
- Ellen's Hayling Island Storm package was a brilliant example of local news. Ellen put the package together in a way that told a good story and the use of the devasting pictures portrays this.
- Spence's 'egg man' story was very good. A point to be made however is that footage from 8 months ago which was used previously could of been put it in to portray how we covered the egg being made nearly a year ago. The question 'why was the egg built?' wasn't really covered in the story and we can not -as journalists- assume that people know things like this.
- Sport; From now we ban the phrase 'I am here at ...'. In some footage this week, the main camera's were too wide so we couldn't focus on what exactly was happening as it was too far out.
You do not need to state what you can see, as if you can see it, so can the audience.
- Lucy's and finally story needed a better variation of shots as they were all a bit wide and a larger variety was needed, especially during the editing stage. However, the natural sound at the beginning of the package was brilliant as it adds something to the story.
- In a similar way to Lucy's package this week, Nadine's story also used brilliant natural sound of gas and a kettle boiling. Such sounds are so easy to do, and it adds a lot to the story.

Ian Anderson's thoughts and opinions of this weeks bulletin;
- We need to develop the stories much more to get a better reaction. If you don't do this, you are ultimately giving the story to your competitors.
- We are falling short slightly on sound. The sound is as important as the pictures.
- Natural sound is very important and should be used whenever is possible to add something to the story.
- Work on framing and natural lighting.
- We must work on sequences of shots that go together.
- Good mix of stories this week.
- Work harder, use more shots and put in more hours!

Overall I think we did brilliantly this week and each bulletin is becoming more professional and successful than the last. Not only this but the features side of WINOL is becoming more established and our new Access Winchester is a fantastic display of some brilliant student journalism.

Week 3 Wednesday Debrief

Today's guest editor was Joe Curtis, the senior reporter of the Hampshire Chronicle.
Below is some notes about the bulletin from Joe Curtis;
- Get people looking at the website. The best way is to use the bulletin to do this.
- Harvey's package was good, using a good variety of perspectives. However make sure you stick to what and why's! A follow up could easily be done after this particular package.
- Emma's package on the teachers strikes could be improved through some shots. The use of the bottom legs of children shots was used in a previous package, therefore it would be slightly better to have new shots for a new package.
- Spence's graduation package was very effective, the walk and talk at the beginning is very good and the presenting was also of a high standard.
- Sport was could be improved as some shots went on for too long and there wasn't a good variety.
- The Volleyball package was very successful this week, the involvement made the story far more interesting.
- Liam's Wolfweek package was good however the fact that he had to travel to Reading to do it, lets it down slightly. If it was more local it would of been perfect. If you have to go too far, then cut the story.

Following is points from Ian Anderson on this weeks bulletin;
- This weeks bulletin was a nice clean programme. At some points we were held back technically and the sound and camera work could be improved. By improving this, everything else will get better. People will not take notice unless this is good.
- Nice headlines this week.
- Writing headlines to picture is always important.
- We are television. If the pictures are not right, people won't listen to the script.
- Oovs are always difficult, and when you don't know cue points, this makes it even harder.
- Emma's strike package is in need of some natural sound.
- Christina's Michael Mansfield package was good, however the two shot of both of them together needs improving as they are too far apart from one another.
- Spence's graduation package had a good opening and an extremeley good use of natural sound.
- Volleyball package was good.
- Liam's wolves story; using 'howl of a story' was not great. As a presenter you use irony, saying it. There are too many mid shots, variation is needed.

21/10/2013

Google Circulation for WINOL 14th October - 20th October

Below is a bar chart relating to the number of views WINOL has received in the past week.


The graph shows that the lowest viewing days are Thursday and Friday, which technically should be our most popular days as WINOL has just been broadcasted. Ultimately, a way to overcome this is by me keeping on top of the social media particularly on Wednesday and Thursdays, allowing our audiences to know that our new bulletin is out.

This week I want to start making sure each reporter is taking good images with their packages. I then want to create a Tumblr account, to put all of our images on and therefore make the most of a variation of social media sites.

16/10/2013

Circulation Figures

Currently WINOL currently ranks 1, 309,425 globally and 38, 579 in the UK. By using Google Analytics, I have created a few graphs which can show how our viewing ratings look over the past week. Also including some overall statistics about WINOL as a whole.

Below is a graph based upon the views WINOL has received each day in the past week. 






The charts below show the number of new and returning visitors for WINOL. Also the number of unique visitors which is the amount of visitors unduplicated (counted only once) over the course of the past month. Bounce rate relates to how many people stay for one story then leave.




I will create a circulation graph each Sunday evening ready for the Monday morning de-brief. Therefore we as a team can keep up to date with which days WINOL thrives and how to improve on the days where the views are low.

15/10/2013

Third and final year

The fact that I am in my Third and final year at university is so scary. Not only has it flown by, it's daunting to think that this time next year I will hopefully have a full time job!
For my first semester of being a third year, we are continuing WINOL and are now joined by the now second years. Unlike the past year where my role in WINOL was the editor of Absolute:ly, our online fashion magazine, I was put as the Social Media Editor. To begin with I was extremely nervous about my role as it's completely different to anything I have ever done before and had got very comfortable in my previous role. However, being too comfortable is never a good thing and now I am so glad to have a different role to last year as I am getting far more from the experience than I would of done.

My role for my final term on WINOL will entail keeping up to date on all of the social media accounts i.e. Twitter and Facebook. Not only this but it's important that I use each social media site to our advantage, by ensuring I target the right audiences on each site. I will also keep a close eye on our circulation statistics through Google Circulation, which will show how many views WINOL is getting daily, weekly and monthly, then from there we can compare to similar sites. This will therefore ensure we are doing the right things to stay on top form and keep WINOL at a high. Hannah, who was our social media editor last year did a fantastic job and I aim to carry on in her footsteps and hopefully help WINOL become even more popular than it is today.

I aim to keep my blog up this term, blogging a few times a week on Monday morning de-briefs, the WINOL bulletin de-brief and the Circulation statistics on a Sunday night.

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