Insightful articles, opinion and commentary about mobile and web.

Back in the 1980s, when the development of personal computers and desktop publishing software made it easy to change page layouts without expensive typesetting, it was said that anyone could become a publisher. Yes, it did increase the flexibility and reduce the cost of putting out a publication, but you still had to sell enough copies to pay the printer, the truck driver and the distributor – there was still a sizable cost risk for independent publishers.

But today, with the advent of the Internet and free blogging tools, the phrase “everyone’s a publisher” has now come to fruition. Millions of individuals and small independent publishers create their own news, comment and videos to share with friends, family and the rest of the world.

Not surprisingly, this has had a devastating effect on traditional media outlets. With people splitting their time between TV, radio, magazines, newspapers and now millions of websites (not to mention the reduced spare time all these self-publishers have to consume media), TV audiences are splintered, radio is slumping, and print circulations are steadily dropping. Newspapers have been particularly affected as one of their major sources of revenue – classified advertising – migrates to the web at a cracking pace.

Australia  - hanging onto eyeballs

But, as with the global financial crisis, the situation for the traditional media is not as bad in Australia as it is in the rest of the developed world. Consumption of traditional media and associated revenue, while dropping across the board, hasn’t fallen off a cliff the way it has in the US and Europe, with newspaper and magazine closures tossing more than 25,000 journalists out of work in the past two years.

And while media proprietors in those countries decry the rise of the Internet, Australian media companies are making the transition to integrating their online and offline presences with a fair degree of success. Take a look at these traffic figures for page impressions (PIs) on Australian media websites, compiled recently by News Limited:

Network     PIs June 2008; PIs June 2009; Change
Fairfax          593,081,202    745,199,109           +26%
News           377,282,786    510,713,402           +35%
NineMSN    378,976,447    465,449,832           +23%

That’s nearly 2 billion page impressions per month to the top three media web portals, up more than 30% from 12 months ago. And while I have my own questions about the measures used to compile these numbers, and the revenue from those impressive statistics still doesn’t compare to the rivers of gold from their traditional activities, at least the Australian media giants are maintaining some semblance of reader loyalty.

So what’s different about the Australian market? I asked Andrew Jaspan, former editor of The Age, when interviewing him for our most recent HotHouse podcast.

Andrew puts it down to geography. Our continental isolation historically kept publications from outside our borders gaining a foothold in Australia, while the distance between our major cities limited our choices for local news.

Even before the Internet took hold, Andrew points out, Australian newspaper companies enjoyed a duopoly in Sydney and Melbourne and a monopoly in Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. Contrast that to the UK, where readers can choose from up to 15 newspapers on the newsstands. Fewer information choices translates into increased loyalty when choices increase.

The future is smaller

But will even the relatively-well-placed Australian media companies be able to survive the massive shift in revenue that’s underway, with smaller players and Google joining the fight for what is likely to end up being a smaller pie?

The answer isn’t clear. But one thing that is clear is that they will need to change the way they operate. Andrew Jaspan says this is already happening as savvy news outlets remove the barriers between online and offline reporting staff and let subject specialties, not media specialities, determine who covers a story.

The next step is much harder: admitting that media consumption habits have changed and reducing the spend on dead trees and printing presses.

For content providers who have a foot in both the online and offline camps, their offline offering will shrink in conjunction with shrinking audiences and revenues. Look for daily publications to contract to weekend-only, focusing on analysis, commentary and investigative journalism rather than breaking news. And without the economies of scale associated with daily publication, they will have to become more expensive – e.g., newspapers will cost up to $4 an issue rather than $1-$2.

This isn’t a new concept. It was first proposed by Barney Kilgore, the visionary publisher who turned the Wall Street Journal from a stock report sheet read by 30,000 financiers in the 1940s to a financial media behemoth with more than a million readers by the 1960s.

The Internet wasn’t even invented when he issued his prediction; he was worried about the immediacy impact of radio and TV on newspapers. But with the added impact of millions of ‘always on’ channels, his view of the future of media is now coming to pass.

The business opportunity in online

Media commentator Bo Sacks recently left a comment on an article in Time that claimed that “Content is rapidly being devalued”. He wrote:

“The author keeps referencing the decreased value of content…. perhaps it is his company’s content that is devalued, but not content itself. That may be splitting hairs, but somebody is always going to make money on content. Right now it is Google; next year or in ten years it will be somebody else. Google doesn’t make the content, but they sure as heck have figured out how to make money on the content. So it still has as much value as before, but perhaps not by the same companies. Get over it and start thinking in 21st century terms and actions.”

The unlimited bandwidth of the Internet is demanding to be filled, and as well as creating opportunities for independent publishers, it’s also creating opportunities for marketers. The phrase ‘everyone’s a publisher’ applies as much to businesses as it does individuals.

There is an opportunity – I’d go so far as to call it an obligation – on companies to deliver content to their customers.

People are desperate for trusted content to help them make practical decisions in their lives. While they’re not looking for advertising in the traditional sense of the word – which creates problems for companies, ad agencies and traditional media – they’re turning to news and information sites, friends (through recommendations and comments), online advice (ditto) and to companies themselves.

Joe Pulizzi from Marcom Professional says that

“Almost all marketing tactics are optional today. The one strategy that is not optional is developing ongoing content for your customers to help them make better buying decisions. Organizations and individuals around the world are trying to figure out how to create valuable and relevant content. While there is plenty of bad content out there, great content is in high demand…..(Content) is needed and accessed by consumers now more than ever. Pure media content is still wanted and needed, but there is more competition today, and since the traditional media business model is threatened, quality corporate content is becoming more important than ever (corporations have the money to invest in content).”

Think of it as a 21st century spin on the soap opera concept.  Instead of soap companies sponsoring a program, they’re commissioning their own online content to support their brand.

This creates yet more competition for traditional media and their advertising-sponsored business model – unless they can transform their business model in a way that can capture this market, through a new type of partnership with businesses.

Most marketers probably find the prospect of becoming content creators quite daunting. But search engines and search terms are driving people to companies for information, and you need to be where your customers are.

Tags: andrew jaspan, Media, podcast