Today starts the busy season on the site.
I say “busy season”, knowing that we’ve been averaging over six articles per day about the Pirates since the season began. We’ve had live coverage from every level by multiple people, with some teams getting three or four people watching them throughout the young season. We’ve written about every top prospect in the system in the first two months, and we’re circling back around to cover the guys we haven’t written about in the last month.
But that’s not considered “busy”. That’s just what we do here on a normal basis.
Today is the start of the MLB draft, which has been our biggest three-day period since the site launched. I don’t know who, specifically, this applies to, but looking at the numbers, we’ve brought in more readers to the site through our draft coverage than with any other event. I hope that continues this year, because we are going all out with the coverage. We’ll have analysis on every pick the Pirates make, with quotes from Neal Huntington, Greg Smith, and Joe DelliCarri. We’ve got anywhere from 3-5 people working on researching each pick and keeping the site updated, depending on the day, and that doesn’t even count our normal coverage in Pittsburgh or the minor league towns.
After today, we will be working on a few big projects. One is to make sure we’ve got mid-season updates on every player who could be considered for the top 30 prospect list. We’ve already started this, and by the end of the month, we will have articles on all of those players over the previous month. That will lead up to our updated Top 30 prospects, which is tentatively scheduled for the end of June, giving time for the draft picks to sign, and for promotions to take place.
Once July hits, things will only increase. We will have coverage of the international signings at the start of July, along with analysis and recaps of all of the big league trade rumors throughout the month, leading up to the trade deadline. And we’ll also have coverage of any prospect debuts along the way, just like today’s coverage of Jameson Taillon. And once again, we’ll continue to have live coverage of every prospect from every level.
If you’re a Pirates fan, then this is the site for you. You’re not going to find another site that covers the system like us. And you can get all of that coverage — writers in seven cities covering every level of the system, plus the latest news, rumors, and full coverage of all the big events — all for less than the price of a cup of coffee per month. That is nothing for all the content we provide.
If you haven’t subscribed yet, this is the perfect time to do so. Head over to our subscription page and pick a plan. The Top Prospect Plan comes with a free copy of the 2016 Prospect Guide, which has reports on every player in the system, plus our pre-season top 50 prospects. The Annual plan gets $10 off the book, or the eBook for $5.
And if you’re already a subscriber, please do us a favor. Tell a friend about the site. Tell a few friends. Give a gift subscription. One of the advantages of being a subscription site is that we have the resources to provide all of this coverage. One of the disadvantages is that we’re providing great coverage, but it’s difficult for new readers to even know about it, or old readers to remember how good the coverage was, and see how much it has improved under the new model. We advertise the site and promote articles, but nothing works better than word of mouth from a current subscriber. So if you are a subscriber, please take a second to tell a friend that they need to sign up for the site, or post a message on Facebook, Twitter, or any other social media site.
We’ve been rapidly expanding our coverage since switching over to a subscription site last year, and I have no intention of stopping that expansion any time soon. By referring people to the site, you’re only going to improve the quality of the site, and I’m already pretty proud of that quality.
Speaking of expanding, here are some of the things we’re already doing…
We’ve Added to the MLB Coverage
So far this season, we’ve added two new writers at the minor league level, adding Brian Peloza in Indianapolis, and Abigail Miskowiec in West Virginia. With the minor league coverage shored up, my next focus was boosting the MLB coverage, just in time for all of the promotions. We’re doing that in two ways.
First, as you may have noticed, we added Alan Saunders to cover home games in Pittsburgh. Alan also writes for the AP, and started his coverage with us last Friday. He had some excellent stuff on Jameson Taillon’s debut last night, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of his stuff on the site from every home game.
Taillon is actually an example of why we cover the big leagues, even though the site name is Pirates Prospects. We obviously put the minor leagues first, and spend a ton of resources covering the prospects as they make their way up the system. When they arrive in Pittsburgh, we know more about them than any outlet. So we’re not going to just let every other outlet take it from there. We’re going to continue covering those guys and their development in the big leagues. And in turn, by covering the big leagues, we get better perspective of what the farm system needs to produce.
The other way we’re boosting the MLB coverage is with added road coverage. Next week, I will hit the road to New York and Chicago, watching the Pirates take on two very important NL opponents, and hopefully seeing Jameson Taillon in the big leagues. We also might have coverage of the Seattle games at the end of the month. That means, with the exception of tonight’s game in Colorado, we could have live coverage of every Pirates game this month.
I’m not sure about the exact road coverage going forward, although I do plan on increasing the coverage once again in September after the minor league seasons are over. I’d like to keep increasing the coverage as the site continues to grow. So if you haven’t signed up, know that you’d not only be getting all of our great live coverage from throughout the system, but you’d be helping us to expand that and make it even better. And if you have signed up, you can upgrade at any time, locking in now for a longer term. All Top Prospect Plans get the 2016 Prospect Guide free, while Annual plans get $10 off. Subscribe or upgrade your account here.
Sponsorships
In order to continue the site’s growth, I’m looking to add sponsors in the future. To date, I have had no time to work on this, as all of my time has been spent working on the site, while being on the road what feels like non-stop this year. My main focus is to provide the best site experience for our 6000+ subscriptions, but I do realize that the experience could be improved greatly by adding sponsors and, in turn, adding more revenue for more expansion.
When we launched the site, I removed all ad networks and rotating banner ads from the site. I have no intention of going back to that. They slowed the site down a lot, made it look messy, and we had no control what showed up, which led to reports of some sketch ads (and it was always uncomfortable replying to those reports by saying that the ads were based on their browsing history). It’s probably not a good financial decision to avoid the ad networks, but it’s a good decision to make the site experience better for subscribers.
The sponsors we’re seeking are different. We’re looking for people local to Pittsburgh, or to the minor league teams. We want companies that will fit in with the site by providing products that are local to our readers. And we’re not looking for ads that would be seen as intrusive or annoying. If anyone is interested in advertising on the site, send me an e-mail at tim@piratesprospects.com and I’ll send you a media kit with information on the options we provide.
Job Openings
With the short-season leagues beginning soon, I wanted to post our job openings for Morgantown and Bristol. We’re looking for coverage from both of those teams. To apply for a position, send an e-mail to tim@piratesprospects.com with the following information:
-What position(s) you are applying for.
-Why would you be a good addition to the site? I get a lot of requests to write for the site, so what could you provide that would separate you from other writers?
-What is your availability for game coverage?
-What is your previous experience (include links to published content)?
For any writing position the following will be very important:
-Great work ethic and independent workers
-Strong grammar/spelling
-Good statistical knowledge, including an understanding of advanced statistics
-The ability to come up with original and interesting topics
-Leaving emotional biases out of the work
-Twitter and social networking experience
-Being a Pirates fan is not a requirement
The site is run on WordPress, so any knowledge of that is a plus.
