From web to Web
It’s a tough time to be in the newspaper business these days, but not necessarily for the reasons you might expect. Despite the explosive growth of the Internet and the public’s growing penchant for getting its news online, printed newspapers are weathering the storm well — at least in terms of advertising. Ad revenue climbed for the eighth consecutive year in a row in 1999, reaching an all-time high of $46.3 billion. Those ad sales are largely driven by dot-com businesses, promoting their services in national advertisements and their job opportunities in the classifieds. So the question isn’t whethertoday’s print newspapers will survive but rather how they can be successful online as well.
Making the Online Leap
The Washington Post provides an excellent example of the conundrum that newspaper publishers face today. The Washington Post Co. has poured a sizeable $100 million (at least) into online ventures such as www.washingtonpost.com. The results have paid off with readers: According to PC Data Online, washingtonpost.com ranked first among newspaper sites in February, claiming more than 108 million page views and readers staying at the site for an average of more than two hours. Not bad. Unfortunately, the site hasn’t yet turned a profit, and by some accounts its losses are starting to drag down the newspaper’s profitability, despite strong advertising sales and lower newsprint costs last year.
Now not all newspaper sites are losing money (or are so well funded), but the Washington Post’s saga shows that content isn’t necessarily king when it comes to online newspapers. Like many newspaper sites, washingtonpost.com is rife with news — local, national, and international — all just a mouse click away. But the promise of frequent updates, accessible archives, and a bottomless news hole that isn’t constrained by slots and 16-page forms isn’t enough to give major newspapers the type of market penetration that they’re used to in print and that they seek online.
All the News that Hits
Although posting content free online doesn’t seem to be impinging on newspapers’ hard copy sales, it’s not enough to transform print reader loyalty into online reader loyalty. (The only newspaper to successfully amass a large paid online circulation is The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition, which has more than 400,000 subscribers.) That’s because the competition for readership for online newspapers is much stiffer than it is for printed newspapers. It isn’t just the afternoon paper (if your city still has one), the local freebie weekly plump with political punditry and entertainment listings, and the local evening news channel (or channels).
Rather, each online newspaper is competing with:
- About 7,000 other online newspapers
- Wire services such as The Associated Press, Reuters, and UPI
- Internet-based news sites such as WorldNetDaily, NewsMax, and the Drudge Report
- Broadcast news sites such as MSNBC and CNN
- Portals such as AOL and Yahoo
- Specialized news services such as ZDNet for technology, Motley Fool for business, ESPN for sports, and weather.com for weather reports.
When it comes to the Top 100 Web sites overall according to PC Data Online, no online newspapers make the list – not even the Washington Post’s. The number of visitors to the most-trafficked online newspapers is a tiny fraction of the number of visitors to these Top 100 sites, which include Web competitors, such as Yahoo, AOL, MSNBC, ZDNet, and others.
That’s because all those other competitors offer something unique — direct or focused news from wire and specialized news services; opinions and perspective at the Internet-based sites; strong brands and an association in viewers’ minds that broadcasters are technologically forward-thinking; and the capability to personalize news downloads at the portals.
Same, but Different
So what are newspaper publishers to do? I don’t pretend to know the answers, but I can put forth some ideas. First, newspapers should rethink the idea of online “editions.” Why shouldn’t Web visitors have access to a fresh stream of news posted continuously, the way newsrooms receive wire service copy? Second, newspapers must get creative and find ways to draw readers to their sites. The Boston Herald, for example, has partnered with popular online auctioneer eBay, which will be accessible through banners all over www.bostonherald.com. And The San Diego Union-Tribune has teamed up with a company called WAM! Loyalty.com to give its subscribers a card that earns them “digital currency” at local businesses. Readers can check their card balances at WAM!’s site, which will be linked to the newspaper’s site.
I don’t believe the news will ever be an either/or proposition – either online or in print. The public will look to different media for different information, and the types of media are only going to grow — wireless communications are here today and digital paper is closer than you think. That’s why today’s print newspapers must adapt to the Internet and remain flexible about other publishing formats.
Luckily, newspapers no longer suffer from IP — Internet paranoia. They recognize the Internet as an opportunity, not a threat. They’ve made infrastructure investments. They’re technologically savvy. And they have the institutional talent and resource to produce quality sites. Hopefully at least a few will survive the upheaval to the industry and master multiple forms of media in the coming years.
This article was last modified on May 11, 2000
This article was first published on May 11, 2000
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