Monday 14th November: Why New Statesman turns long-read features into podcasts

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Esther has been speaking with Chris Stone, Executive Producer of Audio & Video at New Statesman Media Group. They were discussing the news weekly's Audio Long Reads strategy that sees one of the publication’s feature articles published as podcast episodes.

Stone explained how the podcast series plays to one of the title's strengths - long-form, deeply reported journalism. “It is one of the things that the brand has been known for over the years, and so it seemed like a natural thing to adapt from our existing stable of content,” he explained.

As a subscription-focused publisher, the Audio Long Reads podcasts are designed to show off some of the New Statesman’s best long-form reporting outside their paywall. Although the podcast is still in the experimental stages, Stone hopes that it will increase users’ propensity to subscribe to their other products.

IAC CEO Joey Levin has said, “In hindsight, we timed that acquisition poorly,” speaking of IAC-owned Dotdash’s acquisition of magazine publisher Meredith last year for $2.8 billion. In its first Q3 together, Dotdash Meredith saw a roughly 13% decrease in digital revenue to $221 million. IAC blamed the decrease on lower ad rates in Q3, a slower-than-expected integration of the Meredith portfolio and sales force consolidation.

Press Gazette analysis of AAM data shows that America's 50 biggest magazines saw their collective average circulation fall from 145 million to 133 million between January to June 2021 and the same period in 2022. But before everyone gets their 'Print is Dead' T-shirts on, print is still the dominant format in the US magazine industry - over three quarters of magazine circulation in 2022 was made up of print subscriptions.

Drake faked a Vogue magazine cover as a little album promoting joke, but Condé Nast didn't find it very funny: Vogue's owner is suing the Canadian rapper for copyright infringement. Axios reports, the fake campaign was so vast, mimicking Vogue’s logo, design and editorial features, that it made it hard for Vogue to accept the joke. Be warned Liz Truss.

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New podcast:

Our eighth episode looks at the major social media platforms, and how their relationship with publishers has fared after yet another tumultuous year. We're joined by social media consultant and industry analyst Matt Navarra to explore the chaos at Twitter, Meta's bad year and what it takes for publishers to succeed at TikTok.

This year has seen trust in the news fall to an historic low. Despite this bleak picture, there are concrete steps news publishers can take to build and maintain trust in their reporting. One factor that is growing in significance is using data, infographics, maps and charts to add context and help audiences to understand what is going on.