Printed newspapers are dying (part 2)

The bad news keeps coming for the newspaper industry. What is driving the problems?

Booming on the back of advertising demand over the last decade, especially in the property sectors, the industry took its eye off the ball. When that demand fell its advertising revenues went into free-fall and excecutives realised too late that the "secondary" revenue of the cover price isn't enough to cover the difference, especially as large parts of the audience had now moved online to the land of free news.

In taking their eye off the ball, the newspapers failed to see that the world was changing. They didn't adapt to the digitisation of the news, because they weren't forced to. They are now facing a world that is digital and they need to change radically or accept that they are old news.

The digital world still offers rewards for those that get it right. The FT and Wall Street Journal, for example, are in a strong position, as users are prepared to pay for their premium content. And it's not just the broad-sheets, The Sun has just announced a 25% increase in its online usage. 

Content will always play a key role online. And news will always be important content. The challenge now is for newspapers to understand what it is that their specific audience want, to define their premium content. Once they know what that content is, they need to work out how  and where their audience want to read it. 

Sounds like basic marketing to me!

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Printed newspapers are dying (part 1)

Print is taking a bashing

Twittering on

Twitter is the most talked about Internet tool of 2009. Its prevalence is growing, usage is up and so is its profile.

In the US all of the top 10 technology firms have employees using Twitter for their company's commercial gain, showing that it has really taken hold there. In the UK the corresponding figure is only 2 in 10 (story).

Does this show that the UK is lagging behind? Or does is show a reticence this side of the pond to do something without a clear understanding of the whys and wherefores, not to mention the risks. A reflection on communication style, rather that technophobia?

This would support my belief that the contrasting numbers are based on the fact that for most businesses it is not clear where the Twitter oppotunity (perhaps it should be "Twittertunity"!) lies. 

At the moment much of the talk is just talk. How many businesses can really claim that they are using Twitter as an effective tool?

The news that in a recent survey of small UK firms "17% said they were already using Twitter and 25% said they had been persuaded to sign up in the last four weeks", hardly indicates a considered strategic process, more a toe in the water driven either by a fear of being left behind, or curiousity resulting from Twitter's recent press coverage.

Again, people think there's something to it, they just don't know what!

So what should you do about it? For the time being it might be little to lose from experimenting with Twitter and I would encurage it. But before you make it part of your marketing effort, I would strongly recommend a more strategic approach. At the very least you need to understnad why you are doing it.

For a satirical review, have a look at this ...

 

it might even help you to get it!

Firefox usage continues to grow

Firefox has definitely hit critical mass. A recent review of stats put usage at between 21 and 45%. We believe that the 45% figure is heavily swayed by the influence of developers using w3schools monitored site, which means that it is unlikely to reflect overall usage. It does, however, show that Firefox is the browser of choice for the development community.

Google's Chrome has yet to have a significant impact.

Browser stats reviewed are:

www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp - from the technical community? – 45%

www.upsdell.com/BrowserNews/stat.htm - gives an average of 26% Gecko based (which I think is FF!?)

http://www.spreadfirefox.com/node/355) - from the horses mouth - 21%

Getting to the essence of social networking

Seth Godin hits the nail on the head in the short video.



In summary, it doesn't matter how many friends you have in your network, what matters is the quality of the relationship that you have with them.

Social networks - more than Wispa

A spontaneous the consumer campaign launched on Facebook and Myspace last year calling for the re-launch of the Cadbury’s Wispa bar.

To Cadbury’s eternal credit they sat up and took notice of this campaign and the Wispa bar was re-launched last September - selling 1.2million bars in a single week.

The Wispa is not only still out there but has been credited largely with helping Cadbury buck the recessionary trend with a whopping 30 per cent rise in its profits. By the end of last year Wispa had accounted for a massive £25million in sales - and that was just the last few months of the year.

Your customers are talking about you online, join the conversation and start listening. You just might learn something useful!

(Sotry from The Insider.)

See the power of User Generated Content in action

Jim Beam have launched a user generated content website. They are asking their customers to come up with their own ads for Jim Beam based on the ideas from the current TV ads.

In the first week, there were no entries. The marketing execs must have been getting nervous. Week 1 saw 3. By week 2 there were 7 and the "samples" had been taken down. By week 3 there were 16 (4 had been viewed over 4000 times) and after a month they had over 100 videos, several with 10,000+ views.

And the execs could relax and bask in the glory! 100s of thousands of views, the brand being re-presented by loyal customers and spread by word of mouth.

And not only that, but it also gives huge insight into their online audience. How much would that kind of market research cost.

My guess is that this will continue to grow. It will be interesting to see where it gets to by the close date and what Jim Beam do next.