Edmonson Voice's Second Birthday Tomorrow: Nearing Three Million Visits

by Darren Doyle, Editor
It was about 3am in the middle of an August night in 2014 when I got the crazy idea to start an online news network for Edmonson County. I started putting the idea and people together the very next day and within seven days, I started building the website.

"Nobody will take you seriously." "Edmonson County is too behind the times for that." "It won't go over in this county."  These are just some of the things that I heard when I began to share my idea. On September 2, 2014, edmonsonvoice.com first launched and in the first week we had almost 20,000 visits from about 4,500 people.

That was three million visits ago, (two million this year alone) and we're now being read in Warren, Butler, Barren, and several other counties. We now have around 11,000 readers and our site is visited around 40,000 times in one week. Since there are only 12,000 people in the county (including kids and people without internet) that seems really good.

We've expanded our sports coverage with a multi-year deal with ECHS to broadcast high school sports. We're making a conscious effort to include more sports and school activities in our coverage and EC students are being seen and heard more now than they've ever been.

We've reported and covered a little bit of everything during these last two years, some good news, some bad, but we do our best to give you the whole story as soon as we get it. (Well, everything except where the ambulance is headed).

We've been asked to do stories on a number of things, and the requests that we receive certainly keep us on our toes. We've posted some of those crazy requests and emails, but we're no longer publishing them. Not because we don't find them entertaining, but because we've come to realize that the Edmonson Voice has become the hub of information for Edmonson County. People ask us these things because they really expect us to know, and we've embraced that idea and consider it a great compliment.

In the past two weeks we've had calls and emails requesting mud bog info, family ancestry information, Mammoth Cave ticket prices, gas prices at a particular store, the phone number of a local business, and of course..."what's all them sirens about?" We've given some sort of answer to all, although we chose not to do a story about a steak from an area restaurant that wasn't properly cooked. (Actual request).

As funny as that may seem, we also get calls from law firms, politicians, business owners, law enforcement, and school officials, as they know they can trust us with their information.

Our quest to grow and improve continues everyday. Our readership has consistently grown since day one, and it has not yet stalled. Even other news networks including TV, radio, and papers follow the Edmonson Voice so they, too can stay updated on what happens here. We regularly hear things like, "I used to get my news from __________, but I don't anymore. You guys cover it all, and I check it everyday."

Of course, there are still people out there who don't understand what we do or they try to discourage us, but this we know for sure: You HAVE taken us seriously. Edmonson County is NOT too far behind the times for an online network. It HAS gone over in this county, and we have NO plans of slowing down.

Thank you for making us Edmonson County's number one source for local news and information. Happy Birthday, Edmonson Voice!