Here's an ominous headline for the daily newspaper industry I discovered linked to DrudgeReport.com the other day:
Internet use could kill off local newspapers, study finds
Click above to read the story, which says in part: "News audiences are ditching television and newspapers and using the Internet as their main source of information, in a trend that could eventually see the demise of local papers, according to a new study Wednesday."
The actual study is here:
Creative Destruction: An Exploratory Look at News on the Internet
Here's an ominous quote from the study:
"The problem of newspapers is compounded by the fact that they cannot succeed simply by replacing their hard-copy readers with online readers. On a person-by-person basis, the sale of hard-copy newspapers is vastly more profitable than drawing people to the paper’s website. It is estimated that a newspaper needs to attract two or three dozen online readers to make up for—in terms of advertising revenue—the loss of a single hard-copy reader."
Tough times, indeed. Moreover, the study underscores a key point: Newspapers are powerless to stop how audiences want to access news or even advertisers on the Internet. Aggregation sites like Topix.Net and Digg.Com allow Internet users to decide WHAT news they want to access first. Sites like Google.Com and even Amazon.Com allow shoppers to search as broadly or as narrowly as they decide for whatever they want to purchase.
I go back to my rant from May:
"Allow me to choose the news that I think is most important so that it greets me, first. Let me download a zoned pod cast. Give me a blog that allows me to network with my local friends, neighbors and relatives. Allow me to post pictures of what I think is news. Partner so that when big news happens, I get more than feeds from AP stuck on the Web. E-mail me alerts about news that I desire most. Allow me to micro-connect to my neighbors and still follow my college team and double-check my portfolio and make lunch plans.
"I might read the paper. I might choose the 'Net. I might watch a pod cast (I have to take a train into the city today, so my commute is extra long). I might update my blog. I might post pictures of my kid’s school play from last night. I might take the sports section into the bathroom. I might print a coupon. I might tear one out of the paper. I might want the news delivered to my phone.
"The deal is – and this is the important part – that I decide. Me. Time Magazine's "Person of the Year." Give me the power to choose and to do so in a seamless way that makes it all seem like it was my idea in the first place.
"You wanna stay in business AND make friends? Embrace intuitive.
"Yes, deepen advertisement factors. Create innovative revenue models to track three primary tiers: Branding impressions, click-throughs and actual purchases. Embrace search marketing and create a virtual directory tailored for your market with partner links to beyond."
Now, my daily newspaper colleagues will say: "Thats all well and good, weekly boy, but that's a lot harder to do than it is for you to type up and publish on your blog that is so keen, we are jealous."
Au contraire, mon ami. First, I am not suggesting you reinvent the wheel. I am suggesting, in fact, that you STOP trying to reinvent the wheel. Look at how My.Yahoo.Com allows customization. Watch how Digg.Com does the same. Witness the power of Google.Com and Amazon.Com.
Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. Don't waste your Web developers' time creating dinosaurs that will be obsolete before unveiled. Look to successful models that have already engaged vast audiences and are influencing how the Internet is used.
In recent months, daily newspaper after daily newspaper has been working hard to - get this! - put their print advertisements on the Internet. Some are in-house projects (wasting Web developers' time) and others are using various "services" created for this process. The resulting ads are not searchable, by and large. They do not link to that advertiser's Web site in many cases. They are just clunky and they serve no real purpose whatsoever.
Here's a test: Go to your favorite daily newspaper Web site and perform a search for your favorite restaurant. Count the clicks you have to make. Now, go to Google.Com and do the same. If you work at a daily newspaper and you boast about your innovation, you should be ashamed.
Daily newspapers are indeed in peril. Are newspapers becoming obsolete or committing suicide? Right now, it appears to be the combo platter.
More later,
Mark
2 comments:
Looks like you have more ads than a NASCAR racecar! And dare one say, surrounded by more interesting content in a more approachable format than most newspaper websites.
I understand that you are not, for one moment, trying to produce a newspaper site, but the lesson to be learned is that your "blog" is visually appealing and entertaining, unlike many newspaper blogs, and indeed sites, out there right now. At the end of the day a website has to be interesting to sustain readership visits, and in my opinion the majority of newspaper sites are just flat out boring.
It is not enough to scribble something down in a blog, invite readership response, and claim to be a vital, community web site. That is a lazy, uninspired method of trying to hang on to readership. One only needs to look at the content and frequency of comments to see that it does not work. As you say, the "myyahoo" model is far more relevant to the internet user and I have yet to come across a newspaper site that effectively offers that as a service. Until that happens the downward slide will continue.
Nigel, I could not agree more about the slide. Keep in mind, so much of what I am posting here is coming from other publications and independent studies out there. The empirical data seems overwhelming about daily newspaper Web sites (unless, of course, you are busy hanging out at daily newspaper Web site awards run by the daily newspaper industry at daily newspaper conferences). But if you are an unbiased observer, it becomes clear what the problems are.
Thanks, too, for the kind words about the site. It's always been a work-in-progress but it does allow me to both experiment and have fun. I love the NASCAR reference! I just received the latest check for being an affiliate and it will pay for another stein for Mr. or Mrs. or Ms. 9,000 in a month or so... Thanks for all of the support out there!
Mark
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