GOOD FOR PRINT, BAD FOR DIGITAL?
A U.K. website specializing in supplying consumers with digital editions of print magazines has folded, reportedly due to lack of demand from consumers.
MediaWeek reports the Magazines On Demand website, operated by John Menzies Digital, was closed due to "too much uncertainty" in the sector that demands considerable investment.
Is this good news from print publications? Does it show consumers still prefer print versus digital editions of their favourite magazines? Digital editions have been heralded as the saviour for many publishers but I'm sure this news has some worried.
2 comments:
I wonder how many people really subscribe to media for the content? How many people buy something and then never read it? So when the opportunity to buy it again comes up, they just pass on it.
For instance, a newspaper here in the US recently went kaput, and the journalists previously employed there bought it, and set it up as a completely digital on-line newspaper. They figured they would make a profit if they could get "only" 50,000 subscribers at $5 per month. They figured that the reason people bought their newspaper in the past was because of their reporting on local topics.
6 months later, they have 3000 subscribers. So the question is, is it content that drives the market, or something else? If it's something else, what is it?
The Wall Street Journal can sell itself online because subscribers can make money on the information they receive. The content has value to the subscriber that is worth paying for. That isn't necessarily true for the average daily. The sad fact is that most people don't care what's going on. They want the coupons, or comics, or classified ads. Or topless women on page 3.
Value. Intrinsic or Explicit. If it isn't there, it won't sell, online or otherwise. The question is, how to "sell" that value?
Great points as always David.
I might be stating the obvious when I say the content has to be unique to have any value. I'm guessing that with your example of the U.S. newspaper there was dozens of other sources where readers could get hold of the same news for free?
That's why, at this time, it's the niche 'must have' publications that are working whereas the 'nice to have' newspapers and magazines are failing.
How to sell it, as you say, is a whole other ball game!
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