With traditional revenue sources like advertising and print sales taking a significant hit post Covid, print publications are now at crossroads. To survive and thrive in this new landscape, they must reinvent themselves by exploring and diversifying their revenue streams.
From digital subscriptions and e-commerce to events and branded content, print publications must tap into innovative strategies to secure their future.
Alastair Lewis, Interim Managing Director of FIPP (A network of associates who work with media clients across a range of areas including international expansion, digital subscriptions, membership models and more), got in a conversation with e4m to discuss why alternate revenue streams are needed by the print players.
He believes in order to repurpose print and magazines to changing times of digital, alternate revenue streams are the only option for the industry.
Elaborating about his version of three Cs he shared, “Content, consumer, commitment are the top three things a print publication should live by. The first is creating great quality content, the second is to think about what the consumer wants, understanding them and the third is to be committed to building the best value proposition for your business.”
The two best ways to diversify revenue systems are via digital subscriptions and via events that engage the target audience or industry. According to him, the New York Times (NYT) has done a great job when it comes to digital subscriptions and they have been able to supercharge their revenues because of that. They have also been able to maintain website traffic and engage subscribers via gamification with puzzles like Wordle and more.
Secondly, TIME magazine has aced the game of event integration in order to engage with their audience via the TIME 100 rankings they announce every year. This makes them earn via monetising the conclave, attendee ticket fees and more.
The M&E Report by EY also supports this. It suggests event revenues will contribute to top-line growth, particularly in tier-II and III markets, where national mass brands need greater connect.
It also stated, “Newspaper brands could venture into affiliate events businesses such as weddings, sports, government events, ticketing to reinvent their business.”
But the challenge is, in order to earn via digital subscriptions, paywall content will have to be generated which ultimately may drive readers further away since India is a value-focussed market. How will print publications deal with this, when they are already struggling with reader base?
On this Lewis is of the opinion that, the publications need to lose some in order to gain some, as in they have to be able to accept the shrinking reader base in order to implement paywall content. And just for a while because if the first C ‘Content quality’ is impeccable, people would want to pay to read it eventually.
“I understand it is a loop because when the reader base shrinks, then advertisers too move away. Leading to less ads, and when there are less ad volumes, the ad rates increase and more advertisers move away. But, keeping quality content is key and it's important to accept that for a few quarters, post the shift from free to paid content, will bring in this drop. Shareholders and investors also need to be supportive and patient for returns.”
Ultimately, these diversification strategies are crucial for the survival and growth of print media in a post-pandemic world. As the media landscape continues to evolve, those who adapt and innovate will be best positioned to succeed.
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