INMA New York: Brainsnacks serves what readers want

May 21, 2017 at 07:23 pm by Staff


Forget the battle for ownership going on back home, Fairfax Media's Michael Laxton has his eyes firmly on the future at INMA's 2017 World Congress in New York.

Laxton was first up - with a message about promoting subscriptions - at the Brainsnacks sessions which precede the conference proper, which opens today.

After the 2013 launch of its paywall, the company noticed its maturing subscription strategy was falling flat, says Laxton, who is the Australian publisher's chief marketing officer: "We sold the sizzle and not the steak."

He told early-bird delegates how Fairfax addressed this with an audience-driven, three-point strategy:

Find the right audience with the propensity to pay;

Use content as the key differentiator in the market; and
Demonstrate value in paying by moving away focus on cost.

Using these points, Fairfax moved into a digital-first, data-led model, discovering that some visitors to the website portrayed habits similar to that of subscribers with one aspect a key driver: "Bringing in personalisation was a big piece for us," Laxton said.

Fairfax did this in each content pillar, using personalisation to build new audience groups. Driven by the news strategy, Fairfax saw a seven per cent increase in total subscriber revenue, and a 21 per cent increase in paywall conversion.

He says the key is focusing on these content pillars: "We made sure we narrowed down the focus of people that are going to pay for those subscriptions."

Another publisher with a need to revamp an aspect of their offering to build stronger value for the community is Cox Media Group, whose Rob Yarin followed up on the journey to rebrand. It began when people would point out audience-driven brand campaigns at other organisation, "and we say, wait a minute, we've done research with our consumer," says the vice president of content strategy and research.

Cox identified four categories of value to drive a marketing campaign: the "personal ritual" - readers want content days a week - community pride, the demand for real journalism exposing things readers do not know about, and civic responsibility.

Using its audience base, Cox tested slogans. Phrases that portrayed any negative connotation, such as "No fake news. Get real. Get the truth" did not take off, but tapping into the local aspect such as "Know what's really going on in your city" grabbed attention.

Cox built a campaign on trust and honesty without using those words. This was heavily debated internally, Yarin said, but ultimately decided that was not the message that would reach their audience: "We don't believe given our constituents, our customers, we can win an argument with, 'We tell the truth.'"

With INMA

Pictured: Fairfax Media's Michael Laxton

Sections: Newsmedia industry

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