Andy Soloman Global Journalism and New Media

The importance of great content to today’s businesses

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Content Strategy, LinkedIn, social media, social networks, Uncategorized, video Tagged with Business, content, Content strategy, customer engagement, Rugby, The Rugby Business Network, video February 6th, 2012 @ 1:42 pm

I was approached by The Rugby Business Network for a few video views on the importance to today’s businesses of great content. It’s a growing area and more and more businesses beginning to understand just how using great content can really drive customer engagement and help grow profits.

Must say, I really enjoyed doing this.

The Rugby Business Network is a group on LinkedIn that connects some 3,700 fans, players, coaches, employees, volunteers and sponsors of rugby and helps facilitate business among them.

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Creation, curation, and the ethics of content strategy — presentation

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Aggregation, Content, Content Strategy, Curation, publishing, Uncategorized Tagged with aggregation, content, Content strategy, curation, margot bloomstein, slideshare February 2nd, 2012 @ 6:26 pm

Creation Curations Ethics of Content Strategy W2E

View more presentations from Margot Bloomstein

Thanks to Margot Bloomstein for making this presentation shareable.

Margot’s description — From Degas to Danger Mouse, what’s your place in the debate of content creation and curation? Both companies’ and consumers’ expectations of user experience have matured, helping content strategy.

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Today’s #ContentStrategy has some great articles

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Content Strategy, publishing, social media, Uncategorized Tagged with blenderbox, Business, content, Content strategy, publishing, social media February 2nd, 2012 @ 5:21 pm

Just a taste of today’s #ContentStrategy. Click through and take a look, be entertained and informed. There’s some really great articles and I was particularly interested in Matt Raw’s (@mattbot) take from the Blenderbox blog on creating complex content models. . There’s loads of top grey matter sharing their knowledge.

#ContentStrategy 2 February 2012

Content Marketing Expert Jon Wuebben Announces New Book, “Content Is Currency: Developing Powerful Content for Web & Mobile” (prweb.com)

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Content strategy rises to take its seat at the top table

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Content Strategy, Digital, media, online revenue, publishing, social media, Uncategorized Tagged with Blue Fountain Media, Business, chief content officer, Content strategy, contentstrategy, IPad, London, New York City, New York Times, social media February 1st, 2012 @ 11:25 am

This article was originally published on the eSocialMedia blog

: Pearly kings and queens understand content (Image via Wikipedia)

I recently sat squeezed into the basement room of a pub in London’s East End. Even though we were within hearing range of old Bow Bells, this wasn’t a place of cor blimey Cockneys having a knees up. It was a packed house of around 100 people who all shared a single passion — content. We whistled through 11 content strategy lightening talks using the Ignite format (five minutes x 20 slides x 15 seconds and then a mop of the brow) that explored how best to craft and deliver great content strategies. Nothing unusual there you may think. But then a surprising thing happened, when the audience was asked how many were in marketing, just a few put their hands up.

And there’s the rub. Content is finally moving out of the shadows of marketing to carve out a dominent space of its own and be one of the single most important factors in driving business growth. There’s a huge amount going on in the world of content right now, and rightly so. Media convergence offered by the latest iPads or smart phones is delivering a multi-media on-demand experience. People are engaging via search, social networks and with established brands in completely new ways. It is pure empowerment, and unless businesses look to jump on board and start feeding and nurturing content channels they are destined to perish.

The technology is fuelling fundamental shifts in consumer behaviour that is driving change in publishing, and increasingly, washing over other organisations. These days the consumer decision journey has changed from a straight-forward funnel where people would gradually narrow their choices before making a decision, to something far more complex. And as for brand loyalty, the message is beware. Unlike the past where brand was in the vanguard and everything else followed, these days brand is increasingly subservient to its content.

McKinsey & Co’s David Edelman, in a blog posting at the end of last year, asked a very simple question: “Who’s your brand’s editor-in-chief?”. Although he was talking about retailers, his words rang true for any business looking to engage with its customers or audience. “If you’re a retailer and you’re not generating a non-stop flow of customised, interactive content, the writing’s on the wall: Publish or perish. Publishing has become an essential tool for keeping customers close…,” he wrote.

: Consumer decision journey (HBR, Dec 2010)

I hear more and more stories of companies large and small from outside the publishing space recruiting editorial professionals to build their content. One global oil major has just appointed an editor-in-chief, while the really innovative are going a step further and installing Chief Content Officers who can oversee not just editorial but who are also responsible for how the business positions itself through its bespoke, curated and aggregated content together with social media engagement. These positions are, for the first time, giving editorial a seat at the top table, and subsuming the other more traditional roles of marketing, communcations and PR while being a critical stakeholder in sales, e-commerce, IT and customer relations.

But for a company that does take a punt on creating a Chief Content Officer, what exactly can this deliver? John Gelberg is just such a man. As Chief Content Officer at New York web design and marketing agency Blue Fountain Media, he has overseen his agency rising to become a trusted source of critical intelligence. They now employ two nearly full-time editorial staff and the brand is recognised as being a source of digital expertise. Over the past two years Blue Fountain has steadily grown its original content to include articles, a business learning centre and sections offering advice to companies looking to build an online presence. Blue Fountain’s CEO writes for the American Express Open Forum and a column for the New York Times, while Gelberg, a former sports journalist, contributes to Inc magazine and is in demand as a speaker at events. “Through building a compelling content strategy client buy-in comes quickly once the links start coming in, once we can show real metrics,” Gelberg said.

And it doesn’t stop with pumping content out to clients, it also includes sharing content with — or creating content for — clients. It’s a huge job, and not something that can be done simply, quickly and with little thought.

It’s not a case of selling, it is a case of informing, listening and engaging. It is no longer concievable to push potential customers through a sales funnel. They need to be nurtured, educated and entertained. They also need to be reassured by peers. In a nutshell they need to be empowered. To do that requires tact, guile and not insignificant doses of skill in delivering great content that is highly relevant to its target audience. It needs to be trusted to carry a deep value proposition and it needs to be everywhere. That vision can only come from on high, from the umbrella view belonging to the Chief Content Officer.

The Rise Of The Chief Content Officer (contently.com)
Content is Key (goldensolutionsblog.wordpress.com)
“Content Rules” That All Marketers Can Use (buildmediamarketing.wordpress.com)
Content Strategy Success in 5 Steps | Shelly Bowen’s Pybop: Exceptional Web Content (serve4impact.com)

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How to make social media converts and influence people

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Content Strategy, magazines, Marketing, media, social media, social networks, Uncategorized Tagged with Business, chief content officer, Content strategy, contentstrategy, Internet marketing, Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Social business, social media January 30th, 2012 @ 6:23 pm

Who's in charge of sharing? (Image via Wikipedia)

Mhairi McEwan, writing in her Guru column in the lastest edition of Marketing magazine (yes I do still read hard copy, especially when I’m on the CC lists), suggests the marketing department is the “natural leader” of social media within an enterprise. I disagree.

She went on to say that it was critical to have senior management and board-level support. In that, I agree.

However, while marketing certainly is the key for executing a comprehensive social media strategy, that work comes as part of the much bigger content strategy, that needs to be tied in to the business goals. Social media, for all its advantages, only really delivers the sharing capabilities to the underlying content.

Mhairi, who is co-founder and CEO of Brand Learning, was addressing a question that is found in many companies:

My brand has still not got to grips with social media as ownership is a fraught issue… The situation is made worse because the board is of a generation that is not comfortable with social business. Where do we start?

She was offering sound advice but I believe she addressed the question back-to-front. The key element here is in having a senior sponsor, someone who not only has the ear of the board, but someone who is vested with the authority to drive content strategy in line with business goals. Under such a scenario, ownership becomes a non-issue and the focus becomes one of definition, delivery and returns.

The implementation of a content strategy, and in turn, social media execution, follows swiftly where there is a clear set of metrics and a measurable ROI. It matters not whether the “board is of a generation that is not comfortable with social business”, because once the board sees the business goals being met they won’t care whether they like or understand it personally. My bet is that when faced with the compelling evidence, the company will suddenly be full of social media converts.

Forecast: Mobile and social media revenues to grow 31% in 2012 (nfcdata.com)

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#ContentStrategy, the new daily publication for Content Strategy

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Aggregation, blogging, Content, Content Strategy, media, newspapers, publishing, social media Tagged with content, Content strategy, paper.li, publishing, social media, twitter January 30th, 2012 @ 12:41 pm

I’ve been taking a look at paper.li and have launched the all new #ContentStrategy daily newsletter that aims to aggregate and curate content looking at issues around creating great content strategies. Setting up the paper was a breeze, but it will take a little longer to refine the keywords and search terms to ensure all content is spot on. You can see the paper here, so please go ahead and subscribe. Importantly, I’d love to hear your views and whether there is anything you would like to see included. I’m looking forward to your comments, especially suggestions for #hashtags, @users and lists that should be monitored.

(And if you’re wondering, yes, the name has changed after just one issue)

Paper.li – a nice aggregator and also connector (markkellynet.com)

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Content is key to enriching customer experience

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Marketing, social media, Uncategorized Tagged with Business, content, content marketing, Content strategy, contentstrategy, Customer, customers, Internet marketing, Marketing, social media, User story, Website January 29th, 2012 @ 1:42 pm

: Content is the key

The more I chat with people about content, the more I see common themes emerging. In the realms of content it is a case of explaining its value and how it can benefit any business through enriching the customer experience.

These days every company needs a coherent content strategy. It is no longer good enough to say: “We make the best widgets, click here to buy”. Customers need to be educated and they need to be empowered to make intelligent choices through providing accurate and balanced information. Taking the widget analagy further, there needs to be multi-channel content on widget developments and trends, links to credible 3rd party sources, user stories, how to guides and, perhaps most importantly, a business needs to engage with its customers to understand their widget thinking and needs.

If you can build a relationship and get to intimately know your customers, you can build a picture of their needs and you are then halfway to pulling together a compelling offering that will resonate and set you apart from the competition. If you can understand your customer and their workflow you will be able to find ways to position products or services that can be regularly woven into their activities. And the key to that is great, compelling content.

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Mulling over publishing predictions for 2012

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Digital, media, publishing, social media, Uncategorized Tagged with 2012, Business, China, content, Content strategy, digital, Free content, India, IPad, media, mobile, predictions, publishing, social media, strategy, West January 28th, 2012 @ 1:41 pm

I was delighted to be asked by Anthony Ray of Stingray Research to come up with a few predictions for publishers in 2012. The question was really one of where to start and what not to include. Depending on where your business sits, the dawn of 2012 either sees you sitting on the edge of a precipice, or it marks the beginning of a tremendously exciting year where opportunities abound and fortune really will favour the brave.

As I sat and mused over the possibilities and various scenarios, I kept coming back to one over-powering theme. That is simply that the time for waiting and watching has passed. There can be no more excuses, and now the priority has to be action and not words. Get out of those comfy chairs, put away the pipe and slippers, and importantly, no more chin stroking.

In recent years I have spent a lot of time travelling the world, and have developed a great view of the differences between, say, mature publishing businesses in the West and young, fast growing upstarts in places such as China and India. Whereas in the West, too many companies agonise over the “what if”, in China it is the “what are” questions that matter.

The West’s “What if it doesn’t work?” morphs into China’s “What are the risks of not doing this?”

The West’s “What if we don’t make a profit?” becomes China’s “What are the rewards from doing this?”

The key is to innovate and move quickly. Months agonising over a project that will take just a few weeks to get up and running are opportunities lost. It is a nonsense to waste time seeking the negatives, when it is the positives that need to be teased out. OK, so what if it doesn’t work? Is there really any shame in failure? No, not if the process is designed to refine and move on to the next idea. The real shame is in not doing anything at all and pretending the world out there is actually just going through a phase and all will settle down again in the future to restore the nice comfortable status quo. It won’t.

So back to my predictions.

1. Publishers putting the customer first and encouraging the rise of aggregation and curated 3rd party content to supplement original output;

2. Social media engagement will drive an explosion of niche B2B information services combining premium subscription and free content;

3. Huge growth in high margin data services as publishers begin to understand and exploit the true value of their dusty archives;

4. Mobile will no longer be seen as part of special projects, but will shift to be fully integrated into core offerings;

5. Publishers restructuring to reduce costs and taking a more brand neutral approach to content generation in order to leverage maximum value and exposure from every single piece of that expensive original content.

What Is Your 2012 Content Marketing & Social Media Prediction? (junta42.com)
Top 15 Content Marketing Predictions for 2012 (junta42.com)

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20 Great Digital Publishing Ideas

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in advertising, Content, Digital, media, online revenue, publishing Tagged with advertising, Business, google, mobile, online revenue, RSS, Search engine optimization, Website November 25th, 2011 @ 6:28 pm

For any business – publisher or otherwise — grappling with how content can be positioned, generated, harnessed or otherwise manipulated to help grow revenue, this list from Niche Magazine has to be worth a close look. While it is targeted at publishers working off an ad-driven model, it could be adapted in numerous ways to suit other business approaches.

If anyone just stops and thinks for a moment, it captures a whole load of common sense and helps answer those questions about generating sustainable digital revenue streams. But what is so appealing is actually just how simple so much of this is to do. The list was generated from attendees to this year’s Niche Digital Conference in September and polished off by some digital tinkering by Ryan Dohrn from Brain Swell Media.

#1 Exclusive advertisers: Allow one advertiser on a certain day of the month to occupy all the ad spots on each page of your entire website.

#2 Balance editorial calendar against SEO research. Use key word research tools to determine what web users are “really” searching for… then write content about those topics.

#3 Provide an RSS feed of news to advertisers with static websites. Most advertisers have dead, static sites and your content can liven them up and help them look more relevant. Use Feedburner to help.

#4 Get on board with Google+. What is your plan? Don’t play catch-up. Get ahead of the kids and figure out what Google + has to offer through their various “circles”.

#5 Create a unique incentive plan for your sales team that provides a bonus for selling online. Your margins are better in web, so pay a better commission. Or, structure a better plan for banners sold. Out of cash? Give days off or free lunch. Get creative.

#6 Create special holiday or seasonal digital editions. From holiday gift guides to summer camp guides, take ideas and turn them into digital-only special publications. Be sure to tell advertisers how you are going to tell the public about the special digital edition.

#7 Stop giving away digital space! Just stop it!

#8 Create an e-newsletter from your sales team to your current advertisers. Create a list of your current clients and start sending out an e-newsletter. This should contain helpful hints, links to great articles, and deadline information. You can find great information about this on marketingsherpa.com, adage.com, techcrunch.com and ryandohrn.com.

#9 Use short videos to answer advertisers’ common questions. Is there a question that you are often asked by advertisers? Record an answer and create an answer archive. Keep it simple. Jing is a great tool for this type of sales tool.

#10 Spread out your content! Don’t publish all of your magazine’s content online at the beginning of the month. Use the date stamping tools of your content management system to load your content all at one, but publish it piece by piece over a period of time.

#11 Create strategic alliances to offer expanded digital services to your advertisers. Find local web designers, videographers, photographers, and other service providers. Form a creative network where you all get rewarded for referrals.

#12 Register the .tv and .mobi for your main domain. Expand your offerings!

#13 Flip it – “Buy an ad in our digital edition and get the print as added value.” This is a unique twist that may not work for everyone, but give it a try to shake things up for your sales team.

#14 Make sure you charge for social media. You should charge $75 – $125/thousand for your social media updates on your Facebook page and Twitter feed.

#15 Create e-books from magazine content. You have years of content, so put it to good use. Create e-books around a specific topic.

#16 Use a daily video tip to drive B2B sales. Advertisers like the exposure, and they are also your best experts. Have them pay to be the expert in a section on your site and record their answers to submitted questions.

#17 Create an interactive media kit. A PDF just isn’t enough. Advertisers require more stimuli than ever before to make a decision. Also, they want information NOW! http://mediakit.fastcompany.com is a great example of an online media kit.

#18 Monitor your SEO ranking and search volume monthly for key search terms. Each month you want a report that shows you where your site ranks for all the key terms that you have researched as important. Also, you want to re-run your key word research often. Raven is a good tool for this.

#19 Create a social media interaction plan. Each day a member of your team should be assigned to monitor and reply to social media comments. Assign days and make it mandatory.

#20 Create a simple website sign-in with Facebook Connect. Make it as easy as possible for users to sign in to your web site. This is critical if you want to survey behavior or demo targeted advertising.

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Mexican blogger decapitation latest threat to free speech

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in blogging, crime, news, social media, social networks, Uncategorized Tagged with crime, Drug cartel, drugs, Mexico, Murder, Nuevo Laredo, social media, Texas, United States, Wired November 10th, 2011 @ 6:30 pm

A sense of great sadness washed over me as I read the Wired article detailing the murder and decapitation of the moderator of a popular Mexican social media network as the country’s unstoppable descent into bloody drug-fuelled mayhem deepens. I make no excuse for the photo here, but this is the sad and inescapable truth and it should not be ignored or avoided.

Another grisly murder in Mexico

Journalists have long been in the front line in Mexico, but this case is especially unsavoury. The 35-year-old , known online as ‘Rascatripas’ or ‘Scraper’ (literally “Fiddler”), was found dumped just a few miles from the Texas border in the city of Nuevo Laredo. It was reported that under the man’s body was a blood-stained scrawled message that translated as: “Hi I’m ‘Rascatripas’ and this happened to me because I didn’t understand I shouldn’t post things on social networks.” It is alleged he had tipped off local authorities about drug cartels.

Rascatripas was the fourth blogger or social media networker to be murdered in the town by organised drugs gangs in the past three months. A new US report says settlements along the US border are turning into ghost towns as residents flee escalating violence and brutality dished out by drug cartels. Throughout northern Mexico, civil society has “severely deteriorated”, it added.

Scary stuff.

Mexican Blogger Decapitated; Cartels’ War on Social Media Spreads (wired.com)
Mexican Man Apparently Killed for Web Comments (abcnews.go.com)
Mexican man apparently killed for web comments (sfgate.com)

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EVENT – Fancy a little Meet Up?

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in events, media Tagged with event, London, media, publishing, themediabriefing November 8th, 2011 @ 5:52 pm

I do. In fact, today I signed up for TheMediaBriefing’s second meet up due on December 1st at a nice little boozer just off Oxford Circus. This particular MediaSocial event is put together by (yes, you’ve guessed it) those nice folks at TheMediaBriefing who have taken time out from curating loads and loads of useful content to make sure the beer’s nice and chilled. On past experience, a great group of like-minded media people will attend and the conversation is sure to sparkle.

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The case for a Chief Content Officer

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Polls, publishing Tagged with Branded content, chief content officer, Content Management, content marketing, Content strategy November 5th, 2011 @ 11:31 am

Continuing my theme of why content is important, I wanted to share a useful slideshare presentation from Alan Porter. Self explanatory really and a great starting point for businesses looking to transform the way they engage with their customers. The poll on whether Chief Content Officers are required remains live down on the right of this page, so please vote.

The Case for a Chief Content Officer

View more presentations from Alan Porter

Do We Need Chief Content Officers – or More Basques? (customerthink.com)
Why CMOs need content marketing (thecontentlab.icrossing.com)

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POLL — is content important?

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Content, Polls, publishing, web Tagged with Business, Content Management, Content strategy, publishing, Publishing and Printing October 28th, 2011 @ 5:09 pm

Of course it is. Let’s avoid the cliché about content being some kind of regal entity and instead focus on what content actually is, and what its purpose is. In the world of publishing, we need to avoid the old dusty traps of content being tied to title. Content is neutral, it is there to be sliced and diced and served up in ways which suit the needs of the reader or subscriber.

But these days it is not just the publisher that needs to consider its content strategy. Today everyone is a publisher — companies large and small, as well as individuals, are populating the web with every increasing volumes of content. If you are not part of the conversation, you may as well pack up and go home.

I will be returning to this theme, but for the moment, please answer the poll posted on the right of this article.

Related articles

Websites With More Content Generate More Customers [New Infographic] (hubspot.com)

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A Tale of Two Times’ — Digital subscription growth.

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in journalism, news, newspapers, online revenue Tagged with jobs, London, New York Times, News Corporation, news international, online revenue, Paid Content, paywalls, rupert murdoch, Sunday Times, Times October 25th, 2011 @ 12:15 pm

New York Times and The Times digital subscriber growth

They're growing, but not enough.

More than a year ago The Times (of London) introduced its paywall solution, followed in March this year by the New York Times. So how have they been doing?

Paid Content had this useful bit of top level analysis today. The answer, it appears, is not very well.

To quote PC:

NYTimes.com’s paid content strategy is a softer, more porous on-ramp than The Times’, operating a free story allowance before subscription is required. This may be reflected in the graph on the left.

But likely what the comparison really shows is the differing scales of the news publishers’ different addressable markets. The U.S. is larger than the UK, New York larger than London, and 12 percent of NYTimes.com’s subscriptions are coming from outside the States, while NYTCo also operates the adjacent International Herald Tribune. The Times remains a firmly British publication.

In London, it is tough times for The Times. Declining circulation, the News Corp struggles over the phone tapping scandals and an economy sliding into meltdown are doing no favours. It was reported late last week that News International was cutting 200 editorial jobs from The Times and The Sunday Times. The cuts which impact both fulltime and casual staff were the first major change under new News International Chief Executive Tom Mockridge. My guess is that more belt tightening will inevitably follow.

James Murdoch To Give Hacking Evidence Again (news.sky.com)
Time running out for Murdoch dynasty at News Corp (guardian.co.uk)
Can the iPad save newspapers? (go.theregister.com)

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Rex & Getty — it’s off! A letter to photographers from Rex Features’ Mike Selby

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in journalism, media, partnerships, Photography, Uncategorized Tagged with agency, Company, Competition Commission, Getty Images, Mergers and acquisitions, news, nikon, Office of Fair Trading, OFT, photo, photography, Rex Features July 9th, 2010 @ 5:22 pm

These days photography is playing on my mind. As an ex-professional snapper (film, of course) I hung up my Nikons in 1999 and haven’t been back since. I’m now of a certain age where I feel that same old uncontrollable urge to have a decent camera, so I’m going digital. In all the years that I haven’t been shooting a steady trickle of royalties has continued to hit my bank account, some of which was from Rex Features. Now, Rex was the subject of a take over bid by the global giant Getty. In stepped the UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT) which felt the acquisition would be anti-competitive.

As a registered Rex photographer, on Friday Mike Selby sent out the following email:

Dear Colleagues,

As you know, on 26th April we announced Getty Images’ intention to acquire Rex Features and its associated companies in the US. Getty Images voluntarily informed the Office of Fair Trading of the intended transaction to enable the OFT to carry out an investigation in advance of the deal being completed. Following its investigation, the OFT has decided to refer the proposed transaction to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission for competition clearance.

Although the MMC may ultimately have cleared the deal, we feel that the six- to eight- month process which would be carried out by the Commission would be too disruptive and unsettling for our loyal staff and suppliers who have already had to endure weeks of uncertainty. We have therefore decided to call off the proposed merger and the acquisition will not now be going ahead.

Rex was never actively seeking a buyer, and we are not seeking one now. With the deal off we will continue to do what we have been doing all along — give photographers and photo users in the UK and around the world a service which is second to none.

The fact that the OFT had reason to refer the proposed transaction to the MMC is in itself an indication of Rex Features’ strength and confirmation of the Company’s leading position in the market. We had many calls from clients today after the decision, welcoming the news and the fact that Rex is going to continue to be there as their independent picture source of choice.

Our staff have been working as normal all through this period and we will continue to work as hard as ever, to compete effectively with our many industry rivals, and to build on the more than half a century of history and reputation with which the name Rex Features is synonymous.

We would like to thank you for your patience, loyalty and support over the past few weeks in particular and look forward to a successful and long-lasting relationship.

With best regards,

John, Mike & Sue Selby and Martin Hillier

8 July 2010

Rex Features Ltd

18 Vine Hill

London

EC1R 5DZ

UK

Tel: +44-(0)20-7278 7294

Fax: +44-(0)20-7837 4812

www.rexfeatures.com

Getty Images withdraws from buying Rex Features (newstatesman.com)
Getty-Rex tie-up fails on OFT fears (telegraph.co.uk)
Getty Images pulls out of Rex Features deal after rebuff from OFT (guardian.co.uk)
Getty Images to acquire British photo agency (newstatesman.com)

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Times Online tells staff its paywall nearing rollout. Roll up for trials.

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in Uncategorized Tagged with Chief executive officer, journalism, media, news, news international, newspapers, online revenue, paywall, Rebekah Brooks, subscribers, Sunday Times, the times, Times Online March 18th, 2010 @ 7:30 pm

So here it comes. The Times Online paywall is set to be launched. Thanks to our friends at paidContent:UK for Stephen Brook’s posting today that reported News International Chief Executive Rebekah Brooks told staff that readers registered with Times Online will be invited to register for an “exclusive preview of the new digital proposition” this week.

Let me not just repeat Brook’s posting. Go over and have a look for yourself. However, I will repeat the memo reportedly sent to News International staff today, and which will be distributed to Times Online registered users.

FAIR PRICING FOR DIGITAL CONTENT

Message from Rebekah Brooks
Those of you that subscribe to The Times and The Sunday Times or have registered on Times Online will receive a communication starting from this week inviting you to register for an exclusive preview of the new digital proposition. This shows that we are getting closer to the launch of the titles’ new digital sites.
I have made no secret of our intention to start charging for quality journalism online. As you may have seen speculation in the media about our plans, I wanted to take this opportunity to let you know why we believe this is such an important development.
We are committed to producing quality journalism that is written by professionals with a profound understanding of their subject and a commitment to provide well-informed coverage of the issues. Each of our titles, in its own way, has pioneered quality, professional journalism and we are unashamed to say we believe it has value.
In contrast, the industry is making the mistake of chasing millions of unique users by giving the audience more and more content for free. An obsession with traffic just doesn’t pay.

Great journalism needs investment and we are committed to supporting the fantastic work that you are all producing and delivering to our audiences. It is the quality of the journalism that you create, and the ways in which we produce and distribute it, that will continue to set our titles apart from the competition.
And to be clear, when we talk about charging for our content online, we are talking about charging a fair price. Price alone will not be a barrier to take up. Of course, we expect to see the numbers of unique users of our sites come down dramatically. But the people who register to our new digital products will be customers who have made a positive decision to pay a fair price for journalism that they value, and they will be those who are more committed to and engaged with our titles.
This is an exciting development for our company especially as we will be among the first in the world to take this step. There are many who declare we have set ourselves an impossible task. But our company loves nothing more than challenging the status quo.
Shortly I will update you on our plans in more detail. But, in the meantime, I believe that with the combined force of your talent, commitment and hard work, we will, in the months and years to come, define a new future in the way we create, deliver and profit from our journalism.
Rebekah Brooks
Chief Executive, News International

News International puts its cards on the table (technokitten.blogspot.com)
All hail Rupert Murdoch. Without his money, there would be no good Times (guardian.co.uk)
Times picks senior team for paywall push (guardian.co.uk)

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The New York Times in high stakes plans to charge online. Draconian, desperate or inspired?

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in journalism, news, newspapers, online revenue, Uncategorized Tagged with Add new tag, advertising, Business, felix salmon, freemium, International Herald Tribune, media, New York Times, Newspaper, newspapers, NYT, online revenue, publishing, Reuters, twitter January 21st, 2010 @ 2:06 pm

New York Times to charge for online access from 2011. Photo: Andy Soloman

Has the bullet been bitten? Or is the bullet winging its way to the heart of its mark?

The announcement by top US newspaper, The New York Times, that starting January 2011 it will charge frequent users of its website has either been heralded by underfire newspaper execs, or derided as a desperate measure that will hasten the venerable institution’s demise.

The NYT‘s David Carr, in the Times’ Media Decoder blog, said the move represented a hedge.

People who remain reflexively bullish on free [content] ignore the fact that the clock is ticking on many of the legacy businesses that produce that content. The new approach is an effort to replace that ticking clock with a meter, and its success is not assured but to sit still would be dumb.

It is not the job of The New York Times or any other mainstream media company to give away its content until it can no longer afford to do so.

The charging plans appear fairly draconian. From next January visitors will be able to view a few articles free each month, but step over the threshold and they will be required to pay a flat fee for unlimited access. Subscribers to the daily or Sunday print editions will continue to receive full access.

The NYT has yet to say how much it intends to charge, or how many articles will remain free each month.

Newspapers have been grappling with plummeting circulations and advertising revenues. Readers have increasingly turned away from being brand loyal to being increasingly varied in choosing how they access their general news. The Internet, RSS feeds or news aggregators are able to through up numerous sources to information on any particular news story.

Yes, gathering news is an expensive business, but increasingly readers have been opting for free services to keep up with developments. As circulations decline, so advertisers look elsewhere. It’s worth noting that the the New York Times Company, which also includes the International Herald Tribune and 15 other daily newspapers, saw advertising revenue plunge 30% in the first nine months of 2009.

No doubt, this is a brave move by the NYT, but with technology, reader behaviour and news sources exploding by the month (think Twitter and other social networks, think of the boom in citizen journalism, and think cost) it is hard to see whether come next January the NYT is part of a crowd rushing to harvest online dollars or whether it finds itself back tracking as the “loyal” online readers it wants to monetise dessert it for somewhere else.

As Reuters media reporter Felix Salmon wrote (and which was reported in the NYT):

Successful media companies go after audience first, and then watch revenues follow; failing ones alienate their audience in an attempt to maximize short-term revenues.”

So, is the NYT going to charge into battle only to find its followers have quietly disappeared? Will its brazen war cry fade into a garbled mumble? Or has it struck gold? My take is that it is not enough for legacy newspaper businesses to think they can easily transfer the model into a successful online business. They need to find ways to serve up the exclusive essential information that people will be willing to pay for.

This isn’t the first time the NYT has charged for acces. Back in the 1990s it charged overseas readers and then again a few years ago it tried another scheme to charge poeple for reading the op-ed columns. Both failed to gain any significant traction and were dropped.

The New York Times Announces Plans for a Metered Model for NYTimes.com in 2011 (eon.businesswire.com)
The NYT’s paywall (blogs.reuters.com)
New York Times to charge online readers (guardian.co.uk)

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News International confirms banning NewsNow crawlers from linking

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in journalism, media, news, newspapers, online revenue, Uncategorized Tagged with Add new tag, aggregator, aggregators, Associated Press, audit bureau of circulation, circulation, google, links, Microsoft, news, news international, news of the world, newsnow, Newspaper, newspapers, online revenue, rupert murdoch, search engines, the sun, Times January 13th, 2010 @ 5:14 pm

Rupert Murdoch, Chairman and Chief Executive O...

Image via Wikipedia

Following on from my earlier post that The Times Online had barred aggregator NewsNow.co.uk from crawling its website, it seems News International as a whole has the bit firmly between its teeth and has also banned the linking service from crawling any of its newspaper sites including including The Sun Online and the News of the World.

The Guardian reported News International as saying:

“We’ve been in communication with NewsNow for several months. We asked them to remove our content repeatedly from their indexing,” said a News International spokesperson. “Now, we will update our files accordingly for all our titles.”

“NewsNow has been using Times Online content as part of its paid-for, commercial as well as free services. They have continued to do so despite our direct requests for them to stop. As a result, we have taken the decision to disallow their indexing of our content,” the company said in a statement.

“News International makes a significant investment in journalism and we believe that it is entirely appropriate for us to ask that our rights are respected. NewsNow has acknowledged that they require our permission to use our content and, in the absence of our permission, has ceased to do so.

News International owner Rupert Murdoch and other media organisations, including UK newspapers and the Associated Press (AP), accuse NewsNow and other news aggregators such as Google and Microsoft, of being parasites and insist they should pay for access to news content. While Google quietly stopped indexing AP news shortly before Christmas, the News International action represents the first live bullets in what is destined to be a significant battle over the right to link and the basic building blocks of the Internet‘s interconnected world.

For the moment NewsNow seems to have been singled out. From where I sit, I wonder whether the relatively small UK-based operation represents a soft target for a posturing Mr Murdoch as he tries to find ways to bolster declining circulation and revenues at his major titles?

The really big target would be Google, but here the trade off between losing the opportunity to monetise traffic driven by the search giant while trying to unilaterally build online revenue from brand loyal readers sounds a little trickier. Is this a case of wanting it both ways, or will Murdoch eventually put his money where his mouth is and try and hold back the tide of internet traffic by hitting the big boys?

Come on chaps, play the game. The financial woes afflicting newspapers and their general inability to generate meaningful online revenues are not the fault of third party aggregators, who afterall, are driving traffic to their websites. The challenge here is to adapt and develop new business models that can thrive in a new digital world. Yes, it is not cheap to produce original news, but unfortunately it is not a rare commodity. Newspapers needs to find ways to engage with ther communities, not cast themselves adrift.

News International to block NewsNow from all its websites (guardian.co.uk)
Right to crawl vs right to link (malcolmcoles.co.uk)
Sun blocks NewsNow from crawling its site (malcolmcoles.co.uk)
The Empire strikes back or the old order’s attempt to draw a close to the age of free (socialmediatoday.com)

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EVENT — Essential free Online Content Marketing webcasts

0 comments By Andy Soloman Filed in events, media, social media, social networks, Uncategorized Tagged with Add new tag, brent willen, Business, Digital media, Information overload, Knowledge Management, Marketing, publishing, Site Management, those in media, twitter, webcasts January 13th, 2010 @ 11:23 am

Media and digital convergence offers myriad options and opportunities. Fine, if you know what you’re talking about that is. But for many, the emerging digital landscape is confusing. Those nice chaps at Those in Media have put together a programme of free webcasts and discussions on 20 January to help you all get the most out of your content.

Topics covered include tracking content ROI, publishing as the future of marketing, reading “digital body language” and managing content to avoid information overload.

These pages have previously mentioned another Those in Media initiative — the plans to host Mediastock in Europe in the summer. Sadly, as Brent Willen says, it was just too ambitious. So that idea is on hold, but other ideas including the webcasts and a tie up with AuthorsGlobe to produce Online Executive Education Sessions, with the first due on 4 February.

The Twitter Times generates a newspaper from your account (guardian.co.uk)
How Facebook and Twitter could save us from dreaded email overload? (guardian.co.uk)
Survey of Marketing, Media and Measurement (bizzia.com)

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Read previous entries

Andy Soloman Global Journalism and New Media

Creation, curation, and the ethics of content strategy — presentation

20 Great Digital Publishing Ideas

EVENT – Fancy a little Meet Up?

The case for a Chief Content Officer

POLL — is content important?

A Tale of Two Times’ — Digital subscription growth.

Rex & Getty — it’s off! A letter to photographers from Rex Features’ Mike Selby

Times Online tells staff its paywall nearing rollout. Roll up for trials.

The New York Times in high stakes plans to charge online. Draconian, desperate or inspired?

News International confirms banning NewsNow crawlers from linking

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