Guess whose got a new look: 2017 State of Chocolate Hockey
Hockey season is upon us once again and Chocolate Hockey is back for its eighth season. This season our goal is to bring you both the best coverage and best original content of the Hershey Bears from any outlet either on air, online or in print, and we won’t stop until we accomplish that goal. With that in mind, there are a few things I feel like we need to address before the home opener on Saturday night.
Staffing:
I want to take a quick second and introduce and reintroduce our staff.
Scott Payonk is joining us this season as our Associate Editor to the site. He’ll pretty much fill in anywhere I’m not. From photos to videos to writing to editing, Scott does it all. Expect to see his name all over the site this year. Get Scott’s tweets: @ScottP_Hockey
Grace Grill is back for another season with us doing pregame and postgame shows, and will also be a contributor during the season with us. Grace is on Twitter @GraceHGrill
Corey Swartz will return in a different role this season after being our recap writer the second half of the year last season. Corey will now contribute stories from around the AHL and Central PA. Anything that has to do with hockey in our area, we will have you covered this season. Follow Corey on Twitter: @cswa11
Lillian Kashishian also joins us as a contributor. With experience as a player for 15 years and official for six, she’ll provide some of the best insight to the game I think this site has ever had. Her Twitter: @LillyKashishian
I’m also still here for my tenth season covering the team. You can tweet your insults directly at me, @kyle_mace. (Also I have a Facebook page this year with a lot less hot takes than my Twitter.)
We do have a few more contributors we will be adding as the season progresses, and I’ll make sure they get proper introductions as well. This is truly the best and most talented staff we’ve ever had and I cannot be more excited to share what these people do with all of you.
New site design:
As some of you may notice, our site looks a bit different. Actually, a lot different. This has been something I’ve wanted to address for a while, and I am thrilled with how the site looks.
There’s a lot of changes, but I’ll quickly address some of the major ones. Number one: we’re finally mobile friendly. Over 70% of our readers view our content from their phones and tablets, and we wanted to make the site look the best it could on your phone, as well as clean up our look on our desktop site.
Secondly, we’ve addressed how the site loads. One of the big issues we had in the past was how quickly the site would load. After removing a few tools, we’ve been able to speed up the loading of posts, allowing you to access our content in a more efficient manner.
I do need to give a huge shoutout and thank you to Wavelength Marketing for their help with the redesign. Bryant and Gary were the absolute best to work with through this entire process and as I said before, I couldn’t be happier with the result. Please, check out their site if you have the chance and give them some love from us.
Advertising:
For the first time in our history, we will be advertising on our website. Before you freak out, this has been an ongoing project for over two years and we have finally built a program to get some ads on our site. We promise you our ads won’t be annoying, nor will they slow down the loading time on our stories. Our goal is to bring you advertisements for companies and products that you find interesting, as well as try and use our site to help get deals for our most loyal readers.
If you or your company is interested in advertising with us, please click the “Contact” tab at the top of the page, or visit our about page to contact me directly. Our platform reaches hundreds of thousands of people a year, and our prices are extremely reasonable for both big business and small family companies.
Crowdfunding:
This is something I’ve been asked a lot about and felt like it would be something smart to address here. Lots of sites nowadays are going to either subscription-based services or crowdfunding part of their websites. I can promise you that Chocolate Hockey will never go either one of those routes.
As long as I am running our website, Chocolate Hockey will be free. We will never ask for money, nor charge you to read our content. I hate the concept of asking people for money in exchange for “exclusives” or small perks. That’s something I’m really against and won’t be pushing for anytime soon.
Potpourri:
I’m extremely excited about our content this season. Everything we have ever done with this site has lead to now and put us in a position to create some pretty special things. My goal for this site has always been to make things I think people will enjoy. This season will be no different.
My goal is to also be extremely accessible to everybody that has any question, comment, or concern. I’m extremely active on my Twitter account, now Facebook account, and I have a public e-mail I check every day. Please don’t be afraid to reach out to me to talk Bears hockey or anything in general.
We here at Chocolate Hockey are super excited to get this season fully underway, and we hope you are too. For all of our links, check the top of the site for our Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
