News organizations need to upsell users
The idea that news organizations should charge for basic content on the Web is repugnant.
It’s a losing proposition. It’s a terrible, terrible idea. And journalism is filled with terrible ideas right now.
But that doesn’t mean news organizations can’t charge for content. Far from it. Rather, news organizations need to create upsell features.
For years, I have paid to be an ESPN Insider. Insider content is not for casual sports fans, which make up the majority of ESPN.com’s users. But that doesn’t mean some users, like myself, aren’t willing to pay for a premium product.
One of my favorite Insider features are scouting reports. I have access to scouting reports on every single football player in the NFL (and other reports for other sports). For many people that may sound pretty stupid, but it’s a pretty cool feature for me. ESPN also has in-depth trend data for every football game, and I can get AccuScore predictions not only for the outcome, but how each team should do running the ball, passing the ball and play on defense.
Content is one upsell area. Another could be business listings. For instance, a local site should offer every business and restaurant a free listing but also offer premium features for a price.
Want to be able to upload coupons each week to our Web site? Premium feature. Want an in-depth, easily changeable menu for your restaurant? Premium feature. Want a blog to interact with your customers? Premium feature.
Classifieds can be the same way too. Basic classifieds for individuals should be free, but we can still sell people on premium features. Want your listing to stand out with custom features, like Ebay offers? We’ll sell them to you.
Want your listing to show up at the top for a given search? Premium feature.
If we’re going to ask people for money, we have to create value. Basic content isn’t that. News organizations need to stop thinking of themselves as just journalism companies and start thinking of themselves as content companies.
Every news organization should have About.Com-like features for their areas. This evergreen content can be immensely useful for users. The history of an area, the best places to go, etc all should be covered.
New organizations also need to think of themselves as destinations. If you want to be a premium local site, you have to be THE destination that people want to go to. Journalism alone will not make you that destination.
Restaurant guides, business guides, kick-ass classifieds, maps and guides, evergreen content, etc are the keys to becoming a destination. Upselling does not mean offering bad basic products, but rather it means offering really good premium products that people and businesses are willing to pay for.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:30 pm
BINGO! I think you’ve hit the nail on the head — in my new role as “web producer” for a local TV news station, these are some of the ideas that I am going to bring with me. Thanks for strengthening my resolve!
August 22nd, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Agreed. These are great ideas.
You can see this model in print (albeit sparingly) with obituaries. Most papers list the deaths for free, but charge by the column-inch for a submitted write-up, photos and other luxuries. People balked at first when my newspaper switched to the free-paid system, but the number of paid obituaries hasn’t really dropped off.
In your Web business model, I see two minor issues, but the overall idea is strong.
One: People will pay a little extra money when they’re already shelling out a lot of cash (what’s another 50-100 dollars for an obit when you’re already paying thousands for the funeral?). But how do you entice people to open their wallets for the first time to spend money for a premium service? Free trials? Incessant marketing (like what ESPN does)? Either way, the content provided has to be terrific.
Two: What’s to stop someone from stealing your premium content, repackaging it, and sharing it for free on another site? Despite robust copyright laws, you know this is being done all over the Internet.
That said, a lot of newspaper companies are moving in this direction. My paper has a lot of the content you mentioned, but we’re not charging for it. (Maybe that will change.) A shameless plug: http://www.triangle.com/
Andrew M. Roman
Raleigh, N.C.
August 22nd, 2008 at 4:00 pm
Pat: if you really want to be seen as an iconoclast, and not a blowhard, you have to know what you’re leading and where you are leading it from.
This post shows you know neither. It is a catalogue of truisms, which ignores the obvious:
– that subscription models work brilliantly for many media businesses, not so well for others. See Wall St Journal vs New York Times. Exercise: why do you think this is?
– that upselling is an advertising department staple that has been around decades. Ask any seasoned ad man. Exercise: don’t you think they tried this? What happened?
– that furious competition and cheap web publishing has made much of the “evergreen” and commercial content you talk about - restaurant reviews, local listings, directories, blogs - a commodity product. Exercise: do some Google searches on any metropolitan area in the Western world. Work out: what impact does this have on a content market?
Go read someone like Steve Yelvington. See if he’ll talk to you at a conference. Learn from him. Get some real world experience. Approach these difficult problems with humility, an understanding of history, and a knowledge of the present. Then blog.
August 24th, 2008 at 10:44 am
Dead on Pat, especially that bus. directories should be free and then upsold (because nothing is more useless than an incomplete directory) and that community papers should own the web in their communities. I have more on those ideas here: Your content is your honeypot. Enjoy.
Weary (and anonymous) reader: if these are all truisms, then why aren’t media companies doing them? If upsell has been around for decades, then why don’t they apply this to online?
August 24th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
@Tim Burden: they are applying upsells. It’s a standard thing, has been for decades. Digital upsells are now common too. But, really, consider what has happened to classified ads - this is a pointless argument. Classifieds, upsell or not, are gone.
August 24th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
@Weary reader,
I read Steve Yelvington all the time. The problem with your response is that you think some half-assed attempts in the past mean that we shouldn’t try something now.
Upselling means creating premium content that has value. Virtually everything that newspapers and news organizations produce today is not premium content. We cannot charge money for that, but that doesn’t mean we can’t charge money for premium content. Premium content is usually not journalism but rather services.
In fact, it is the very advertising departments that you cite as “upselling” that have failed newspapers so miserably. They do not know how to sell Web ads. Nor do they get the concept of targeted advertising.
Ad staffs have killed newspapers with incompetence. Why would I ask a season ad man about his past failings? Most ad people need to be replaced ASAP with people who know how to sell Web ads.
What Steve argues for is not charging for basic content. I’ve never seen him say we can’t charge for any content. I have seen very few news organizations that created original, PREMIUM content on the Web. The New York Times USED to charge money for BASIC content that was print centric. That was a terrible idea, and of course they no longer do it.
What I am calling for is creating value by creating new, Web-first content. This often means kick-ass business listings. It means creating a community for users, not just a news site.
Classifieds are not gone. Steve himself is working on a project to reinvent them. Craigslist does charge for some listings. This is how they make money. But the idea that we should charge for every listing is idiotic and only worked when newspapers were monopolies.
Newspapers need to adjust to a competitive landscape. Craigslist is not a great product. It’s beatable. But it’s only beatable by a substantially better product.
What I argue for is a free classified model like Craigslist that combines some paid features of Ebay. If you want to have a free listing, great we’ll hook you up. But if you want features like Ebay has with themes, bold titles, better search results, etc you’ll have to pay. And when I mean pay, I’m talking a few dollars, not the ridiculous amounts that newspapers used to charge for print.
Have you ever seen a newspaper attempt this? Of course not. It makes too much damn sense. I use Craigslist. I use Ebay. Do you? Newspapers have always half-assed the Web. Half-assing will continue to get them crushed, but if they really invest, they’ll have a chance at fighting back.
September 25th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Newspaper will continue to die if they don’t stop treating the Web as an “upsell”.
@pat, Yes, “ad staffs have killed newspapers with incompetence.”
If anything should be an upsell, it should be the newspaper. Old school newspaper people have been trying to shove squares into circles since the beginning. They are sticking the guns to their own heads.
@pat, I couldn’t agree more with your idea for classifieds. Free basic listing on the Web, upsell to print, and upsell features like extra photos.