THINK!: FT.com user figures

Wednesday, 29 October 2008

People will pay for content and internet advertising is over-rated.

O.K, TimesSelect was a failure (sorry, a success, but an ad model was better) we are told. And there a lot of believers out there who want you to believe that there is no future in paid content.

I disagree.

On the reader side there is heaps of content I would pay for, content I shamelessly nick and post in full on this blog just to demonstrate the fact that there is content that I personally would pay for and don't have to.

On the ad side, a lot of these ad networks (300 by last count?) are delivering poor value to advertisers because their metrics systems are poor (at best).

And, back to the reader, they are often annoying, and for the advertiser don't offer the impact of print. Way, way too much inventory and poor industry pricing models.

There are people who don't run with the sheep, the FT is one of them.

Where we're at with the Internet and media is NOT a crisis point but THE VERY VERY BEGINNING of what will come: better thought out models - that exploit audience fragmentation, not fight against it; better technology for monetizing content; changing user demands and habits.

I hate the cliche carpe diem, but this is the day to go for it.

When is the NYT Company going to demonstrate they can do this?

FT.com focuses on "quality not quantity (Editors Weblog)

Posted by Alisa Zykova on October 28, 2008 at 10:29 AM

As we reported yesterday, FT.com has launched the Long Room page on the Alphaville blog. In an interview today, Managing Editor Robert Grimshaw reported that the website will not be participating in monthly traffic measures by the UK's Audit Bureau of Circulations Electronic (ABCes), because its focus is on "quality not quantity."

Grimshaw said that online news sources in the UK that have cut back on advertising and stopped charging for their content may experience difficulties in the future in the event of declines in advertising revenue. "We think it's philosophically right. We've produced some hugely valuable content and we know for a fact that our users are prepared to pay for it," says Grimshaw. "It's about using the flexibility of the access model and the business model overall."Grimshaw thinks that his site's competitors are too reliant on the advertising industry, whereas FT.com aspires to "carve out its own path online," according to Journalism.co.uk.

Long Room's content will adhere to FT.com's business structure and will be "high-level" and "intellectually charged", but will not propagate "expertise."

In March, the site attained 7.1 million users, although it is more interested in the 500,000 to a million senior users.
Source: Journalism.co.uk
http://www.editorsweblog.org/multimedia/2008/10/uk_ftcom_focuses_on_quality_not_quantity.php

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"Community" creation for newspapers

Oct 27 2008 1:00AM EDT (Porfolio.com)
FT.com Gives Readers a Seat at the Table
If there's a buzzword in the newspaper industry these days -- apart from "downsizing" -- it's "community." The New York Times recently took a step towards getting its readers involved with its new TimesPeople program, The Wall Street Journal made similar overtures with its recent website makeover, and now the Financial Times is getting in on the action with a new area of its popular Alphaville blog where market professionals can hold their own discussions about the day's news.
Called Long Room, the new offering is named after a famed London restaurant that was once a prime venue for financial chatter. "What we're trying to do is allow our users to have that kind of forum for gossip and discussion and debate in the digital world that they used to have in the real world," says Rob Grimshaw, managing director of FT.com. Continuing the metaphor, discussion will be divided by topic into "virtual tables," with users free to start their own new ones.
To ensure a high quality of discussion, participants will have to be approved by FT.com editors. That vetting process, says Grimshaw, will minimize the risk of users posting rumors of the sort that could have ugly legal ramifications or have a dangerous effect on markets -- rumors like the one about Steve Jobs' supposed heart attack that appeared on CNN's iReport site. With Long Room's relatively stringent membership policy, Grimshaw foresees a minimal need for moderation: "We are going to be pretty free in terms of how we allow users to use this room."
FT.com's foray into community comes a year after the site switched over from what was essentially a subscription-only model to one that enables users to view a certain amount of content for free. Grimshaw says the new model has been a success: The site now has 750,000 registered users, up from 150,000 at the end of 2007, and it retains a subscriber base of 100,000.
"It's an interesting time in media right now," he adds," because all the other publishers who decided they should just give away their content entirely free of charge might be feeling exposed as the online ad market seizes up a bit. We've got a lot more options in terms of what we do over the next couple years."