Monday 9th May: Pandemic growth was unsustainable. What comes next?

May 09, 2022

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We watched the total upending of consumer behaviour two years ago with a sort of horrified curiosity. The boom in eCommerce and the subscription wave were two predictable - but welcome - effects of lockdown. We speculated at the time which behaviours would stick, and which would fade as normal life returned.

In this piece, Mark Stenberg takes a look at what pandemic trends might soon be cresting. "A growing body of evidence suggests that the economy the pandemic wrought was, rather than a glimpse into the future, simply a makeshift survival mechanism," he writes.

He applies this to the publishers who have reaped huge benefits from eCommerce over the past two years. The growth was unsustainable - we could all see that. But what comes next?

Talking of pandemic rightsizing... Inflation fears, supply-chain shortages, the Ukraine war, Tiktok growth, Apple privacy changes and a gradual return to normalcy after Covid are creating some serious headwinds for the triopoly. Facebook's advertising growth was the slowest ever experienced since going public a decade ago. See, it's not all bad.

An articulate obituary of Bitch magazine and what it means for feminist media today from Samhita Mukhopadhyay. "The story of Bitch is, in part, the story of how feminist publications influenced the coverage of gender issues writ large. But it’s also the story of the difficulties of keeping independent outlets afloat..."

Clickbait creative may generate short-term revenue, but it sharply degrades user experience. When publishers put consumers at the centre of their monetization strategy, revenue follows. Digital publishers must recognize that user protection and user experience go hand in hand and act on the sizable gaps left in both. Louder for those at the back.

Mediagazer is an up-to-the-minute homepage of breaking trends and commentary for publishers and media owners. They sift through thousands of sites to present the very best picks on a single page. It's definitely a site we check on a daily basis before putting this newsletter together.

Go to mediagazer.com or follow them on Twitter @mediagazer.

This week's podcast

This week we spoke to Snigdha Sur, Founder & CEO of The Juggernaut; a content and community platform for global South Asians. She talked about founding a media business with a business background rather than a journalism one, and how her knowledge of media VC and funding has influenced how she runs the publication.

We offer a limited number of media vendors the opportunity to lead the conversation for our listeners through our sponsored podcast series: Media Voices Conversations. Just reply to this email if you'd like a look at our info pack!