Comments on: Why newspapers need to get to know their readers better

By: Tim Allen

Tim Allen — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 19:44:16 +0000

That’s not news- that’s grooming the narcissists.

By: Tim Allen

Tim Allen — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 19:41:25 +0000

How does institutionalizing make it successful? Whoever owns it has a vested interest in controlling it for their own purposes: money, power, prestige, etc. As long as there is a threat to the owner’s well-being, news will be filtered to accommodate the perpetuation of the institution. In the hands of the government, is unacceptable for obvious reasons, in the hands of corporations, nearly as bad, and in the hands of a privately held company, the best of a bad situation. What other option is there, and how would the controlling power be held accountable for the truthfulness of the reporting?

By: Gavin Lauman

Gavin Lauman — Sun, 09 Sep 2012 21:59:49 +0000

Newspapers are in danger of becoming increasingly irrelevant because the headlines in many major daily newspapers scream at me that all is not well in my life. I don’t subscribe to that message. Look what happens online. Many of the stories that “go well” online aren’t what most journos would call hard news. It could be argued they are the quirky, lighter, often are reflective of some in the moment “reality TV” show. I read somewhere where news as being described what is in the mind of the beholder. As an industry we need to give readers what they want to read NOT what we, as journalists, like writing.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sun, 09 Sep 2012 14:07:32 +0000

Yes. This.

By: Scott Olson

Scott Olson — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 20:28:28 +0000

Mathew, very well thought-out and written piece. I agree the newspapers need to get better at targeting and understanding who is participating in their conversations. All the information is there and there are multiple ways to gather this information. I think the key, which was stated in the comments, is that the newspapers need to do something with the data once they collect it. If they show advertisers more than unique visits and clicks, they’ll be much better off.

By: Scot Kerr

Scot Kerr — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 20:32:34 +0000

mindctrl – I’m not sure how far back you’re thinking about when you imagine newspapers not supported by advertising, but it’s a long long time ago. Newspapers and other reputable news organizations have generally done an exceptional job serving both the public through reporting and commerce through advertising.

Advertising is part of the information package, especially for local newspapers, where geography defines what readers are interested in — local shops, local events, and local services. It is even included in the Journalist’s Creed, written in 1906 by Walter Williams: “I believe that advertising, news and editorial columns should alike serve the best interests of readers; that a single standard of helpful truth and cleanness should prevail for all; that supreme test of good journalism is the measure of its public service.”

Although I’d agree that newspapers need to do a much better job knowing their readers and partnering with them, publishers can’t lose sight of the responsibility to give the public what they need as much as what they want.

By: magbill

magbill — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 20:02:27 +0000

You know who may have pioneered this ‘velvet-rope’ approach? The sports sites Rivals.com and Scout.com back in 2001. Even now, after being acquired by Yahoo and Fox Sports respectively, at least 95% of their content is free, generating large traffic, but they also sell premium subscriptions for a limited but valued set of premium features. Scout alone had garnered over 100,000 paying subscribers before their acquisition in 2005. Though the units are too small for their owners to break out numbers, I understand both are nicely profitable. ESPN also implements an “Insider” subscription service, but its success is unclear.

By: mindctrl

mindctrl — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 14:15:43 +0000

The fundamental flaw with newspapers is that they moved to a business model that relied on advertising as the primary revenue generator. *News*papers should be about news. Newspapers have essentially become advertising companies disguised as purveyors of information. At some point newspapers became more about business than about news, and instead of putting public interest first they were required to put profits first. When advertising profits are the primary objective, the reader and the news are secondary and incidental to the business model. Doing a slightly different version of the same thing that got them here doesn’t seem to be a worthy alternative.

We’ve institutionalized this mindset in our culture, and if newspapers are to survive (and I mean newspapers as the concept of purveyors of information that inform the public and hold government and private corporations accountable) we’re all going to have to start institutionalizing that this is something of quality that we want for humanity and that we’re willing to pay for. We need to move away from advertising-supported “news”, and move in a direction that is beneficial to humanity.

If we maintain that news should be the bait that lures us to the advertising that compels us to buy products, it’s not the survival of the newspaper industry that we should be concerned about, but the values of humanity and the survival of the species.

By: Bill Densmore

Bill Densmore — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 12:55:08 +0000

The Day, in New London, Conn., is pioneering a membership model of engagement and retention with users. The September issue of the International Newsmedia Marketing Assocation’s “Ideas” publication will have a backgrounder on it. It’s online by Sept. 1 at:

http://www.inma.org/modules/platforms/index.cfm?action=ideas_public

The notion that newspapers must move from a business of printed products to one of providing a one-to-one service based on deep knowledge of their users’ interests is the subject of our 2010 “From Paper to Persona” white paper from the Reynolds Journalism Institute: http://www.papertopersona.org

By: Bill Densmore

Bill Densmore — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 12:48:14 +0000

Matt:

The need for newspapers to move from focusing on a print-based production, to a service focused on one-to-one relationships with users was the topic of the 2010 Reynolds Journalism Institute white paper: “From Paper to Persona.” Check it out at http://www.papertopersona.org — Bill Densmore