Content Will Be King In Solving Newspaper Crisis
Newspaper readers soon to be extinct?
I read an interesting editorial in the local newspaper the other day – it was about the great challenge newspapers and other printed media has to deal with in the decades to come. According to a professor emeritus of journalism, Philip Meyer, the brand of the printed newspaper has perhaps never been stronger – professional journalism of this kind is still broadly seen as very credible, responsible and intelligent – but with rapidly declining sales combined with grossly unprofitable Internet editions, the newspaper world definitely has to come up with better strategies for their online products.
I think they could have a lot to learn from smaller entrepreneurs, who have distilled various Internet marketing techniques down to an exact science. They need to get the online, Twitter-touting generation to really develop a desire for what they are offering.
Microbloggers may be the fastest online reporters right now, but those who market the professionally produced journalistic products need to emphasize that they have way more insight to offer their readers.
Ah – The Smell Of A Fresh Newspaper
I must confess that, as much as I like the web, I still thoroughly enjoy reading the paper (printed on actual paper) every morning. I guess that makes me part of an endangered species or something, as more and more people turn to the online editions of traditional newspapers these days. If they indeed read any traditional newspapers at all.
Thus a paper like the Washington Post now have more readers than ever before, yet they find it increasingly difficult to make a profit – especially online. Advertising revenue from the paper edition is going down, and selling advertising space online has proven to be very difficult to turn into a profitable business.
Here it is of course only fair to point out that even one of the most popular sites online right now, Youtube, is losing Google money by the bucketload – and Google certainly know one or two things about online advertising.
Sites like Facebook and Twitter are likewise (at least so far) more known for their immense popularity rather than their financial success.
So what are the newspaper industry to do?
I think it is clear that they should abandon the idea that the social media trend will somehow automatically turn the boat around. There are so many purely social (news) sites out there that it is very difficult to compete. And while having comment forms and other feedback on articles is nice, it actually offers very little additional value.
Because exceptional value is in the end what the online papers need to offer their readers if they expect them to pay for reading an e-paper. Financing a free online edition with money from the printed edition will soon not be a working solution. In fact, in his book The Vanishing Paper Philip Meyer have calculated that the printed news media in the US will be dead by the first quarter of 2043.
Personally I hope he is wrong (as I like real papers).
But it seems clear that if newspapers are to survive – in any format – they need to emphasize what their readers want the most. And that is carefully analyzed and produced content of the highest quality. Brings a whole new dimension to the cliché “content is king”, doesn’t it?
In any case, we certainly don’t need more “desinformation overload” on the web, and we sure aren’t prepared to pay for it.
Photo credit: micsten
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