Frank De Raffele
Hudson Valley News Network
Posted on: 1/20/2015
Over 1 Million Served!
Less than 18 months ago Hudson Valley Sports Report.Com launched. A website that focuses on bringing our Mid-Hudson Valley high school and college sports to the general public.
Let’s Imagine the Work That Goes Into This.
Covering 31 high schools in the Hudson Valley region, sports 12 months per year; indoors, outdoors, afternoons, evenings, weekdays and weekends…..shooting video of the games, interviewing the coaches and players, editing, receiving phone call results, writing articles, and doing this day after day, 6 to 7 days per week. All in an effort to focus on our local athletes and athletic programs and broadcasting it every day on the HudsonValleySportsReport.com website for all to see – FOR FREE. Not one single person in the Hudson Valley has to pay to read an article or watch crisp and professionally edited video of their team’s game highlights, athletic achievements, or post game interviews.
That’s just the touching the surface. Then there’s all the back room “stuff” we don’t get to see. The research required to write the many articles on the site every day and the hours of work that needs to go in to verifying all information and creating the interesting articles we all enjoy reading.
Why?
To make our student athletes stars in their own communities. Helping them to build their esteem confidence and pride. For some, helping them get college scholarships not to mention memories that will last a lifetime.
Headed by Professional Sports Broadcasters and Writers
This major undertaking and is the brainchild of Charles Cornacchio and Richard Thomaselli. Charlie has been a sports broadcaster for over 25 years and Rich has been a sports reporter for over 30 years. The two realized the synergy of combining Charlie’s video experience and Rich’s writing prowess and combining it all into a multi-dimensional online platform that comprises quality sports coverage that is second to none.
If you have ever owned a website, you are familiar with the massive amount of energy and hours it takes to create and update on a daily basis. From a business sense, that’s the easy part! The hard part is getting people to even know the site exists and then getting them to visit it. I know many businesses that are happy if 100 people a day see their website. For them to think of having 1 Million visitors in their lifetime, never mind 18 months, is not even in their wildest dreams.
“We knew this idea of local online sports reporting would work. As sports reporters, both Rich and I knew exactly what was lacking in local coverage and what people wanted to see. We knew we could deliver it. But the immediate support and loyalty to the site and what we were doing was somewhat humbling,” commented Cornacchio.
HVSR covers high school, college, and pro sports teams from throughout the Dutchess, Putnam and Ulster County areas. A key to its success is the sites social media presence. As of this publication, HVsports twitter account has over 3,600 followers. The site appeals to Moms and Dads as well as the athletes themselves.
“Interacting with our followers has allowed us to provide a whole new insight to the local sports scene. We have built a community of like-minded people who are interested in positive reporting where ever game gets a headline.” Thomaselli stated with great pride.
How Significant is this Accomplishment?
Matt Chernay, President and CEO of IT Visions, Inc. has been the man behind the curtain, in terms of the development and maintenance of the website mechanics. He is as impressed as much as everyone else. According to Chernay working on HVSR was through a serendipitous email from Cornacchio about 24 months ago and as they say, the rest is history.
“Now, HudsonValleySportsReport.Com is in the big leagues; accumulating over 1 million page views, just shy of 18 months, is a monumental and exciting day for me as well. Aside from providing support and consulting on HVSR’s website, I have also provided the necessary website hosting services for this local sports news company to ensure the site was operational and stable 24/7/365. I have been a web designer and developer for 14 years now – no other website I have developed has come close to the traffic that HVSR has achieved in just under 18 months. I’m very fortunate and grateful to be a apart of HVSR. I very much feel like the proud Papa.”
Over 80% of all Small Businesses Fail in the First 24-36 Months.
You hear about many businesses that don’t make it past their first 2 to 3 years, and you wonder why. When you see a business like this, a new concept with no client base to pull from and a lot of work to produce their product, it make you wonder why or how did they do it? In this case, the answer is easy. They focused on serving their community. They have been fully committed to providing a great service for all to enjoy and their hard work has paid off.
With over 1 Million visitors (and growing) in less than 18 months HVSR has identified itself as a staple in the Hudson Valley business community,but more importantly, Thomaselli and Cornacchio have created a community through insightful articles, quality and impressive videos, and the focus to promote our local athletes and their achievements.
Congratulations and great future success.
