SMART Newspaper - Success of Newspaper Industry Demystified

Introduction

Smart Newspaper

Smart Newspaper, is an advanced version/state of Newspaper cohesive to applied technology & analytics. It is yet another step towards continuing journey of Newspaper evolution, wherein, readers are empowered to respond to printed post (includes advertisement) creating disruptive market. The very service enables newspapers to be more responsive, interactive and inline with market trend.  Smart Newspapers enables stakeholders to build metric based business intelligence based on various applied analytics, which can be further utilized by Newspaper stakeholders to align their Socio-Commercial business model with respect to trending consumer behaviour and needs.

Newspaper organizations which are affiliated to “Smart Newspaper” (www.smart-newspaper.com) have access to variety of analytics & Business intelligence, which further enables them to position their newspaper  with respect to geography, readership, market etc. and validate RoI (Return of Investment) to advertisement providers. This features helps in regaining and rebuilding confidence in the market and attract more revenue through advertisements.

Smart Newspaper as a service let their Readers sticky to the newspapers rather than completely drifting to other media.

Definition

• A Technology-Agnostic Collaborative platform destined to suffice Publishing-Stakeholder’s needs by converting “Passive Posts” into measurable “Active Posts”, in turn validating investment/s on “Post” and enhancing end-user experience.
• Newspaper which suffice stakeholder’s Specific needs, Measure their response/s at any given point of Time and Achieve effective value of Investment by provisioning Relevant data and output. (SMART)
• Stimulating Measurable Methodology to Achieve Consumer’s (Readers & Advertisement Providers) delight through Technology Readiness.
•  Newspapers which are Stimulating to Consumers (Readers & Advertisement Providers) by provisioning Advanced User Experience and metric based Measurement using Disruptive Technologies for Market/Response Readiness.

Summary

Recently Newspaper industry is experiencing the mighty effects of Digital Darwinism, wherein evolution of Readers, Market & Technology is much faster than ability of Newspaper Industry to adapt it. It’s not Newspaper industry which is dying, their readers are. The industry is failing to replace older readers with younger individuals. At some point, the newspaper audience may contract so severely that either publisher cannot attract enough advertisers for revenues; and/or publishers no longer enjoy the economies of scale necessary to print profitably. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_newspapers

Consumer behaviour, particularly readership, is going through massive transformation; from paid news to free news; and also market is becoming more receptive to “performance based model” than conventional “space selling”.

Once a mammoth industry which was supposed to be too big to die is now experiencing “Decline Phase” and losing its placement to other Media/s, especially Digital Media. Digital Media is also undergoing significant shift in order to pace-up with market demand and its evolution. However Newspaper as an industry failed to impress its stakeholders, including readers because of lack of warranted measures like innovation, adequate technology adaption, user experience & enablement, measurability, validation of RoI (Return of Investment) etc.  For these obvious reasons, readers & other stakeholders of newspaper prefer migrating to other media which are evolving with time, need and trend.

In the race of being adaptive to market demands and trend, majority of Newspaper organizations instead of aligning technologies with their business objectives, in focus, transformed to diversification. Many newspaper organizations have jumped to render contents to Internet world which defeated their core business model. Instead of enabling and empowering their reader- base there initiatives made users to drift to other media.

Newspaper industry per say, perhaps due to lack of vision and progressive roadmap adopted initiatives which inturn helped other media to grow rather themselves.

Beyond Convergence Era

Smart Newspaper is evolving, to not only sustain and make Newspaper Industry thrive but also enable other media and audiences to coomptete (cooperation amongst competitor) and take media industry, as a whole, to new heights. Ideal approach will transform the way stakeholders advertise, read, respond, validate, measure and get the needful. Smart Newspaper as an approach is way beyond Convergence. It fulfils objective of following types of convergence: -

1. Convergence of Media

2. Convergence of Network

3. Convergence of Platform

4. Convergence of Technologies

5. Convergence of Communication System

6. Convergence of Content Platform

7. Convergence of Data

8. Convergence of People

9. Convergence of Culture

10. Convergence of Source

11. Convergence of Distribution Channels

12. Convergence of Probability

Unlike “convergence era” which is evolved with an approach of “All in One”, Smart Newspaper enables conventional Newspapers approach to “Universalizing era” which works on the concept of “All-in-All”. This approach stimulates the way stakeholders of Newspaper Industry Post, read, advertise, respond, validate, measure, share, invest etc.

Features & Benefits

Capturing potential of the opportunities and possibilities is yet to be explored in Smart Newspaper. Various convergence combinations of largest and highly successful media like Publishing & Printing, Broadcasting, Telecommunication & Internet has opened plethora of attractive & “must have” features which take Newspaper Industry to all new heights.

1. Collaborate: Smart Newspaper as a Platform enables stakeholders to post, repurpose & share contents/post/advertisement to gain humongous response for respective content (postings or advertisement) from wide array of source/s. This outcome helps in elevating confidence in Advertisement Providers to continue investing with Newspapers for product promotion, candidate sourcing or otherwise.

2. Convenience: The most attractive feature of Newspaper being a Smart Newspaper is its convenience and user-friendliness. Irrespective of technology and end-user gadget, readers can respond to specific post or advertisement irrespective of technology or end-user gadget he uses. Imagine readers buying a product, published in newspaper using their mobile phones.

3. Measurement: Now Newspaper companies can validate and measure their subscriptions and readerships on metric basis. Subscribing to Smart Newspaper enables them to capture and record gamut of statistics which builds up their metric based Business Intelligence to further position their newspaper more effectively and command advertising pricing. Now a national newspaper can charge premium for their diverse reach whereas a local newspaper can charge extra-premium for specific advertisement/s targeted to his readers.

4. 24/7 Always ON: With smart newspaper, readers can respond to postings based on their convenience & availability. System can capture and do all the needful on behalf of the newspaper or advertisement intender.

5. Targeting Trending Customers (X,Y,Z): With Smart Newspaper, Newspaper can reach to non-customer (readers) as its postings are universally (Print, telecom, Internet) available. This enables newspapers to re-position themselves to these Y generations who are tech savvy & action hungry. With Smart Newspaper, these to-be subscribers can be attracted by offering them meaning solution aligned to their taste and evolution.

6. Account Mapping: Newspapers, when subscribed to Smart Newspaper are empowered to access response rate, fulfilment rate, reader’s details etc with respect to given post of account. This can further be shared with their client to assure optimal return of investment and value of investment.