Readers pick their own alerts
Most news apps send everyone the same notifications. Clarksville Now does it differently. Readers switch individual topics on or off, then use the same app to browse events and listen to local radio. The Clarksville Now team built the app with AppPresser's app builder.
Born the month before a flood
The site launched in April 2010 to support a group of Clarksville, Tennessee radio stations. One month later a historic flood struck the city, and the new site became the place residents turned for urgent updates. It went on to become a full newsroom covering breaking news, local government, sports and investigations. Today it belongs to 5 Star Media Group, the local radio group owned by Saga Communications, and Saga later copied the model in other cities. The Clarksville Now team built this app on AppPresser.
Seven switches
Notification settings offer seven separate toggles: Military, Crime, News, Weather, Sports, Business and Entertainment. A family stationed at Fort Campbell might keep Military on and turn Entertainment off. A high school sports fan might do the opposite.
The rest of the app
Four tabs organize everything:
- Top Stories for the biggest headlines of the day
- Recent Stories for the newest posts in order
- Categories for every section, plus local weather and traffic
- Listen Live for station streams such as Beaver 100.3 and Q108, along with local podcasts
A searchable events calendar highlights featured happenings, sorts and filters by distance, and lets readers save events.
The audience
Clarksville and Montgomery County residents get free local news. Military families new to the Fort Campbell area get a quick way to learn the community. Radio listeners and anyone hunting for weekend plans have a reason to open it too.
Where the content comes from
The newsroom publishes on WordPress using the Saga News Theme, Gravity Forms and WP Google Maps. As soon as a story goes live on the website, AppPresser makes it available in the app.
A daily habit, not an occasional visit
Letting readers choose topics keeps alerts welcome instead of annoying, and pairing news with events and radio gives people several reasons to come back.
Running a local newsroom on WordPress?
Here is how AppPresser works. You can also ask our team about a build.
