A blog on issues affecting Australia's newsagents, media and small business generally. More ...

Newspapers

Full colour e-paper in two years?

Oliver Luft writing at journalism.co.uk seems to think so. He writes about colour e-paper Fujitsu previewed at a conference in London a couple of weeks ago.

Here we (newsagents) are fighting about who should sell newspapers, home delivery fees and all manner of print product issues and on the other side of the world attention is on the technology which could ultimately replace the print product.

If you’re coming late to the discussion on e-paper then check out the Wikipedia entry for homework.

0 likes
Media disruption

Current newspaper model not working well

So says Steven Rattner, managing principal of Quadrangle Group in this interview with the Financial Times. Rattner’s insight is worth reading. The interview contains this quote from Rattner:

I personally believe that fundamentally the problem is a changing appetite for news on the part of consumers, for the worse. And its something that I feel very sad about, because the fact that people are more interested in whether Britney Spears shaves her head and goes into alcohol rehab, or what is happening at Guantanamo Bay, really is troubling to me.

Of course, Rattner is speaking from a US perspective. My view is we are better served by newspapers here than in the US. While we do have a strong tabloid press, we also have a robust more serious press – just look at the on going campaign by The Age about the plight of David Hicks.

0 likes
Newspapers

Newspaper circulation boost on campus

age-uni-card.JPGUniversity students across Melbourne this week are being offered The Age for 40 weeks for $20.00 which includes home delivery on Saturday and Sunday for the 40 weeks. That’s revenue of 7.1 cents a copy. University schedules being what they are, students will not pick up their copy every week day.

I am curious to know what the folks at The Age will report in their audit numbers. Do audit bureau reported sales include real counts of copies collected or what could be collected over the 40 weeks? Given the on campus management of the collection I suspect the audit number would be the latter.

UPDATE (27/2) I have been contacted by Fairfax and they have confirmed that only actual copies collected on campus are counted in audit figures.

The brochure put in student welcome packs connects with the market using the promotional line: The easiest way to pick up on campus…

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Newspaper records 52% circulation growth

The Sydney edition of News Ltd’s MX free daily newspaper increased circulation by 52%. The Australian has the story. MX was a huge hit in Melbourne for several years before the launch in Sydney. The 52% increase will encourage News executives who are considering/planning a Brisbane launch as I blogged here a few weeks back.

Free daily newspapers need a certain level of traffic access for little or no cost and my understanding is that there is a question as to whether Brisbane can deliver this.

0 likes
Newspapers

Newsagents and the Fairfax half yearly results

Why newsagents need to cut home delivery costs and look for new revenue opportunities.

I’ve had some time to digest the Fairfax half yearly results and comments by some reading this site and what the share some more observations.

Fairfax interests me because it is Australia’s largest locally owned newspaper publisher; their deliberations from recent years have been exposed through the recent book by former CEO Fred Hilmer; and, because of their considerable success at monetising their brand online.

THE AGE
Circulation Monday to Friday is up 4.5%; Saturday down 3% and Sunday up 11%. Circulation income is up 0.3% – interesting compared to the circulation numbers. I’ve mentioned problems with Saturday sales here before for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. Over the counter feedback is that the papers are too big for what people want in a weekend paper now. But I’m sure Fairfax have their own more scientific research on this. Whatever the reason, action is needed.

The difference in circulation revenue compared to actual circulation supports my concerns for newsagents who provide home delivery services. The pressure will be on them to take a ‘pay’ cut and deliver for less. They can’t afford to do this yet can’t afford not to, so they will – an economic consequence for newsagents of deregulation

DIGITAL
Revenue is up 43.7% and profit up 41.8%. Take a look at Digital profit contribution over the last three years

While these are exceptional numbers, they are not sufficient to replace the loss of advertising revenue if newspaper sales and ad revenue fall as has happened in the US. Their decision to promote more aggressively into other markets such as Adelaide where they do not publish a daily should boost revenue.

The pressure old media companies such as Fairfax is under was the subject of this story in The Australia last Thursday.

MASTHEAD VALUE
For months I have complained here about Fairfax newspapers, specifically The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, abusing their masthead with post-it style stuck on ads. The accounts report intangibles representing 123% of net assets. Most of this would be mastheads. So, why what an ad on top of the masthead? The longer term damage is not worth the short-lived thrill from ad revenue.

I am sure that the half year results unlock more valuable information than I have covered here.

Key messages for newsagents are that Fairfax is pushing hard to replace old (newspaper) revenue with new (online) revenue and that while they do this they will be looking to cut costs associated with old media products. Newsagents need to make similar adjustments in their businesses.

It bothers me that newsagents are not being fed current information about these challenges.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Great numbers from Fairfax despite newspapers

Fairfax Digital’s revenue was $61.2 million, up 43.7%, with a profit at the EBITDA level of $17.0 million, up 41.7% over the previous corresponding period.

Revenues grew strongly across all news and classified sites. Total traffic across all the Fairfax sites increased to over 6.2 million unique browsers per month, up 47.8% on the previous corresponding period. Fairfax Digital enjoys the leadership positions in online news (smh.com.au and theage.com.au), online dating (RSVP), and holiday rentals (Stayz), and strong positions in the employment, real estate and automotive classified categories. Fairfax Digital continues to invest in improving its competitive position in key markets, such as with the recent acquisition of Essential Baby and the launch of property site in.domain.com.au in Adelaide.

Fairfax released a good set of numbers yesterday thanks, in main, due to the excellent growth in its digital business.

As a newsagent I am tempted to blog from a negative perspective about Fairfax moving its revenue base from print to online and bemoan what this means for my business. The reality is that Fairfax is doing what every other major print media player globally is doing but with more success than most. They are advanced in monetising their traditional print brands through online offerings and they are bringing in new eyeballs and revenue through acquisition. The Trade Me acquisition from just a year ago, for example, has delivered A$20 million of the earnings.

Newsagents need to follow the Fairfax lead and find new sources of eyeballs and revenue to replace print products. Some are doing this, most are not. Newsagents need to be wary of investing capital in traditional areas of their businesses such as newspapers and magazines.

While sales will be key for years to come, they are not as strategies as they once were. The key investments will related to gaining greater efficiency from these decaying products. This is the big challenge for newsagents just as it is for Fairfax – they will drive production and distribution costs for newspapers and newsagents will bear some cost from that action. Home delivery margins must fall is Fairfax is to protect earnings from newspapers. Rural Press has been successful at this and Brian McCarthy’s role in the soon to merge Fairfax / Rural Press operation could see him bring Rural Press strategies to Fairfax. If this happens newsagents can expect to experience pain.

I have blogged here before about areas newsagents could consider developing in an effort to broaden the appeal of their businesses. The challenge is to alter the mindset of most newsagents. Having operated in highly regulated businesses and under the direction of powerful suppliers, newsagents are not used to being entrepreneurial. This must change.

For my part, my newsagency is benefiting from changes we have made over the last two years: creation of a card shop within a shop and to the front of our retail space; selling the home delivery run; entry into the art supplies space; expansion of our stationery offering; bold entry into the ink and toner space; and, better proactive management of our lottery offerings. The results achieved through these initiatives are excellent. Traffic is up and basket depth has improved.

We obsess about customer efficiency. Two years ago 77% of our customers used to purchase a newspaper and nothing else. Today, that number is 57%. While I say newspapers are challenged in the long term, our short to medium term goal is to ensure that newspapers customer are more efficient for us. We’ve implemented simple strategies to make this happen.

0 likes
Media disruption

Newspaper ditches newsprint

Wired has the story. Okay, it’s a small circulation title with legal listings. That does not diminish the significance of the move.

I first read this story about Sweden’s Post-och Inrikes Tidningar somewhere else last month and thought it was not worth blogging about. Then, today, I heard Cemeron Reilly of the Podcast Network and James Farmer, the online Community Editor for The Age debating the role of ‘citizen media with Jon Faine on ABC local radio in Melbourne. Farmer was talking down the impact of online on mainstream media. Reilly batted well for the disruptors. Farmer would have us believe that most blogs are a waste of time and irrelevant. Traffic says otherwise. Feedback at blogs says otherwise. Blogs provide a better opportunity for transparent democracy than mainstream media could ever offer.

Mainstream media has lost its monopoly on access to the masses and it’s struggling to come to grips with that.

How we consume media is changing. In a small way I’m covering some the change in this blog – in the context of change impacting Australian newsagencies. There is no point resisting such inevitable and good-for-the-community change. Indeed, we ought to embrace it. The challenge is how we in small business deal with this when our suppliers do not adjust their behaviour.

Take computer magazines. Sales in the category are in free-fall. The top selling titles are doing okay but outside these five or six titles, everything else is in trouble. Newsagents are still being supplied at quantities reminiscent of the halcyon days. This is sucking their businesses of cash. Fixing the problem is taking newsagents away from adjusting their businesses elsewhere to address the challenge of consumers accessing online what they used to buy in a newsagency.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Newspaper home delivery costs

In the 1990s Australian newsagents made, on average, 26% of the cover price per home delivered newspaper. This includes delivery fees. Today, based on data from a sample of newsagents in four states, the average gross profit has fallen to 21%. This has come about because home delivery relationships have moved from being between newsagent and consumer to publisher and consumer with the newsagent a hired delivery service provider.

While some newsagents have altered their businesses to cope with the revenue squeeze, many have not. In one state we are seeing GP as low as 11% on some newspaper offers. This does not cover the costs of managing, wrapping and delivering the product. There is no doubt that GP per titles delivered will fall further this year.

In a flat (decaying?) market, GP and therefore cost pressure will increase significantly. One way newsagents can make the relationship more profitable is to take it beyond newspaper home delivery. Successful newsagents regularly market to their home delivery customers and through this achieve good stationery and other sales; they are visible in providing the service – well branded vehicles and employees; they promote to acquire their own home delivery customers outside of what the publishers do; they focus on their own costs. Unsuccessful newsagents deliver the newspaper and that’s it. This is where decay in newspaper sales will hit the hardest.

0 likes
Newspapers

Former newspaper executive writes about life inside the tornado

The problem facing metropolitan newspapers is essentially the same one encountered by department stores. Department stores are facing a tough slog everywhere because almost everything they do can be done better by a specialist retailer. There were many specialist providers chipping away at the motoring, real estate, business, employment and sport sections of papers. In 1998, Fairfax – then John Fairfax Holdings Ltd and now Fairfax Media Ltd – had an enviable newspaper franchise with a deserved reputation for strong, independent journalism and dedicated readers. Although this resulted in pricing power in the market, the source of revenue that leveraged the company’s business model was under threat.

This is an excerpt from The Fairfax Experience: What the Management Texts Didn’t Teach Me, by Fred Hilmer (former CEO of Fairfax) with Barbara Drury.

The excerpts published in The Australian so far are a fascinating insight into how Fairfax was dealing with competition and technology driven disruption.

Like any of these books it is, in part, an attempt by the author to control history. Newsagents will find the book interesting because the challenges navigated then (and now) by Fairfax are challenges faced by newsagents. Fairfax experienced a chipping away at its core revenue stream. We do in our newsagencies as well. The difference is that Fairfax is resourced with advice to guide a road forward whereas newsagents are too much under the pump from current suppliers; too under resourced; too ignorant (or all of the above) to engage in pursuing their road forward.

Fred Hilmer’s book is published Feb 1.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Kudos to Fairfax for page one euthanasia story

A common positioning in any debate about the future of newspapers is that they will evolve away from breaking news. The Age and Sydney Morning Herald today on page one publish a story which I feel reflects that evolution. It’s a story about an Australian Doctor with a terminal illness who traveled to Switzerland to die.

James Button’s story about Dr John Elliott and his desire to die with dignity is compelling reading – his words are appropriately sensitive while dealing with a highly emotive and often misunderstood topic.

While coverage of euthanasia is not new, such page one prominence in an Australian newspaper is.

I don’t know if Fairfax, publisher of The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald has made a conscious decision on less time sensitive lead stories or whether this is a one off. I hope it’s the former and that they are adjusting their offering in response to changes in consumer habits in terms of accessing news.

0 likes
Newspapers

US newspapers target mothers

Media Life Magazine has an excellent story about newspaper innovation. Lisa Snedeker writes about publisher interest in mums as the demographic of most corporate interest. The article is well worth reading. Chck out this passage:

Why didn’t someone think of moms before?

A good part was certainly that newspapers knew they already had moms, and in their ever-growing panic over declining circulation, the bigger issue has been snagging readers they didn’t have–and what they see as the next generation of readers–the young.

But another part has to do with the stodgy, male focus of traditional newspaper managers. As local monopolies, or near monopolies, papers traditionally put little value on understanding their readers’ different wants, operating on the premise that one paper fits all.

What’s caused all this to change is the realization, dawning on publishers and advertisers, that mothers are increasingly hard to reach through traditional mass media, such as the daily newspaper and network television. They are no longer a given, and that has made them a more valued demographic.

Mums are a big chunk of newsagent traffic. Our shops serve them through the journey of pregnancy, motherhood and well beyond. If newspapers were to focus specifically on the mum demographic as some are in the US newsagencies would be the ideal retail partner.

0 likes
Newspapers

Saturday newspaper sales versus efficiency

Data suggests newspaper efficiency for a newsagency improves as sales fall.

I have been tracking sales of newspapers in newsagencies on a Saturday for some time. While sales on other days of the week are flat or falling, Saturday seems to be the most volatile. Not in all newsagencies I should note – some are delivering excellent growth. With newspapers available in so many outlets now, newsagencies are not as important to the impulse purchase as they used to be – destination purchases make up more sales than before. This is reflected in growing efficiency of newspapers on a Saturday for newsagencies as shown in this graph.

sales-efficiency.JPG

Efficiency in the graph reflects basket depth when a newspaper is in the basket. From the data from the small group of newsagencies, newspapers sales have become more efficient as sales have fallen. This suggests that the newsagency is more of a destination for these customers, making the customers far more valuable for the newsagent.

While the vast majority of Saturday newspaper sales are single item and therefore inefficient sales, the upward trend on efficiency correlating with a fall in sales is interesting.

What does this really mean for newsagents? I’m not sure. I want to dig deeper into the data and look at other days of the week. I do know that if I can build more efficiency around newspapers I can neuter the impact of falling newspaper sales in my shop.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Daily Telegraph drops shares listing

I’m not surprised the Daily Telegraph dropped its share price listings from the print edition. Newspapers overseas started doing this in 2005. The listings page directs people to the newspaper website. The News Ltd stablemate the Herald Sun still have a double page spread for its listings.

0 likes
Media disruption

Opportunity knocks for newsagents

Using habit based products to replace falling newspaper and magazine traffic in newsagencies.

Newspapers and magazines are less important to newsagents than ten years ago. Since they are available in more high traffic outlets and with sales flat and, in some cases, falling, they are not the traffic promise they used to be. Few newsagents have addressed this fall in traffic.

One answer newsagents could consider is habit based product categories. That is, products which bring people back for more. In our store we have focused on Art Supplies for two years. It has a healthy GP and builds a loyal habit based following.

art-habit.JPG

I like Art Supplies because they fit with our traditional mix of stationery and craft products. Also, we sell art magazines and if you put the two next to each other both benefit. Newsagents can buy their Art Supplies from their usual wholesaler or an Art Supplies specialist like Mega Shed – his is what we do.

There are other habit based categories newsagents could consider to build GP and lock in loyalty as traffic from other categories falls. These include:

Second hand books – out of left field but think about it, people buy / rent these because they are avid readers. This means they will, come back and back. The key would be to do it right and not bring your shop down.

Puzzles and jigsaws – these fit with crossword magazines; scrapbook products. Some newsagents do well in this space.

Ink and toner – sits with stationery. Again, some newsagents are doing well in this space.

Collectibles – say, small bears which you collect over a year.

These are just a few ideas in the habit based area. Our experiment with free WiFi is another example of what could be habit based – depending on those who use it.

Newsagents must start to evolve their retail businesses to address changing consumer habits. This is a wonderful opportunity to embrace change. Habit based products are a good fit. The challenges are to bring in good GP product and to do this in such a way as to not shock existing customers yet to ensure that new prospects are attracted.

0 likes
magazines

Australia Day newspaper bumper edition frustrates newsagents and customers

I’ve heard that Fairfax in NSW will publish a ‘bumper edition’ Sydney Morning Herald on Friday January 26 and to be on sale for the entire Australia Day long weekend for the usual Saturday price of $2.20. I would have thought that in the current newspaper market – challenged at best and decaying at worst – Fairfax would do everything possible to not upset customers. Their customers will be upset by yet another lazy Bumper Edition. Newsagents will bear the brunt of customer anger. Talk to any newsagent and they will tell you of the frustration expressed across the counter and on the phone explaining the pricing and the convoluted rules associated with the Bumper Editions this past Christmas. Bumper Editions are not good customer service.

Everywhere you turn there are reports of sales declines being experienced by newspapers. Newspapers themselves are regularly running naval gazing pieces about their own future. Publishers like Fairfax have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in online businesses which are speeding the decline. It is odd to me therefore that Fairfax would ‘play’ with their customers in this way. If they want to delay the decline they would publish each day of the Australia Day weekend. But then, maybe the financial return is better if they run a Bumper Edition and that’s more important than what the customers want.

Memo to Fairfax: You might want to let the computer companies know about your Bumper Edition plans so that they can provide advice in advance to their newsagent clients and thereby save the hundreds of phone calls which would be made otherwise.

0 likes
Customer Service

Newsagents worried about free daily newspapers

The Sunday Herald in Scotland has a story about the possible impact of a recently announced free afternoon newspaper on newsagents. The UK newsagent association (NFRN) is holding meetings of members and with the publishers to discuss the lost of sales and customer traffic caused by free newspapers.

As data from Dr. Piet Bakker – published here just a few weeks ago – shows, free daily newspapers are growing. Even though Australia is behind Europe and the US, they are gaining traction. These free dailies provide publishers with an easy sell to advertisers and are being used in many situations to boost advertising sales for the paid for product. It makes sense. In Europe especially publishers have been very successful maintaining revenue through by launching free daily newspapers.

While it’s natural that newsagents will complain to publishers about the impact of these free newspapers, my view is that our energy is better spent expecting the move and adjusting our businesses today accordingly. Free newspapers are not new, we have seen them growing for the last five years. This is change we can prepare for today. Indeed, it is change we ought to have been preparing for long before now.

We need to rely less on newspapers for traffic and revenue. This means we need to build traffic from other categories. It also means we need to adjust the layout of our businesses and focus on higher margin traffic generating product toward the front of our shops. While publishers will resist such a fundamental change – given that newspapers have always had the best location in our shops – they need to allow us to respond to market trends just as they are through acquisition of online businesses, moving their product further outside the newsagent channel and by launching free newspapers.

The newsagent channel in Australia was created by publishers to serve their needs. In 2007, newsagents must put their needs ahead of publishers. Tough decisions face us and we must be businesslike and swift in making them.

For the record I am not advocating that newsagents get out of newspapers, rather that they invest real estate and labour in newspapers according to their anticipated return to the business.

0 likes
Media disruption

Newspaper home delivery woes

The theft of home delivered newspapers is a worldwide problem as this blog post by New York resident/writer/journalist Dimitry Kiper shows. No matter whether you’re in rural Australia or high rise New York, there are tight ar*se people who prefer to steal a newspaper than buy one. In our small newspaper distribution round it used to cost us at least two or three newspapers a day – newspapers our distribution people were certain they delivered.

I wish there was a way we could humiliate these petty criminals. Two hundred years ago people were transported from England to Australia and a life of hard labour for stealing less.

I found Dimity’s blog post courtesy of Jeff Jarvis’ BuzzMahcine.

0 likes
Newsagency challenges

Polarised retailing affects newsagents

The toughest part of retailing has been newsagents and book selling, where sales dived throughout 2006, with a 4.5 per cent drop since June. Mr Ganz said many of their sales had been cannibalised by supermarkets.

There are signs retailing is becoming increasingly polarised.

“Top-end and bottom-end retailers are doing well but those focused on the vague middle market are struggling,” said Andrew Cavanagh, of the Australian Centre of Retail Studies.

So reports David Uren in The Australian today. I know of newsagents who would agree with the report and others who would disagree. I’d like to see the data for city versus regional / rural and shopping centre versus high street and a comparison of socio-economic areas.

The newsagents doing well, and there are many, are those who make their businesses stand for something, where they control the business. We have to be bold, not necessarily big, but bold in making a statement about what our business stands for. The more valuable we are to our customers the more they will spend.

We must create our own businesses and turn our backs on the businesses our suppliers created for us more than 100 years ago.

0 likes
magazines

The plastic newspaper

Rafat Ali at PaidContent reports that Plastic Logic, developers of flexible plastic content readers (plastic newspapers maybe?) has received US$100 million in venture funding.

The company will use the money to build a factory in Dresden, Germany to make the display modules for electronic reader products…these flexible active-matrix displays can be fabricated like the pages of a book and used to display downloaded content of books or newspapers. It will start production in 2008.

I talk here about newsagents facing a tsunami of change. The Plastic Logic funding will fuel part of that tsunami.

From the Plastic Logic press release:

“Our displays will enable electronic reader products that are as comfortable and natural to read as paper whether you’re on a beach, in a train or relaxing on the sofa at home.” stated John Mills, Chief Operating Officer at Plastic Logic. “Wireless connectivity will allow you to purchase and download a book or pick up the latest edition of your newspaper wherever you are and whenever you need it. The battery will last for thousands of pages so you can leave your charger at home.”

“Even in this age of pervasive digital content, our research shows that consumers are very reluctant to read on laptops, phones and PDAs,” said Simon Jones, Vice President of Product Development at Plastic Logic. “We still carry around enormous amounts of paper. However, people are making less room in their lives for the weight and bulk of paper and are becoming more sensitive to the environmental impact of printing to read. We believe there is a substantial unfulfilled need that Plastic Logic can meet by making digital reading a comfortable and pleasurable experience.”

This tsunami of change is an opportunity for newsagents. Now is the time to grab the surfboard and lead your business through change. Take control and choose your future.

0 likes
Media disruption

A great newspaper stand at 7 Eleven

7eleven4.JPG7 Eleven stores in Hong Kong have a great newspaper display out the front of the shop. Apart from a few street vendors, they dominate the retail of newspapers and magazines in the city. These newspaper displays are excellent. Since their shops are only 30 and 40 sq metres they’re not trying to draw people that far in off the street. The size of newsagencies in Australia makes drawing people in essential.

By the way, check out the height of the store. Like a lot of convenience retail here, you take the least amount of space possible.

0 likes
Newspapers

Optimism for 2007

newsagency_mags.JPG

I bang on here about the tsunami facing newsagents – disruption due to technology, waning publisher interest and an unfair magazine supply model. I complain about big picture and macro issues almost every day. I criticise newsagents and their suppliers. While I try and present information in a balanced way, I am, naturally, going to be biased toward newsagents.

Despite what I write here through this blog, I am an optimistic newsagent. I feel good about the future. My future and the future of the channel. While I have no doubt there will be significant consolidation very soon, the channel will survive and, indeed grow in some areas. We are entering an era where entrepreneurial newsagents will lead.

My optimism is best illustrated by new investments I am contemplating – a new newsagency in a greenfield location, a second specialist card and gift shop under the new banner group I am involved with – the first of the stores opening next month in there centre where my newsagency is located – three additional positions for the newsagency development and support teams in my software company.

Others are investing too. New people are buying newsagencies and some existing newsagents are reinventing their businesses. The key is the control they exert over their businesses.

Optimism flows from business decisions which have their foundation in research and good business data. It relies on business owners taking control of their businesses and standing up to unfair and unconscionable practices.

While I’ll continue to draw attention here to suppliers who treat newsagents poorly, I will also be a happy newsagent because, overall, things are good. Sure they would be better if 200 to 300 magazine titles died or if Australia Post stopped trying to take cash from my pocket. But I can deal with these challenges through this place and through lobbying elsewhere.

The key to my optimism is the knowledge that my business is what I and my team make of it. Hence my use of this place to lobby for a better deal and as therapy. I always feel better after a good blog.

Thanks for reading.

0 likes
Calendars

Placeblogger lists hyper local news sites

local_news_d.JPG

Courtesy of Jay Rosen’s Press Think blog I have found Placeblogger, a new place where you can “discover, browse, and subscribe” to over 700 local blogs. It launched January 1 and while only US blogs are listed at the moment it’s well worth a visit.

What’s a placeblog? Here’s what the site says:

Placeblogs are sometimes called “hyperlocal sites” because some of them focus on news events and items that cover a particular neighborhood in great detail — and in particular, places that might be too physically small or sparsely populated to attract much traditional media coverage. Because of this, many people have associated them with the term “citizen journalism,” or journalism done by non-journalists.

MNSpeak is the best example from the Placeblog top 10. It publishes news which mainstream media news sites and newspapers are unlikely to cover or at least cover in the way it does. These local news sites are the future of news with newspapers and mainstream websites moving to more blended coverage.

Back in 2005 we had a half hearted crack at creating a local news site, called local news daily. We built the site in Drupal and sought out retired journalists to get us going. One thing led to another and we let it slide. Maybe the time is right now to get newsagents engaged in the Local News concept. Hmmm… In the meantime, check out Placeblogger and see what they’re up to in the US. It’s exciting.

0 likes
Blogging

Free daily newspapers up 43% in 2006

fdn.JPG

Dr. Piet Bakker’s latest and excellent Free Daily Newspaper newsletter reports that total circulation of free dailies in 2007 increased with 43% to 35 million. The growth in our region is 14%. MX in Melbourne and Sydney are the biggest players in the free daily space in Australia. It’s expect that to change as Australia catches up to Europe and the US in paid circulation falls.

Newsagents in Australia are being told that by newspaper publishers that it’s business as usual. All this free newspaper activity contradicts this. Newsagents need to plan today for major disruption to their traditional business models.

0 likes
Media disruption
Trending Articles

Fairfax changes approach to TV Guide, disrespects newsagents

Published on April 20, 2011

What do you think of the Powerball changes?

Published on February 16, 2018

IPS releases new magazine contracts

Published on June 21, 2011