Content from Next Avenue, the website for older adults from TPT, is now available to all public media stations to republish.
The St. Paul, Minn., station is offering for free more than 4,000 articles through the Public Media Platform focusing on lifestyle topics including health and well-being, caregiving, money and security, work and purpose.
Previously, around 90 stations were Next Avenue affiliates. They provided links to nextavenue.org from station websites, teased content in social media and newsletters, ran on-air spots and in some cases sponsored related local events, said Susan Donley, Next Avenue managing director. However, they could not republish the content in full on their own websites.
But in the years since that network of affiliates supported Next Avenue’s launch in May 2012, “stations are wanting to build their own traffic,” said TPT President Jim Pagliarini. Now, content republished on station websites contains Next Avenue bylines, but TPT imposes no branding requirements. “Stations can own their traffic and support their own brand,” Pagliarini said.
The change comes in response to the growing number of public media news portals, community blogs, membership communications and social media channels. Stations need more high-quality content every day, Pagliarini said.
Nextavenue.org publishes 20–25 stories weekly, along with videos and other resources for aging Americans. Between 1.5 million and 2 million unique visitors use the site monthly; for comparison, PBS Food, another subject-specific, largely text-based site, receives about 756,000 visits. Some 115,000 readers subscribe to Next Avenue’s newsletters.
Washington Post columnist Rodney Brooks picked Nextavenue.org Monday as one of his three top sites for baby boomers.
“We were happy to find that the media marketplace really has a Next Avenue–shaped hole,” Donley said. “And with the enormity of the size of the audience, Next Avenue continues to grow.” The audience is also engaged: A TPT reader survey found that 96 percent of visitors had taken action as a result of something they saw on the site.
Donley said Next Avenue has also been working closely with stations on social media. Next Avenue Facebook posts “tend to be more engaging than the average station post,” she noted, and perform well on PBS’s social streams.
The station intends to soon offer content from its Rewire digital service for free as well. Rewire is TPT’s engagement initiative for under-40 viewers, featuring videos about subjects such as food, money and music.