'All the news that's fit to click' at NYTimes.com

JON FRIEDMAN'S MEDIA WEB
'All the news that's fit to click' at NYTimes.com
Commentary: Separately, why the Times killed the TimesSelect program
By Jon Friedman
www.MarketWatch.com


NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- It takes a lot to wipe the smile off Vivian Schiller's face.

"People tell me that my biggest character flaw is that I'm a Pollyanna," the general manager of the New York Times' Web site, NYTimes.com, told me. However, she couldn't help but frown when pondering the reaction to the recent decision to kill the TimesSelect program.

In 2005, amid fanfare, The New York Times Co. (NYTNew York Times Company

News, chart, profile, more launched TimesSelect, believing that customers would be willing to pay $49.95 a year or $7.95 a month to read columns and other online content as well as to gain access to the Times' vast archives. (There was no charge for print subscribers or for some students and educators.) The program produced annual revenue of about $10 million.

But after news of its demise made the rounds, bloggers proclaimed that TimesSelect had bombed and that the mighty Times miscalculated from the start, ultimately swallowing its pride by putting TimesSelect out of its misery. To be fair, I suspect that a lot of them have simply always hated the Times and were trying to make the paper look bad.

"We're a target," Schiller shrugged over lunch on Monday. "I'm still PO'd that [blogger] Jeff Jarvis called TimesSelect a cynical act. We're the least cynical people around -- for the news business." (Yes, I almost choked on my coffee at the notion that any New York Times people could lack cynicism.)

For the record, Jarvis told me: "What I meant was that by choosing to put up the Times columnists, it was a clever or cynical act. It didn't have an impact on their ad revenues since there are few ads [surrounding] their columnists. It's not like they put travel stories behind a pay wall. I wasn't trying to condemn the whole thing. I was trying to be wryly amusing about their cleverness."

Online strategies

The New York Times isn't alone in trying to find innovative ways to attract readers and turn them into paying customers. Newspapers everywhere are doing much the same thing. Just this week, the Financial Times said it would be unveiling a plan for its online content, in which it allowed 30 free views before asking readers to subscribe.

Yet naturally, media hounds immediately started to speculate that the Times made the move to pre-empt the rival Wall Street Journal, the jewel of Dow Jones (DJDJ

News, chart, profile, more which is acquiring Dow Jones, is said to be considering the idea of eventually converting WSJ.com into a free site. Dow Jones also owns MarketWatch, the publisher of this column.

Schiller downplayed the chatter, saying the mechanism was in place before news broke that News Corp. had made an unsolicited bid for Dow Jones.

"Our projections for growth on that paid subscriber base were low, compared to the growth of online advertising,'' Schiller told Times media reporter Richard Perez-Pena last month.

"There's no mystery to it," Schiller told me the other day.

The flaw in Schiller's argument is that WSJ.com is a monument to the success that a fee-based Web site can still enjoy in 2007. It has a paid-subscriber base of nearly 1 million customers.

When TimesSelect was being launched, I wrote that the Times was suggesting its loyal liberal reader base would pony up a nominal fee to continue reading the likes of such widely followed columnists as Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich, Paul Krugman, Nick Kristof and (yes, even the resident conservative on the bench) David Brooks. See related column. Ultimately, TimesSelect attracted about 225,000 paying customers of its own.

Focus on growth
The NYTimes.com's growth strategy centers on the in-house mantra, "All the News That's Fit to Click," a twist on the newspaper's age-old motto, "All the News That's Fit to Print."

NYTimes.com, which was introduced in 1996 and now claims some 13 million unique users, has more than 30 blogs and 12 daily and weekly podcasts. It also generates 100-plus original video segments a month

"The whole marketing campaign stems from how people don't think of us only as an online newspaper," Schiller said. "You don't know what's going to stick. Slide shows have taken off like a rocket, accounting for 10% of our page views in August. Our strategy is to unleash the creativity of our journalists to tell their stories and build communities around areas of interest."

While the Times failed to give more specific statistics about the success of the slide shows, Schiller noted: "What it says to me is that you can figure out a compelling way to deliver news and information to the readers. What do we do next? We do more of them. We're thrilled that people are attracted to the core of what The New York Times is."

To flourish online, Schiller stressed, the Times doesn't intend merely to fall back on its world-class reputation.

"You can't just say 'Come and get it' any more," she said, leaning forward for emphasis. "You've got to push your content out. You've got to skate where the puck is going."

Times Kills TimesSelect: What It Means for Magazines

BoSacks Speaks Out:
I don't think this move means anything specific to any single publisher. Publishing today is all about niche. The NYT is in the very broad and global niche of world news delivery. Most magazine publishers are not in that particular information boat.

The stronger, more focused your editorial(niche) the stronger your franchise is. Publishers with robust online sites should continue to prosper relative to the value of their content to the reader. If you build a sustainable editorial product of excellence you should continue prosper. Here is a simple formula. CGE & CR = CSR

Continuously Great Edit which delivers a Committed Readership equals Consistent and Sustainable Revenue.


"A satisfied customer is the best business strategy of all."
Michael Leboeuf quotes


Times Kills TimesSelect: What It Means for Magazines
Posted by: Dylan Stableford
http://www.foliomag.com/page.asp?prmID=273&dspMore=1&prmPID=142&showmonth=9#142


The New York Times today announced that it will drop its paid online subscription program, TimesSelect, effectively admitting its two-year attempt to charge its Web site users to access premium content and archives had failed.

TimesSelect, which charged $49.95 per year ($7.95 a month) for access to its columnists and the newspaper's archives, drew an estimated 227,000 paid subscribers and $10 million in annual revenue. Beginning at midnight, the newspaper will open up access to its entire site to readers. So what changed?

Many more readers started coming to the site from search engines and links on other sites instead of coming directly to NYTimes.com. These indirect readers, unable to get access to articles behind the pay wall and less likely to pay subscription fees than the more loyal direct users, were seen as opportunities for more page views and increased advertising revenue.

According to Nielsen/NetRatings, NYTimes.com traffic sees roughly 13

million unique visitors each month, and could explode without a wall, according to industry observers. The crumbling of the Times subscription modelleaves the Wall Street Journal as only major newspaper in the country to charge for access to most of its Web site, generating $65 million in revenue, according to the Times.

So what does this mean for magazine publishers? Consumer Reports, one of the few remaining magazines to charge for access to its site, is nearing three million paid subscribers to its Web site. (Most subscriptions cost $26/year.)

But for most consumer magazines, the free model dominates the industry. Why? Because it comes down to readers - which is why magazine industry consultant Bob Sacks likes the Times move.

"They are thinking long term and this move will continue to protect and promote the Times brand, and at the same time cultivate new readership," Sacks wrote in an e-mail. "After all sustained loyal readership is the bedrock of any publishing empire, be it large or small. If you don't have readers, exactly what do you have?"

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Murdoch makes case for free WSJ online
By Kenneth Li
NEW YORK (Reuters) - News Corp chief Rupert Murdoch on Tuesday sketched out early plans for Dow Jones & Co Inc, saying he leaned toward making the online Wall Street Journal free but had not yet made a decision.

Murdoch also projected about $100 million in cost savings, or double the amount earlier anticipated, saying he had identified "low-hanging fruit." His $5.6 billion purchase of the publisher of the Wall Street Journal is expected to close in about two months.

Murdoch said he saw opportunities to increase growth at Dow Jones. Like the rest of the publishing industry, Dow Jones has been grappling with slowing advertising growth.

"Dow Jones presents a great challenge," Murdoch told the Goldman Sachs Communacopia conference. "We think there are enormous opportunities ... We're about expanding revenue."

He also talked about building a closer relationship between the Journal and Dow Jones Newswires, which compete with Reuters and Bloomberg.

"Between the two, you have 1,600 journalists. That's a lot of journalists. There's a huge resource there to build on," Murdoch said.

He reiterated his proposal to make the Wall Street Journal's Web site free, rejecting criticism that it would hurt the newspaper. Analysts have said a free wsj.com could be a risky move as the site is a rare Internet property that has managed to attract paying customers.

Murdoch said making the site, which currently charges a annual subscription fee of $99, freely available online would help boost viewership and revenue globally.

"Will you lose $50 million to $100 million in revenue? I don't think so," Murdoch said. "If the site is good, you'll get much more."

His comments came a day after the New York Times Co said it would end its paid TimesSelect service to attract more online ads.

FOX BUSINESS NETWORK

Dow Jones resources are expected to contribute to News Corp's Fox Business Network, seen as a potentially strong rival to General Electric's CNBC. It launches on October 15.

Murdoch said he envisioned a network that would look very different from the reigning cable business news network, which also competes with Bloomberg television.

"CNBC is a financial news network for Wall Street," he said. "We're for Main Street."

Analysts have questioned whether there is a large enough audience to support a third business news network, especially after Time Warner Inc's CNN closed its financial channel several years ago.

Murdoch said he faced a similar criticism when he started the Fox television network and when he launched Fox News, which became the top cable news channel by viewership and whose advertising growth contributes to News Corp's bottom line.

"When I started Fox News, everyone considered me to be an idiot, spending $1 billion," he said. "It's now worth $10 billion."

Although the Journal is locked in a deal with CNBC through 2011 forbidding Journal reporters from appearing on the new Fox Business Network, Murdoch said the paper can still contribute its coverage of politics, national and international affairs, and lifestyle news.

"And we'll have that in another four years," Murdoch said.

On Tuesday, Fox Business Network added four more anchors to its roster of four other Fox News veterans.

The new hires are Peter Barnes, a former Washington D.C. correspondent for CNBC who most recently was a Washington bureau chief for Hearst-Argyle; Jenna Lee, a former news anchor and reporter for Forbes.com; Nicole Petallides from Bloomberg Television; and Cody Willard, a columnist for The Financial Times.