Lots of work done over the past week:
- I did float my own revenue project, and it got a favorable reception. Hopefully I’ll be able to unveil the plan sometime over the next few months, lest anyone think I’m just talking here.
- Rolled out a Suns Draft History in record time. I’d been working on a bell and whistle-laden version to compare NFL draftees from ASU and U of A. It was slated for August. Then someone said, “Hey there’s an NBA draft coming up, can we do something for that?” Two days later, voila.
- Wrestled with Caspio. Tried to make a Google map using instructions on site. Here’s what I got:
-Threw up some working Caspio nonsense, including University salaries, Gas pump violations (again. It’s always in season!) and Executive Pay. Keep an eye on those, as existing non-Caspio templates will be replacing many of them as they are approved.
My conclusion on Caspio is that they do one thing very well. But other, cheaper alternatives do it just as well. Further, to learn to make it do otherwise seems pointless, especially seeing as we would be paying for the luxury of learning to hack it.
And this is just an outright lie. It’s not even as powerful as old faithful, MySQL and PHP.
UPDATE: Wouldja lookit that! ASU salares is already free of its Caspio chains!
The news industry is broken. A business model based on 100+ years of being the only game in town has left us slow on the draw, slow to compromise and scared to try anything new without knowing exactly what the results will be.
But we’re merely slow and scared. Not incapable. Lately I’ve seen more ideas bring thrown around and tried out. I hope this becomes a trend.
Last week I met with a couple Marketing/advertising poobahs from the Des Moines Register. They talked, believe it or not, about James Wilkerson — a newsroom journalist — and the work he did to webify their garage sale listings. It’s a pretty cool application that allows people to search for sales in a certain location or with certain keywords and print out matches to a map.
I think it exemplifies an idea covered here about how the Internet might make money. The trick?
“The way for Main Street Web ventures to make money is to help other people to make money.”
I like that idea, and think our organizations are uniquely positioned to take advantage. The argument is that it’s not enough to simply deliver an audience to your advertisers in hopes they make a purchase, but to cut out that middle process entirely. Sell sales to your advertisers. Instead of something passive like CPM, we could turn it into something far more tangible… CP$?
That idea makes a lot of sense to me. It’s doable. It makes advertising with us valuable in a far more tangible way that a Google ad, TV or radio spot. But it’s far from the only idea out there. And I may be missing that’s a better fit.
With that in mind, I present the mechanisms of Time’s 50 best websites 2008 and the way they make money, thieved fiendishly from Valleywag.com.
- GasBuddy — Google AdSense and a display ad.
- Howcast — Google Adsense.
- iliketotallyloveit.com — Google Adsense
- Omiru — affiliate accounts with vendors such as Amazon and Bluefly
- PsychCentral — Google Adsense.
- TripKick — ValueClick banner ads.
- Wikitravel — Google Adsense.
- Yahoo! Answers — Yahoo display and search results.
- Zeer — Google AdSense
- Afrigadget.com — run by volunteers.
- AskMen.com — Google search ads and Google AdSense.
- ConcreteLoop.com — Google AdSense
- Health.com — Display advertising, served by DoubleClick, sold by Health magazine.
- PopSugar — display ads, sold internally.
- ProFootballTalk — Sponsored by Sprint, Valueclick display ads.
- Rate My Professors — display advertising and Yahoo contextual ads.
- Serious Eats — diplay advertising from BlogAds.com network.
- The Nest — display ads, sold internally.
- Geni — ad-free.
- MapJack — Google AdSense.
- Mint — affiliate marketing.
- NexTag — sells its own search ads.
- Nymbler — Google AdSense.
- Picnik — sells premium accounts
- Pixelgirl Presents — Volunteer run.
- SearchMe — Doesn’t make money.
- TinyUrl.com — Google AdSense.
- Mobaganda.com — Doesn’t make money.
- Urban Dictionary — Microsoft display ads, Google AdSense, Amazon Affiliate.
- Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project — Volunteer-run.
- Hulu — Pre-roll video ads.
- Imeem — affiliate sales, in-house ad sales and video ad networks.
- Kongregate — Google AdSense display ads.
- ffffound.com — Display ads from The Deck ad network.
- Lookybook — Affiliate links to Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.
- Someecards — Google AdSense.
- WebSudoku — Google AdSense.
- Penny Arcade — Google AdSense display ads, internal ad sales.
- Gaia Online — Sells virtual goods.
- CarbonRally — Volunteer run.
- COLOURlovers — Display ads from The Deck ad network.
- Apartment Therapy — Glam ad network, AdBrite text ads.
- Digital Vaults — Volunteer run.
- Free Rice — Volunteer run.
- HypeBeast — Google AdSense display ads.
- Kiva.org — Volunteer run.
- Net-a-Porter — Sells clothes.
- Open Source Food — Google AdSense.
- Petfinder — Sponorships, display ads, sold internally.
- WikiSky — Donations.
I’ll also tack on one more link with some ideas.
FINALLY, SOME CONTEXT:
Lest anyone think otherwise, I do commit journalism for a living. I hope to continue doing so well into senility. The recent rash of business-related posts (from a clueless dude whose only business-sense comes from his small-business owner mommy and investor daddy, no less) is because I’ve decided things like this have very little to do with bad work in the newsroom. I don’t think doing more video will save the industry. I don’t think Twittering beat reporters are the magic bullet. The product isn’t broken, just dated, and it’s changing fast.
It’s the business side that’s utterly damaged, and I don’t see enough — ANY — discussion, navel-gazing, twitter updates or general rowdiness because of it. These past few posts have been my attempts to change that. I’ve been dropping my bucket of substandard water into the ocean in hopes others will do the same.
Go pass along your thoughts to the Columbia Missourian, which is weighing its options.
I didn’t post in the comments, but I did send along an e-mail to Tom Warhover, who has some fancy title over there. I advocated for going digital-only, which should be about as surprising as molasses. My thinking was, well gee, that’s where we’re all headed, anyway. To throw a driven, massive, dedicated staff at an online-only endeavor would be the best argument to-date for other papers following in the Missourian’s footsteps, at least on a journalistic level.
But I took it a step further. Bear with me.
One reason few papers have made his switch is because online ad revenue barely begins to pay for coffee, much less salaries, capital, etc. It’s simply not financially possible. Worse, I haven’t heard of many publishers who are really driving hard at growing online ad revenue. It’s a big Catch 22 that’s going to leave us at status quo for the foreseeable future.
The Missourian serves a number of purposes. Foremost, it’s the community paper for Columbia, Missouri and the surrounding area. Second, it’s a training ground for budding young journos. Third, it’s the canary in the coal mine for this entire industry. This is a paper that’s not afraid to fall flat on its face in the interest of moving forward. (*cough* Emprint *cough* Seriously, will you kill that thing already?)
If I were king for a day, or just a member of UM’s Board of Curator’s, I’d chart out something like this:
- Go online only. throw the full manpower of hundred or so staffers at making it the best dam community paper there is, and train the most competent journalists in the country. Employers want slideshows? Audio? Video? Put their desires to shame.
- Serve that community in a way no other local media outlet can/is willing to, because they don’t focus online. Take the best of hyperlocal and own it. Take the best of online magazines and own it. Throw turds at the wall and see what sticks. Make the rest of this industry excited to copy your work (and believe me, I’ll be first in line to do so).
- Last, but perhaps most important, make this work financially. That’s the big hairy audacious goal. I feel bad for saying it, because I have no vision of how this plays out. Zero. Nada. But that’s the point. I don’t trust myself; I trust you. I have no doubt that the concerted efforts of the most reputable J-School in the country can come up with something. With minimal overhead (no paid reporters!), the Missourian is in a special position to figure it out for all of us.
You will find yourself at the receiving ends of such fine Google searches as:
- Making money in journalism
- Journalism Money
And my favorite:
- Leave journalism, make money
Good luck, guys…
May 2nd, 2008
8:01 am
Misc
It’s been in the works for a couple months, but now it’s for real. I’ve agreed to take a position at the Arizona Republic, and get started May 21. I’ll be doing pretty much the same thing I’m doing now, only I’ll get the added benefit of the Republic’s commitment to CAR/First Amendment collaboration. To me, that means the best of both worlds. I’ll still get to putz around on the web, but I’ll also get a hand in investigations — which is where my heart has always been. I’ll also have the extreme pleasure of working with Ryan Konig, who I’m fairly sure is one of the smarter folks I’ve ever met.
I’m pretty excited to get in and get started, but this wasn’t easy. I honestly believe that Springfield is in a position to be the next great non-metro — they have good folks in all the right places, and every day they’re adding more. If anyone wants to talk about what’s going on there, give me a shout and I’d be happy to spill the beans.
Over the past few weeks, a sort of taboo subject has continued to bubble up. More buyouts at some of the best news orgs in the country. Plunging stock prices. An intriguing article on the relationship between the newsroom and print advertising.
As if fated to be seen in contrast, the Pulitzer winners were announced, and some fantastic work got the credit it was due. Google beat out Wall Street projections and posted a profitable first quarter. And some yayhoo railed against Rob Curley, calling him a schlub because his products don’t make money (I have no clue whether that’s true or not, but, regardless, the barb was lofted).
So I ask, with both feet firmly planted in the journalism camp: At what point does all of this become our problem? At what point do we, as journalists, as the webby voices in the good ol’ MSM, start actively thinking about how we can make it better?
If there was a theoretical continuum mapping out the stance on this problem in the average newsroom, I’d wager the needle would be staunchly on the “Not my job” side of things. Any product of a worthwhile J-School has heard the horror stories: Staples Center, the CBS New Year’s Eve gaffe, various examples of ad placement for story coverage or spiked stories to preserve an advertising relationship. The overall message many students walk away with is, “If you think about how any of your work will make money, you’re dirty.”
This isn’t true. What’s more, it’s hurting us. Go over to TechCrunch and check out the list of startups. The plurality of those applications would have been ideal undertakings for a news organization. Those ideas were cooked up to make life better or more interesting, sure, but they were also meant to make money. Generally, they’re succeeding at both.
We’re doing good work, too.
But too often, we’re leaving it in the hands of advertising people to see that it makes money. Their solution, inevitably, is, “Slap an ad on it!” “Upsell X, Y and Z!” or my favorite, “You can’t do that, we sell something similar in print.”
These aren’t wrong answers. Well, except for that last one. Unfortunately for all of us, it isn’t working. It’s time for a new plan. What about allowing subscription cell phone updates for our best apps, or a choice for ad-supported and free? What about harvesting user information and allowing for targeted, premium advertising (The Facebook model)? What about sponsorship?
The journalists who are doing this kind of work are spilling over with ideas. We’re passionate. We love what we do and we want to keep doing it. And I honestly believe that if we started thinking about this, from Project Day 1, we’d come up with something that could work.
To be clear, I’m talking about turning our best ideas into sources of money, not building ideas around sources of money. That’s an important distinction, and a tougher pill for our bosses to swallow. We don’t have to compromise our passions to make this go. Doing so would subvert the entire undertaking. But the belief that our employers should let us do good work because that’s just what news organizations do is somewhere between dead and dying. We have to prove ourselves.
And we can.
ADDENDUM #1: Any and all comments appreciated. If you think this means I lost my soul, please say so.
ADDENDUM #2: Heard from an advertising/marketing person who was looking to repair a relationship with a news editor after mentioning that a new product was mostly being created because it would lead to new revenue. At the very least, that denial of the business side of this business gotsta stop.
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Part of me thinks this can be accomplished by us: the webby, CARish folk. After all, many have forsaken strict content work to move to the web side. Why can’t we save our industry while we’re at it? But then the other part of me — the one that hates hear