Knowledge Bridge

Global Intelligence for the Digital Transition

Newspaper groups find success in moving their classified business online

Classifieds, once viewed as the “river of gold” for newspapers, have migrated online, and Asia-Pacific newspaper consultant Peter Ong shows how newspapers lost time and much needed revenue by failing to move their classified business…

//February 28 / 2013 //read more

Online classifieds: Choosing a successful strategy

The global classified advertising market is forecast to reach $14 bn, according to ZenithOptimedia. MDIF’s Senior Digital Advisor Ross Settles gives practical advice on how you can assess the opportunity in your market, identify the…

//February 28 / 2013 //read more

South Africa’s Paperight holds opportunities for long-form journalism

A start-up in South Africa, Paperight, shows how technology can help bring books and, potentially, long-form investigative and magazine journalism to wider audiences by using the web and copy shops in the country and elsewhere.

//February 19 / 2013 //read more

Making money with digital: Four lessons in success

While we don’t yet have a general model for news business success in the digital age, we are starting to identify successful revenue strategies – complete with the management and business organisation strategies necessary to execute them -…

//February 15 / 2013 //read more

Lessons on sustainability from global study of news start-ups

A look at 69 journalism start-ups in 10 countries found numerous models for building sustainable digital journalism companies. However, they look little like the media companies of old, but how these start-ups mix revenue streams to reach…

//January 25 / 2013 //read more

El Faro: Using the best of new and traditional media to give Salvadorans a voice

News website El Faro in El Salvador partnered with an ad agency to create a highly successful multi-platform campaign. Using the website, Twitter, radio, TV, billboards and print, they provided a way for local people to tell politicians…

//January 18 / 2013 //read more

Multi-platform projects: Focused experiments to get the best out of all platforms

Using more than one platform for a project or campaign can be a strength, not just a challenge. But to give yourself the best chance of success, you need to think strategically from the outset. Make your planning multi-platform from the…

//January 18 / 2013 //read more

Associated Press experiments with a way to make social media pay

The Associated Press has struck a novel deal with electronics giant Samsung to post sponsored tweets to the news cooperative’s 1.5m Twitter users. We look at the deal, which the AP says is “profitable”, and how to properly balance…

//January 9 / 2013 //read more

Mail & Guardian’s Hoosain Karjieker: Digital first but not digital only

South Africa’s Mail & Guardian were early movers online, launching the first news website in Africa in 1994. As digital revenues grew, the newspaper recently shifted to a digital first strategy, but the news group’s CEO Hoosain…

//December 20 / 2012 //read more

Visual journalism is ‘not just for the big boys’

Major news organisations like The Guardian, The New York Times and The BBC are breaking new ground with data-driven visual journalism, but digital editor Paul Rowland, who works at a regional news group in Wales, has shown that these…

//December 14 / 2012 //read more