Kansas Press Association — February 8, 2001


By Bernard Re, Jr., Online General Manager, The World Company



 


 


Convergence: Using content, marketing and technology to your advantage



 


Using 	--- Content (print/online/cable) 





--- Marketing (and cross-promotion) 



--- Technology (and company services) 



in a way 



THAT IS APPROPRIATE FOR YOUR 



(ANY) 



PARTICULAR SITUATION.



 




I hope to have some time at the end of this to take some questions… 



	


		Regarding this title…



			It could be shortened to:



				Doing what we do best.


			OR



				Doing - - > MORE of what we do best.



Some BACKGROUND first…	


MY EXPERIENCES…



 




 


SEPARATE OR INTEGRATED…



• INJERSEY — separate businesses — print VS online VS classifieds VS 



"you're not letting me participate"




"your pricing is too high for the local businesses to get involved"




"businesses that the paper helped build — and helped build the paper — were frozen out"



• LAURIN — NO  integration NO communication 



"you're stealing my content"




"don’t talk to the sales people"




• SC JOURNAL — SOME integration SOME news commitment SOME sales effort



"bring as little news online as possible"




"protect the print"



• WORLD COMPANY — DEEP commitment DEEP integration DEEP cross-promotion



"online news INTEGRATED and INDEPENDENT"




"online sales PRINT BUNDLES and ONLINE ONLY"




"company CONVERGENCE religion"



WHAT HAVE I LEARNED? (in my travels)



"company divisions KILL success" (the INJERSEY model)




"lack of communication KILL success" (the LAURIN model)




"integrating halfway KILLS success" (the SCJOURNAL) model



 


MORE IMPORTANTLY I’ve learned…



 




 


HOW TO WORK WITH 


"resources" (and limited resources)




 


HOW TO FOSTER BETTER


"communication"




HOW TO WORK WITH



"integration" (convergence and cross-promotion)




 


AND HOPEFULLY HOW TO WORK WITH 



"a company the BELIEVES and ACTS in convergence mode"




			*** ask me back next year and I’ll let you know how that is going :)



How to TO BUILD SUCCESS 









"for online and the company as a whole"




 









 




 


SOUNDS LIKE CHAOS?   SOUNDS LIKE ORDER?






   YES.          				          BOTH.







IT’S IN FACT Chaordic — which is the organization of CHAOS and ORDER… 




WORD CREATED BY…





Dee Hock — Birth of the Chaordic  Age (chaordicalliance.org) — VISA — independent yet united into one of the largest organizations on the planet…



Hock SEES MANAGEMENT AS THE ART of inducing ordinary people to do extraordinary things. 








He writes in THE BIRTH OF THE CHAORDIC AGE :








"One need not know and be able to prove in advance what could be accomplished.




 One need not have a precise plan about how to get there. 




In a complex, rapidly changing world, a clear sense of direction, a compelling purpose, and powerful beliefs about conduct in pursuit of it, seemed to me infinitely more sensible and robust than mechanical plans, detailed objectives and predetermined outcomes." 



He is talking about moving from the industrial age to the information age.



 




 


A friend of mine wrote this in a review of HOCK’s book…



"LEADERSHIP (HOCK) WRITES, is about not what things were, or how they are, but how they might become. 


									FLEXIBILITY


SOME QUOTES from the book…



"Rules and regulations, laws and contracts, can never replace clarity of shared purpose and clearly, deeply held principles about conduct in pursuit of it . . . 



 


"Force is the tool of tyranny . . . Lead yourself, lead your superiors, lead your peers, employ good people, and free them to do the same. All else is trivial.



 


SO HOW WILL WE…





- - > MOVE



 




FROM 



industrial age cogs and wheels 











(command and control) 




business model














TO 



information age (Chaordic Age) people and process 













(evolutionary and inclusive)














								business model



 


By UNLOCKING digital assets and people assets



By EMPOWERING your people with "Trageted Action" plans 



AND 



By helping your people GROW (don't hold them in a job that you 










need them in IF THEY WHAT TO GROW)









SCJournal - borrow people from other departments - AND help them grow





By using cross-promotion as the FIRST STEP to convergence







-convergence group / email / list



-what's coming / email / list / from each department






 


By remembering what we do best.



      • Getting readers for our content  **(We are communicators.)**



      • Introducing our content and advertisers to our readers**(We are marketers.)** 



By doing WHAT WE DO BEST.


By INTEGRATING.


By OPENING UP the process to more people.



TO BE SUCCESSFULL we must be in AT LEAST two businesses.





1) Communications business	2) Marketing business





AND — We must act more like a COLLAGE ARTIST that works with the materials at 




hand — only adding elements when they can be integrated 




into the work — and making it better.







BUT WE ARE ALSO IN…










The business we ARE (must be)  in  TODAY…




AND




The business we WANT (need) to be in 














      TOMORROW…

























 




 


Using CONTENT (print/online/cable)…



 


We need to INTEGRATE - GROW - CROSS-PROMOTE and CONVERGE your content, people and technology to be successful in this new age.



Doing what you do best…


										---- example ----


ELECTION SWEEPS — content 



Election Sweeps (Content "Sweeps" Idea)



How Idea Was Implemented:



We are building "Sweeps" packages around high profile news events. This is a 


concept that takes what we do best — reporting the news — and leverages that effort into marketing opportunities for target advertisers.



We first used this during the national elections. We brought print content online into a election section along with other election related content. 



This included online newspaper story content, where to vote, polls, forums, voter tools, links to state and national election sites, links to party pages, viewpoints, video from our cable news station and more. This all lead up to election results pages and ongoing coverage.



Into this burst of content and reader interest we sold short term 10-day banner positions site wide and sponsor positions with election section.



We covered the election the same way we would have normally and did not create any special content. What we did was position the content and packaged it for a specific audience event.



We cross-promoted with print ads, cable spots and online banners and our online editor DAVE TOPLIKAR co-anchored the live news from the Courthouse as results came in with our cable news anchor. 


 




 


Results



We illustrated and tested how to launch a converged news event between print, cable and online — and in our case convergence relating to our weekly online newspaper sites as well. 



Online traffic increased 27% from the previous week.



We earned $1,500 for 10-days of billboard banner advertising.



The important thing here is that EXISTING CONTENT, existing TECHNOLOGY and a marketing idea were used to create readership, viewers and revenue. 



We simply used the technologies at hand 


newspaper delivery




cable transmission




online access




to distribute the content — not drive the content creation process.





We are in the communication business and the marketing business.



 




 


Using MARKETING (and cross-promotion)…



Doing MORE of what you do best…




IN A INTEGRATED WAY



									(PRINT — ONLINE)


- use and share content without giving up your brand identity or independence



 


Let's look at what are you doing now - PUT YOUR 



MARKETING HAT ON...



 




 




Do More…





- bring PRINT news = /politics/columnists/weather/sweeps/ ONLINE and


 ORGANIZE INTO special packages 




=  target audiences


				 (as listing ONLY)






- bring PRINT tabs online (INTRODUCE YOUR ADVERTISERS TO THE WEB)






=  target audiences







- classifieds with ASSOCIATED CONTENT 






= target audiences






							  POSITIONS








(low cost, target audience pages that advertiser can relate to)



 








*** target audience pages ARE POSITION PAGES FOR 












billboard banner advertisers 












			=  target audiences



 


- special online sections (that ARE IMPORTANT TO YOUR MARKET) 






(hunting - fishing - arts - boating, - electronics - home & garden)



 






		AND


*** local companies that have HIGH INTEREST LEVEL to local/national 




LIKE Gateway Computer…




	=  target audiences







organize existing content per audience segments (SECTIONS)






	=  target audiences 


= readers 


= billboard banner positions 







MORE


- blend of inter-related products that 




BUILD RECOGNITION (SUCCESS) 




- PROFILE page




 		- COUPON page 








- DOT COM directory 




- AD page (or what we call FOCUS page)




- MENU pages














 




 


Using TECHNOLOGY (and services)…



TECHNOLOGY as DISTRIBUTION VERSIONS …



my perspective


						it’s


VERSION 1 - delivery people		CUMMULATIVE +



VERSION 2 - newsstands			WE TEND TO ADD + 



VERSION 3 - delivery verticals		NOT SUBTRACT + 



VERSION 4 - racks



VERSION 5 - bulk postal



VERSION 6 — cable television



VERSION 7 - internet 			 = NEW DISTRIBUTION METHODS



VERSION 7a - audiences niches and products (content and classifieds)



VERSION 7b - expanding area 




(neighborhood + town + county + state + region = world)





					BUT WE NEED TO GET BACK TO THE 


					NEIGHBORHOOD…


							- - > MORE TIMELINE of coverage


						Back to "super-local" coverage…


People and technology…



Remember empower your people with new technology











AND   help them grow 











SCJournal - borrow people from other departments — 












AND   help them spread technical 










knowledge























 




 


E-MAIL AS AN ORGANIZATION TOOL…



	After driving people nuts for a few months we came up with this…



- Use "Targets for Discussion" e-mail



A "Target For Discussion" e-mail roughly outlines a "PROJECT" that is coming up.



This e-mail is sent to (CONVERGENCE GROUP) list


- Print Content Champion (print editor)




- Online Content Champion (online editor)




- Sales Champion (sales manager)




- Convergence Champion (?)









It is designed to open up a dialogue in advance of any "Action Plan" between (CONVERGENCE GROUP) member and the people within their departments


 




 


THEN MEET and set "Action Plan" (per the discussions with people in your areas)


 


THEN disperse and communicate project needs, issues and assignments




within your specific areas and get the "Target" project done.





E-MAIL would keep members of this group informed 




AND other regularly scheduled meetings 




(CONVERGENCE GROUP) would not have another


joint meeting on this "Target" unless necessary







- "Action Plan" communicated to cross-promotion e-mail list


		


	Sample Components:




• Content (print and online)


• Calendar (Timeline)


• Interaction	(poll, forum, e-mail response, etc.)


• Announcement story


• Promotions (print and online)


• Cross-Promotion (print promotes online and online promotes print)




		• Project Graphics (used in print and online)




• Programming (if needed — try to use what you have — 




• Revenue (print and online bundled and independent adv strategies)







 




 


E-MAIL AS A CROSS-PROMOTION TOOL…





We PASS upcoming content with headline, brief and date to appear 


between (CONVERGENCE GROUP) members







- FEATURES editor print organizes (features, arts and entertainment and MAG print and theMAGonline.com 


upcoming content (HOLDS BACK SOME AS PRINT 


ONLY — we promote it online — see below)



- PAPER editor organizes and e-mails upcoming main news stories and packages



- ONLINE organizes and e-mails upcoming online news stories  and new sections and tools









		- 6NEWS production manager organizes and e-mails upcoming








cable news and programming additions, changes and updates



- NOW ON TO Classifieds and Circulation








 




 


We HAVE A CROSS-PROMOTION ICON that we ALL USE







- - > MORE www.ljworld.com/section/election01



- - > IN PRINT 






WE NOW HOLD BACK SOME PRINT FEATURE STORIES and promote them 


online as IN PRINT ONLY


	WE provide a link to our print subscription page










	


			Strange coming from a ONLINE GUY…











But I ALSO WANT PRINT TO PROMOTE THE ONLINE


 ONLY CONTENT THAT WE CREATE…



Building value for the whole company.











 




 


So THIS is Convergence?


















   Ok once again with feeling :)


















- It is NOT SOMETHING FORCED



- It is INTEGRATED MARKETING over all available distribution methods



- It is ABOUT BUILDING a INTERNAL and EXTERNAL BASE of 




















available resources 




















- It is INCLUSIVE



- It is ABOUT A NETWORK OF OPPORTUNITIES




Between 




- - > content distribution methods




Between




- - > departments




Between




- - > people




Between




- - > us and our community of readers and advertisers






		Between


			- - > systems



- It is NOT DIFFICULT BUT takes WILL POWER












Start small — then infect EVERYONE in the building!












- It is A PROCESS



- It is NOT THE SAME FOR EVERYONE but any news business can do it



- It is NOT DRIVEN BY TECHNOLOGY but 


by CONTENT —and—  MARKETING


	and PEOPLE MOST OF ALL


Convergence is everything — our CONNECTION


		with everything we work on and everyone we work with.



Thank you.			QUESTIONS ?



For more information on using this concept in your local area * contact Bernard Re, Jr, at GlobalHome.




[E-mail]












© 2002 Inter-Vitae, Inc.  GlobalHome is owned and operated by Inter-Vitae, Inc.