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Posted

This website is getting a little long in the tooth. The basic design dates back to 2021, when our only site was Twins Daily. Since that redesign, we've added nine (!!!!) sites and crammed in more new features than we can count.

It's time for a ground-up rethink of everything about this website, and we need your help to do it right.

A lot has changed over the past half-decade, especially for independent publishers like us: social media has throttled our reach to near-zero, Google is replacing search results with AI summaries, and economic uncertainties continue to loom over us all.

As a result, we're focusing inward and doubling down on community. We offer more interactivity than ever before; we want to offer the best comments, forums, and user blogs you'll find anywhere. Features like the You're The GM! offseason tool will gain more prominence, and new features are coming that expand upon that idea. At the center of everything we do is you, the user. 

We only know how we use the website; your experience could differ in very important ways. That's why it's important to let us know how you use the site and how we can do things better. We can't improve without input, and yours is vital to the next generation of DiamondCentric sites.

As always, thank you for being such an important part of our community!

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Community Moderator
Posted

I noticed that I'm getting a lot of "Reviewing the Brew" articles on Chrome when I open a new browser window.  Google puts a list of articles that "I may be interested in" below my search bar and pinned shortcuts.  This is besides the fact that BF is one of my pinned shortcuts.  I read a lot of BF articles and BrewCrewBall articles, but none of them ever show up there.  Maybe RTB is advertising with Google to push their articles... because it isn't because I regularly go there. 

Just an observation / idea if you are struggling to get traffic. 

"Rock, sometime, when the team is up against it, and the breaks are beating the boys, tell 'em to go out there with all they got and win just one for the Uecker. I don't know where I'll be then, Rock but I'll know about it; and I'll be happy."

Posted
7 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

I noticed that I'm getting a lot of "Reviewing the Brew" articles on Chrome when I open a new browser window.  Google puts a list of articles that "I may be interested in" below my search bar and pinned shortcuts.  This is besides the fact that BF is one of my pinned shortcuts.  I read a lot of BF articles and BrewCrewBall articles, but none of them ever show up there.  Maybe RTB is advertising with Google to push their articles... because it isn't because I regularly go there. 

Just an observation / idea if you are struggling to get traffic. 

So on chrome when you open a new tab, the recommended articles are dominated by RTB? Want to be clear I’m understanding the situation.

And our traffic here is good, better than most of our other sites. It’s just that the tech giants have turned the publishing market toxic. Their behavior has been abhorrent, frankly. We’ve been given a fast lesson in never relying on anyone but ourselves because corporate behemoths are vile. 

Posted

For example, if I search "Brewers news" the sites appear in the following order:

mlb.com, sportspyder, Reviewing the Brew, Brew Crew Ball, Sports Illustrated, Brewers' Twitter account, Yahoo, espn and THEN Brewer Fanatic

Community Moderator
Posted
14 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

So on chrome when you open a new tab, the recommended articles are dominated by RTB? Want to be clear I’m understanding the situation.

And our traffic here is good, better than most of our other sites. It’s just that the tech giants have turned the publishing market toxic. Their behavior has been abhorrent, frankly. We’ve been given a fast lesson in never relying on anyone but ourselves because corporate behemoths are vile. 

I get a variety of news articles, sports articles, etc... but the MLB articles are RTB (75%)or MLB.com (25%). They are never BF or BCB...which Google knows I read. Now, I have clicked on those links occasionally to see the article, but I rarely go to RTB otherwise. 

  • Like 1

"Rock, sometime, when the team is up against it, and the breaks are beating the boys, tell 'em to go out there with all they got and win just one for the Uecker. I don't know where I'll be then, Rock but I'll know about it; and I'll be happy."

Posted
32 minutes ago, duewizard said:

For example, if I search "Brewers news" the sites appear in the following order:

mlb.com, sportspyder, Reviewing the Brew, Brew Crew Ball, Sports Illustrated, Brewers' Twitter account, Yahoo, espn and THEN Brewer Fanatic

Our google traffic is decent. It could be better, and I'm going to take a look at the tech side during this redesign, but our content is also NOT written around SEO as it often it with those platforms you just listed (other than MLB.com, they just have massive authority on the subject). And we won't be writing to SEO any time soon, I've always believed that's short-sighted, and given how google is screwing publishers right now, that approach is proving correct.

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