{"id":11214,"date":"2017-04-03T06:48:31","date_gmt":"2017-04-03T11:48:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/smallbizsurvival.com\/?p=11214"},"modified":"2022-03-03T09:45:25","modified_gmt":"2022-03-03T15:45:25","slug":"my-local-newspaper-wouldnt-hire-me-so-i-started-my-own-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/smallbizsurvival.com\/2017\/04\/my-local-newspaper-wouldnt-hire-me-so-i-started-my-own-online.html","title":{"rendered":"My Local Newspaper Wouldn’t Hire Me, So I Started My Own–Online"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest Post by Micah\u00a0Choquette<\/h2>\n

Owner, Editor and Author of the Sapulpa Times<\/a>, Sapulpa, Oklahoma, population 20,000<\/h3>\n

Angrily, I hit \u201cSend\u201d on the message, certain that I was burning a bridge by doing so, but at this point, I didn\u2019t care.<\/p>\n

It was 2015 and I had just spent far too long chasing a deal with a prospective client that went nowhere. Despite literal years of doing favors and having conversations with numerous staff, customers and other interested parties, I had finally gathered enough information to send them a decent proposal, only to receive crickets on the other end. My polite but consistent prodding did not help the situation. I did not get a formal rejection\u2014I got nothing at all. Silence.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Micah Choquette, waiting for news to break in Sapulpa Oklahoma. Photo by\u00a0Julia Choquette.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Less than 2 years earlier, I had left a job working for the largest media site in Northeast Oklahoma, where I was doing the best work of my career as a web designer for The Tulsa World. When they were purchased by BH Media in 2013, I made the decision to leave, and we parted ways on great terms.<\/p>\n

Even so, I had found at The Tulsa World the intersection of a number of things I loved: The web, design, and journalism. So I eagerly watched for another opportunity to use my skills to do something similar.<\/p>\n

In late 2014, the website for my hometown\u2019s local newspaper went down and never came back up. I had been a columnist for them before my days at The Tulsa World, and had kept up a relationship with the folks there, even handling their email administration as a favor to them. The work involved was minimal and I did it purely for the chance to stay in touch.<\/p>\n

I emailed the editor and asked for the chance to submit a proposal to give them a brand new website with all the needed functionality to help them provide value to their readers and bring in more revenue. He gave the go-ahead and I got to work. It looked as though those years of doing favors were about to pay off!<\/p>\n

Over the next several months, I began having numerous conversations with their staff, their readers and their advertisers. We began exploring what their needs were and how we could use this opportunity to launch them into the digital world in a big way. I met with a team of designers and content producers to ensure that when we did this, we were going to do it really, really well.<\/p>\n

Finally, in March of 2015, I had enough to submit a thorough and ready-to-execute proposal. I emailed it over to them and waited with baited breath.<\/p>\n

And waited.<\/p>\n

And waited.<\/p>\n

I checked the address. Did I send it to the right person? Yes. I sent a follow-up email a couple days later. Still nothing.<\/p>\n

I reached out to my usual proxies. Had the boss seen the email? Was he mulling it over? Was there something he didn\u2019t like? Something we needed to change or work out? They all assured me he had seen the proposal, but nobody could give me an answer on whether or not he wanted to move forward.<\/p>\n

As the days and weeks went by I became increasingly frustrated at his silence. Finally, I could tolerate it no longer and sent a message that told him I\u2019d no longer be pursuing the project and wished them the best.<\/p>\n

That final click of the Send button was the point at which I decided to wash my hands of them entirely. There would be no more favors. No more trying to help those that wouldn\u2019t be helped.<\/p>\n

But the problem remained: there was no longer an online news presence for the local folks. I really felt an obligation to the community to inform them of what was happening around town, as well as share their stories. So I began to look for another opportunity.<\/p>\n

That very day, I turned to a man who had started a Facebook Page writing those types of stories. He was a veteran journalist and publisher who was using his retirement to write feature stories on the happenings in Sapulpa, as well as repost other news and events that folks sent his way.<\/p>\n

I asked him if he\u2019d be up for writing his stories for a website so they could be archived and shared around and searched for. He was extremely responsive, and I met him just a little while later to get the details ironed out.<\/p>\n

By the way, that conversation? A whole 90 seconds.<\/p>\n

Later that summer, he came to me and asked if I\u2019d be willing to run the show on this little adventure we were starting. He was retired, and didn\u2019t want to deal with the headaches of running a news organization, even if it was online-only. I agreed and again, got to work.<\/p>\n

A short while later, SapulpaTimes.com<\/a> was born on August 26th, 2015. There\u2019s been a lot of love and dedication to this project, and a year and a half later, a lot of great things have come out of it:<\/p>\n