Update May 28th: Drew McLellan at Drew's Marketing Minute discusses this post and adds his take, with some good comments coming in.
Valeria Maltoni, the real Conversation Agent, pointed to an article several days ago in The New Yorker, titled "Out of Print: The Death and Life of the American Newspaper." In typical New Yorker fashion, the l o n g article by
Eric Herman stretches, going back to the first American newspaper published in Massachusetts in 1690.
The article offers a good understanding of the pressures today's newspaper management is under -- rising production and labor costs, increased competition on a playing field that's no longer level, and advertisers looking at and moving to other channels for reaching their target consumers.
The article also talks about news websites that are becoming generators of original news content, singling out the Huffington Post, which coincidentally that same week enjoyed a major profile in the business section of The New York Times. Both stories cite the online venue's hiring of news reporters, albeit a handful at this point, to do original reporting.
Independent news sites (ie., those that are not an online offshoot of a newspaper, magazine, radio or TV station) seem to have focused their original news content in a few distinct areas -- politics, entertainment/gossip, and health. That's sure to change over time.
Newspapers are still the primary generators of original local news content -- and that is their strength. Local news is what can keep newspapers alive. Whether the paper of tomorrow is delivered to your doorstep, on your computer screen or on a Kindle-like reader remains to be seen. My guess is it will be a combination of them all, as well as through other channels that haven't even been developed yet.
Regular readers here know I'm a newspaper junkie and my preference is to turn the pages of a "real" newspaper rather than scroll through a virtual edition. I was pleasantly surprised, though, when I heard similar comments from many of the 20- and 30-something marketing bloggers I met recently at Blogger Social. Some said they usually skim through a paper online and then later, at their leisure, thumb through the same paper in print, where they might spot something they missed going through it online.
So maybe newspapers aren't dying the slow death we keep hearing about.
I think they stand a good chance if the build on what they do best -- deliver local news and analysis.
In the public relations profession, we may need to view newspapers in a different way as well. One of the biggest p.r. prizes is a great feature article in the paper. There's still something about seeing a story in print that has a certain impact and credibility. But newspaper websites and blogs are opening new opportunities for p.r. placements, and their readership is growing.
I sent a story idea a few weeks ago to the ad columnist at The New York Times, even though I knew it might be a bit too technical for his column. I acknowledged that in a note, saying I wanted to give him a first look and asking that he pass it along it wasn't for him. He did, and the material ended up in another reporter's nytimes.com blog. The readership isn't as big as it would be for a story in print in the business section, or even as big as a mention in Stuart Elliott's weekly online column. But those readers it did reach are a highly targeted group.
Likewise, advertisers need to take another look at options newspapers offer. In some cases, a smaller but much more focused audience may make sense, rather than the costly mass audience of print newspaper or TV.
And, the ad salespeople for newspapers need to do a better job selling the merits of their online options.