Wednesday 12th June: Connecting through podcasts and newsletters is a publisher superpower

Good morning! Today’s newsletter is brought to you by Peter. If you’re at our Publisher Podcast & Newsletter Summit today, say hello! If you’re not… keep an eye out for the video-on-demand replay.

Publishing a story is often just the starting point. A couple of years ago I wrote a post for What’s New In Publishing about the similarities between podcasts and newsletters. That piece was the result of an ongoing conversation we’d had at Media Voices, a conversation that has led us to today’s dual-track Podcast & Newsletter summit.

The link above is to an update I wrote on the original WNIP piece and in my closing keynote today, I’ll revisit it again. If you can’t be there, there will be a video, but I promise to write it up too. My overarching point, however, is that podcasts and newsletters are an opportunity in an industry that really has its work cut out looking for silver linings.

There are many reasons why podcasts and newsletters share so much space in the Venn diagram of modern publishing, but the biggest is the ability to build direct relationships. Whether its audio’s in-head localisation or email’s inbox localisation, the ability to connect directly with audiences through podcasts and newsletters is a publishing superpower that we’ll be discussing for a long time to come.

Don’t forget: SMBs are being left out of the conversation when it comes to digital advertising — and it’s costing publishers as well. Read our piece on how Smartico is helping to solve that problem [N.B. Smartico can be found at smartico.one]

Print is clearly not dead if a business like Mediahuis is still generating 70% of its revenues from ink on paper. There’s a whole other conversation to be had about magazines in print, but for a news organisation, print is an increasingly uncomfortable place to be. The company’s 7-7-7 strategy is designed to reverse its print-digital revenue mix within seven years. “If we are there by 2030 then we can say that we are a digitally sustainable company,” says Chief Exec Gert Ysebaert. God Speed, Mediahuis. God Speed!

After a dramatic Indian general election result, MD of the Vikatan media group Srini Balasubramanian spoke at the FIPP Congress about how they continue to have an impact. In a time when many people despair of the media’s role in politics, this is a great story about a media house that has leveraged print and digital formats to effect real social change, from smoking bans to calling out political corruption.

Field & Stream, the outdoor magazine that first appeared in 1871, has returned to print. After a four-year hiatus, the title is back with a 160-page issue presented in an oversized A4 fomat. Subscriptions to the new bi-annual can be bought through Field & Stream’s 1871 Club membership community, but non-members can buy a single-copy for $25. Premium print FTW!

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