[MGP-Forum Announce] Boston researcher thinks TimesSelect experience shows a market for content service charging

[Ken Doctor]

CR is a great example. It's unique, actionable and in the flow of
money. How much of newspaper content meets those criteria? Ken

On 11/4/07, J Fox <jf at pipeline.com> wrote:
> Why is no one mentioning the fact that Consumer Reports (for whom I happen
> to work) has 3 million paying subscribers without any outside
> advertising.We're the largest web-based subscription site in the world, I
> believe.
>
>
>
> Is it possible that if you offer unique, quality content, people will pay
> for it?
>
>
>
> Jeff Fox
>
>
>
>
>
> From: post-bounces at mgp-forum.org [mailto:post-bounces at mgp-forum.org] On
> Behalf Of Tish Grier
> Sent: Sunday, November 04, 2007 3:42 PM
> To: Bill Densmore; post at mgp-forum.org
> Subject: Re: [MGP-Forum Announce] Boston researcher thinks TimesSelect
> experience shows a market for content service charging
>
>
>
> anyone interested in the business-side of journalism--as in how journalism
> is going to make money in the future-- should be follwing what's going on in
> marketing with behavioral targeting and issues of loss of privacy.  As the
> landscape changes and more concerns want to fully fund their ventures with
> advertising, marketers are looking for ways to gather intelligence on all of
> us that they may not be entitled to have.
>
> That's part of why the FTC is still looking at the Google/DoubleClick deal.
>
> This article from the NYTimes gives something of a taste of what's brewing
> in the world of marketing:
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/technology/02adco.html?_r=1&ref=technology
> &oref=slogin
>
> If advertisers/marketers don't begin to use something that targets us, then
> the cost of advertising will go down due to the proliferation of it in so
> many nooks and crannies.  However, there's got to be a better way than
> allowing them access to personal information that, perhaps, they shouldn't
> have in the first place.
>
> Best to all,
> Tish
> (who's working a bit with marketers and p/r people these days--seeing it
> from the inside's fascinating!)
>
> Bill Densmore <mediagiraffe at journ.umass.edu> wrote:
>
> MGP2006 alum John Garfunkel has completed an eight-part, 21,000-word study
> about charging for content on the web. Garfunkel, a Boston-based software
> engineer and Princeton University grad, studied available public
> audience-traffic data for the New York Times website during the period when
> access to its columnists and archives were behind a "TimesSelect" paywall.
>
> His report is dense and its difficult to draw hard conclusions from it. But
> in
> an interview, Garfunkel makes one key assertion: He says the influence of
> Times
> columnists, as measured by they amount they were referenced in blogs,
> dropped
> only about 20% during the period their material was "behind the wall."
>
> In general, Garfunkel believes news organizations may be making a mistake by
>
> relying solely on advertising. But he nuances that. "The answer is not in
> charging for content, it is in charging for service," he says. "It seems
> there
> should be options in service or avoiding advertisements."
>
> He goes on in an interview: "I found it disheartening that so many
> commentators
> like Jeff Jarvis were willing to go to 100% advertising supported. But if
> you
> read Neal Postman and any other media commentator going back decades, you
> wouldn't find anyone seriously trusting the credibility of 100 percent ad
> supported content." Garfunkel's self-published study is on his website:
>
> http://civilities.net/TimesSelect
>
> "There is a solution for newspapers to charge money to readers who want to
> pay
> money for a premium service of news," Garfunkel concludes. "I don't know if
> it's a viable market, but I have discussed in some more depth in this series
>
> and feel it should considered as well."
>
> Garfunkel says The Times reported it pulled in about $10 million from
> subscriptions to TimesSelect. By comparison, he says, Fox News channel
> realizes
> $850 million a year in carriage fees from cable systems. "I think the
> economics
> of this bears further consideration by people who care about the future of
> news," says Garfunkel in an email report of his findings.
>
> Garfunkel notes he did not have access to NYT's internal data. "The only
> person
> I spoke to at the Times was Marshall Simmonds, mostly to clarify some public
>
> facts," he says.
>
> His key findings, he says:
>
> -- During his study period (with TimesSelect in place) tThe seven regular
> Times
> Op-Ed saw their references in the blogs go up 8 times. A non-representative
> sampleset of pundits saw increases of 10 times -- a 20% drop-off.
>
> -- Nielsen/NetRatings data for the period TimesSelect was in place, posted
> by
> Jon Dube at cyberjournalist.net, show an aggregate 27% increase in NYT
> traffic.
> Garfunkel says this traffic growth exceeds the growth during the same period
> at
> comparable, competing websites.
>
> -- The paywall was not the reason that the Times archives did not show up in
> a
> Google Web search over the last two years. It was already indexed by Google
> News. Why it did not show up in the web search, was an application of
> Google's
> unofficial policy (as reported by Danny Sullivan) to favor non-subscription
> content.
>
> CONTACT: Jon Garfunkel Boston, Mass. http://civilities.net/
> jgarfunk at civilities.net / 617.939.3449
>
> FULL DISCLOSURE: The author of this post is a shareholder in Clickshare
> Service
> Corp., which has developed a patented system for charging for content on the
>
> web.
>
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-- 
Ken Doctor
Content Bridges

Check out my blog at www.contentbridges.com

E-mail: kdoctor at gmail.com
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