In my previous role as the director of digital products and platforms with a major regional public media group in the US, I often said that my strategy was building loyalty and habit that leads to membership. Revenue Hub CEO Mary Walter-Brown speaks with Jacob Granger at journalism.co.uk about the loyalty strategies that are working to build trust and revenue. It’s the second story in the last week that looks at some of the successful approaches that are working for US local independent publishers. So much of the last 30 years of the local journalism industry in the US has been about trying to achieve scale to compete with the major digital platforms, but now, we’re seeing small-scale newsrooms taking a different tack. They are not focusing on large audiences but rather on loyalty and building long-term relationships with audiences that translate into financial commitments that allow them to achieve sustainability which has been elusive for local news businesses.
On that note, there is a look at Votebeat, which started as a pop-up news project in 2020. In 2022, with very important midterm elections set to take place, they are setting up as a permanent news operation. They talk about focusing on impact, but I wonder how they could take the strategies that Revenue Hub is talking about to make a sustainable democracy reporting project.
A couple of other items worth mentioning. EEF looks at a proposal similar to the law in Australia that has allowed news organisations to jointly negotiate with the major digital platforms for payments. They say it won’t work and offer up policy suggestions that might have a better chance of success.
And last week, there was news that Substack was laying off 14% of its workforce so that it didn’t have to seek additional funding. Defector takes aim at those claims and looks at how the newsletter shop was seeking funding that valued it at $1 bn on revenues of $9m.
Plus:
- 11 Google sheets formulas that every SEO editor needs to know
- Zuck prepares Facebook for a bumpier 2022
- Building MLP - Minimum Lovable Products
- Eliminating doubt from your product decisions
- Practical ways to earn respect as a product manager
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