What is “Local”?
What’s local? This is a fundamental question, and the NAA’s Digital Edge blog asked it recently:
Local can’t be universally defined by mileage — that’s obvious. To a person living in the suburban sprawl outside Los Angeles, a business 20 miles away could be “local.” But to a resident of Brooklyn, a “local” business might be one that is within a 15-minute walk.
The cool part about “local” is it depends on you. It’s not circulation area, it’s not county line, it’s not zip code. It’s specific to you and the way you live.
Here’s my definition of local, broken down into four tiers:
- First-tier local are the areas I go on a regular basis: my home, my job, my friends’ places, the gas stations, the parks, the bars, the grocery stores — and the places I commute through to get to those places.
- Second-tier local are the areas around those areas — or the places that wouldn’t be much out of my way to be at. I pay less attention to what’s happening in the second-tier local spaces than the first-tier, naturally.
- Third-tier local are the places that are first-tier to my family and close friends.
- Fourth-tier local are the places that *used* to be first-tier local to me and still matter for one reason or another.
January 11th, 2007 at 8:42 am
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January 13th, 2007 at 9:21 am
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