Divide and conquer
About two years ago I was a big proponent of integrating newsrooms. I thought it was the way to go: Multi-skilled journalists, equipped with cool tools, and a new mindset ready to tackle every platform and reach audiences where they want and how they want.
At the same time, I helped hire a mobile journalist to work for GazetteOnline.com in Cedar Rapids whose responsibility was to create, collect and present information for a digital audience.
Within a few months, the mobile journalist flourished in both content collection methods and audience growth by using the latest tools and technology to publish information quickly, while also equipped with new tasks to meet the growing needs of that digital audience. The position did that, in part, by spending 85 percent of the time outside of the traditional newspaper newsroom and focusing almost exclusively on the wants and needs of a digital audience.
At the same time – and even to a certain extent now – journalists who spend a majority of their time in the newsroom still have not yet reached the level of producing digital-first content for digital audiences. There have been huge strides made, but we struggle with the new mindset, fear and the “sucking sound of the core” like many other places across the industry.
Howard Owens, who runs The Batavian – a digital-only local news and information source, recently wrote that the original sin of media companies was in keeping its online operations “tethered to the mothership.” He instead argues that web products should be businesses on their own.
Here is his realization:
“Instead of thinking about how to generate more cash, I needed to figure out how to create a news operation that could exist profitably based on a reasonable expectation for local online revenue.”
Here is his proposal:
- Minimally staffed on both the sales and content side.
- Both staffs would operate in a building far away from the newspaper office.
- No newspaper content would feed the web site, and the online staff wouldn’t consult or work with the newspaper staff on stories. There would be a total wall of separation.
- There would also be a total wall of separation between sales staffs.
- The separate business unit would be competitive with the newspaper, not complimentary.
News tasks lead to new mindset
My colleague at Gazette Communications, Steve Buttry, writes that mindset is more important than organization in referencing the points made by Owens.
Howard has some excellent advice on starting an independent online operation and most, if not all, of the online spinoffs from newspaper organizations did not do things the way Howard is saying they should have. My point is that organization is not as important as mindset. And spinning digital operations off did not change the mindset.
I agree that mindset trumps organizational structure. But the only proven way that I’ve seen mindset change in a newsroom environment is by creating new tasks – (the show, don’t tell philosophy) – with clearly defined expectations and incentives and consequences attached to them. But even then, that process will take years to accomplish at the enterprise level what a small group, whose focus is entirely on reaching a clearly defined audience, can do in a matter of months.
Audience-first philosophy
What’s missing in many reorganizations across the industry are the wants and needs of the audience. We aren’t collecting content – both in news and advertising – with clearly defined audiences in mind.
Chuck Peters, the CEO of Gazette Communications, told me about 18 months ago something like this (I’m paraphrasing): “If you own a product and are not tied directly to revenue, how can you judge whether the product is successful?”
It made sense. I find myself asking another question too, and since I’ve stuck to a content theme I’ll continue with that: If you are responsible for putting content in front of digital audiences with a goal of increasing engagement and usage, but have no sustained and direct link between the content collectors and the audience you want to engage and reach, how can you be successful?
Especially in the digital realm, the lines between content, sales, marketing, audience and web development are so intertwined that separating those entities extremely hampers the success of digital operations.
It’s a little surprising to me that after all my study of Clayton Christensen and other thinkers on disruptive innovation that I didn’t see more clearly sooner the imperative of a separate operation, but it is what we should have been doing. – Howard Owens
Katherine Warman Kern would probably disagree with my assessment based on the future of media will be marketing post.
Publishers/Programmers, Technology, Marketing should collaborate to identify how each platform will add incremental value to the consumer and the brand’s bottom line. To create incremental value, the media brand should leverage the unique advantages of each platform to express itself and evolve its relationships with the audience. A fully integrated, multi-platform media brand will deliver a whole much bigger than its aggregated parts.
On digital platforms – or any other platform for that matter – having content collectors, sales staff and marketing folks focused on that specific digital audience offers the best chance for success. A small team and a self-sustainable revenue model, like the one Owens mentioned, can work.
The flip side is that on the enterprise level we will continue to market digital products in our legacy brands. We will continue to put newspaper ads online. We will continue to cover events that newspapers have always covered.
As director of new media in Ventura and VP of interactive in Bakersfield, I certainly had some grasp that online wasn’t print. I did push such innovations (at least for the time) as comments on stories, video, web-first publishing, locally focused home pages, user profiles/social networking. But looking back, I see now that I still had a lot of newspaper-think in my outlook. – Howard Owens
Newspaper readers and broadcast TV news viewers who use our online products will not solely help us grow audience. Adding incremental value to further the overall brand’s bottom line, in my opinion, will not help a product engage and reach audiences that have never consumed our products before.
It’s time to divide and conquer.
Do a couple of self-proclaimed tech guys/news junkies stand a chance competing in a crowded online news media field? While it doesn’t seem plausible, the digital age has made it possible. And sometimes, that’s enough. – Mark Briggs
I found another example that helps further my point of a complete divide and conquer approach and felt it was worth sharing. It comes from Judy at http://simsblog.typepad.com/simsblog/2009/09/top-10-lies-newspaper-execs-are-telling-themselves.html
Lie #1: We can manage this disruption from within an integrated organization.
No you can’t.
Economic pressures over the past few years have led many newspaper execs to convince themselves that the integrated organization is the best option.
This will not work because the disrupted cannot manage their own disruption. Most newspaper employees are not qualified to do the strategic thinking required to manage disruption let alone create it in the form of new products that may challenge the core because they still see themselves as print newspaper employees. Just stating that you are a “news” company instead of a “newspaper” company doesn’t make it true.
I couldn’t agree more with Howard Owens analysis. The only way newspapers can ensure the survival of their brands and the journalistic principles they hold so dearly is to separate the web organization completely from the newspaper.
Clay Christensen talks about the “sucking sound of the core”. That’s exactly what is happening at news organizations around the world. The print product will always win because it still makes the most money, has the most people and cost associated with it and is where everyone feels comfortable.
It would be very difficult to sit at a boardroom table and convince the room that the focus should be on the thing that makes little money, has unlimited competitors and a very unclear future or path to profitability. Michael Nielsen gives a nice explanation of this here. The sensible manager will focus on managing the core even if it is in decline and that’s why the two operations cannot co-exist.
PS.
Jason,
My other point to Howard was that dividing the two also reduces your competitive offering for advertisers. From my experience, advertisers want an integrated solution – something in the paper that drives people online to register, opt-in, communicate, etc. When the two are separate it leads to internal confrontations that I have witnessed destroy the advertiser deal entirely.
In fact, advertisers are producing their own “custom published” social media sites, to create what media properties are not.
Note, today Nielsen reports a $10 Billion, 15.6% drop in ad spending 1st 1/2 2009. The most significant drop is in local sunday supplements at 47%+. I wonder if those $ aren’t going right into to digital custom publishing.
K—
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