RBM: Premium Digital Media: The Future May Be Brighter Than We Think - Andrew Leinicke

RBM has a longstanding relationship with some of the publishing industry39s most venerable brands including Condamp233 Nast Hearst Magazines the Financial Times and the Los Angeles Times Working for these clients has revealed to us unique insights into online content consumption from the fluffiest entertainment to the weightiest news analysis How content is discovered bought and sold is rapidly changingamp8212the effects of these changes affect all marketersIt comes as no surprise that in the last five years the print journalism industry has been struggling to find its place in the media marketplace Print circulation for major US newspapers has fallen steadily over the last decade and now less than half of US adults read any print edition in a given weekYet it39s also important to bear in mind that only in 2010have interactive advertising spends overtaken print newspaper not including magazines or other print ad vehicles amounts at 26B according to the IAB In comparison at the beginning of the last decade newspaper publishing was a 50B businessUntil the advent of the Web newspapers controlled customer relationships via the newsstand and direct subscriptions Now however two new channels dominate content discovery search and social media As a result a new breed of content has emerged online to take advantage of these channels Publishers39 reverseengineer audience demand with lowquality content farms The two most obvious examples AOL and Demand media are now serious players in online news The Google Finance charts below illustrate recent revenue declines at The New York Times and rapid rises at Demand Media AOL has not fared as well but that is a long and complicated storyPreviously content quality was a requisite for owning relationships In the last few years online publishers have learned that they can instead master the nearly free discovery pathways of search and social media This spring a horde of AOL journalists Paul Miller Joshua Topolsky and others left after learning that they would be required to produce content based on trending interest according to Google and Twitter reportingIronically it is this approach to audience marketing that appears to worry Google In recent weeks Google announced its 1 listings feature which allows account users to rate both organic and paid listings increasing their favorability by the engine directly or indirectly Meanwhile earlier this year Google also announced changes to its search algorithm meant to mitigate the effect of lowquality content pages Quantcast and comScore reported significant traffic declines for the standout content farm eHow by Demand Media shortly afterwards I believe that Google realizes that the quality of its listings is critical to its continued success as the defacto navigational and discovery tool for online content As Matt Cutts recently stated on the official Google Blog quotOur goal is simple to give people the most relevant answers to their queries as quickly as possiblequotIn the long run we believe there will be plenty of opportunity for highquality content The Wall Street Journal the largest newspaper in the country with a printanddigital paid circulation of 211M charges for access to its content Likewise the risky and muchcriticized move by the New York Times to gate its content has resulted in yearoveryear gains in digital ad and circulation revenue stemming the ongoing sales loss faced by this incredible brand in recent years This event has particular meaning to RBM because in the past the major media brands able to survive with gated content were large financial news outlets The New York Times by contrast is squarely general interestDespite the high profiles of free and usergenerated content brands we believe professionally produced content looks forward to a long and profitable future in the digital media worldAndy Leinicke is Media Director at RBM He manages all aspects of our Paid Search Practice Andy is in charge of organizing developing and overseeing every aspect of a campaign from message and testing strategy to media buying and segmentation He can be reached at aleinickeredbricksmediacom Read all Andy39s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at The BrickwireCheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates MediaBizBloggerMediaBizBloggers is an openthought leadership blog platform for media marketing and advertising professionals companies and organizations To contribute contact Jackmediadvisorygroupcom The opinions expressed in MediaBizBloggerscom are not those of Media Advisory Group its employees or other MediaBizBloggerscom contributors Media Advisory Group accepts no responsibility for the views of MediaBizBloggers authors

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RBM: Premium Digital Media: The Future May Be Brighter Than We Think - Andrew Leinicke

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