Warwickinfo.net reaches one million annual page views

WARWICK — Warwickinfo.net, the largest Internet directory in the region dedicated to the three villages and eight hamlets of Warwick (with additional information about Sugar Loaf and Vernon, N.J.) reached a million annual page views during 2011.

Warwickinfo.net began 2004 with only 100 pages of data about area businesses. Today, the site has more than 1,500 pages of content, with monthly traffic of between 80,000 to 90,000 page views.

In his press release announcing the business accomplishment, founder Peter Hall said Warwickinfo.net also enjoys high page rankings that are at or near the top of major search engines, a high visitor repeat rate (25 percent) and a visit duration that lasts almost three minutes – a long time by directory standards – when people are trying to find the right answers quickly.

‘Hyper local’ “We gather information from a wide variety of sources,” Hall said, “that include public bulletin boards, post offices, schools, churches, e-mail sources and not-for-profit organizations.

Maintaining the site, however, can be challenging. Many so-called “hyper-local” sites contain aggregated stories that can be irrelevant or outdated because they rely upon computer algorithms that approximate and automatically upload the content.

Warwickinfo.net content, however, is “updated manually because it’s the only way that we can ensure that the content is relevant, accurate and meets the needs of our audience,” Hall said.

The site, he added, provides an opportunity for Internet exposure for small mom and pop businesses at an affordable rate.

“At $25 a month we haven’t increased our prices in five years,” Hall added. It lets visitors navigate to subscriber’s web sites, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, blogs, YouTube channels and more quickly and effectively.

400 web sites linked Warwickinfo is the official web site for the Florida Farmers’ Markets, Warwick in Bloom, St. Stephen’s Church and other not-for-profit organizations.

Warwickinfo.net is the first place that visitors and residents consult for the arts, and is an important promotional site for the Summer Arts Festival, The Warwick Jazz Festival, the Black Dirt Feast and other arts and entertainment events.

There are currently more than 400 outside web sites that are linked to Warwickinfo.net, further reinforcing the site’s popularity. The company has also launched a new digital weekly newspaper, Warwickinfo Digest, containing links to recent articles and upcoming events from local media partners and other local sources, including restaurants, artists and libraries.