If you need more evidence that the line between semi-pro (or pro-am or whatever you want to call it) and professional journalism content is blurring rapidly, lets have a look at usage data between topline News (ie journalists) figures and the unduplicated audience of the top 4 blog platforms.
According to Neilsen Netview, the topline News & Information figures (which is a unduplicated figure taking into account News Digital Media, The Age, SMH, BBC, Yahoo!7 News, National Nine News, NY Times, Bigpond NEws, Google News, Conde Nast, Daily Mail, CNN etc) only saw essentially a zero usage increase from April 07 to April 08 - from 7.785m in April 07 to 7.786m in April 08.
Now lets look at the unduplicated figures of the top 4 blogging platforms - blogger, wordpress, typepad and livejournal.
April 07 - 1.839m
April 08 - 2.484m
That is a YOY increase of 35%. What does this show? Well .. people are turning to blogs more and more to get their information. Why is this? Well ... I don't have the definitive answer ... but I believe that blogs offer more credibility and passion than their larger counterparts - especially in niche areas (which we all know become quite big when there are enough niche's combined). And this doesn't even cover sites like Perez Hilton, TMZ, Gizmodo, Defamer, Slashdot etc - which I would argue are blogs by format and design.
It's not all bad for the News & Information category - page views per user per month are up YOY from 65 to 74. Still, if I had the choice between a marginal increase in consumption or a major increase in users I know which one I'd take.
Maybe we will start seeing large news site bloggers become more than just light entertainment 'columnists' and actual evolve to being actual experts on what they're covering.
Showing posts with label TMZ. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TMZ. Show all posts
Monday, May 26, 2008
Friday, February 1, 2008
AOL re-enters Australia
Out of nowhere AOL has surfaced in AU.
And the first thing you notice about the site is that it is an absolute unashamed rip off of the Yahoo!7 homepage.
I remember AOL's other 2 failed attempts in this market and assume the 2008 V3 won't be much different. There only strong property is tmz.com and that doesn't need a local mirror.
View the eerie homepage similarities.
http://www.aol.com.au/
http://www.yahoo7.com.au/
And the first thing you notice about the site is that it is an absolute unashamed rip off of the Yahoo!7 homepage.
I remember AOL's other 2 failed attempts in this market and assume the 2008 V3 won't be much different. There only strong property is tmz.com and that doesn't need a local mirror.
View the eerie homepage similarities.
http://www.aol.com.au/
http://www.yahoo7.com.au/
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Exploit
News is at it again with lightening fast SEM response to the death of Heath Ledger.Type Heath Ledger into Google and News is using paid search to drive traffic to their site. The copy alleges it was an overdose ... it even has an exclamation mark (!)
The media hysteria was reported in depth on todays Crikey - and one interesting thing is TMZ.com has been seen as the definitive authority on the death ... they broke the story and are breaking most developments.
Most of the coverage on the local sites is based around what is being reported overseas, or footage/content from recent articles.
You have to ask - is this a desperate grab for page impressions and revenue or legitimate news?
The Age had a major whoops with their headline to the left (pic taken from Crikey) ... and if you look further down they are also running with video footage of Amy Winehouse smoking crack!Is 08 the year we see the portals go trashy(er)?
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Entertainment: The new battleground for AU digital dollars?
The launch of ninemsn's The Fix website last year gained some column inches in the local media, including this story (http://business.smh.com.au/ninemsn-offers-celebrity-fix-in-push-to-boost-audience/20071128-1diu.html) from Julian Lee of the SMH which talked about these gossip sites ability to bring in ad revenue (generally across FMCG products which traditionally haven't migrated marketing dollars online despite the eyeballs shifting away from their more traditional media sources).
So anyway, I was checking out news.com.au the other day and noticed that they have also given their Entertainment properties a spruce up (further to their consolidation of their gossip sections into the Confidential section last year). Check - http://www.news.com.au/entertainment
The relaunch looks good - brings a lot of the content to the fore ... only downside is the page is way too long and perhaps is trying to cram too much in. Still - any site with an MREC and a Leaderboard above the fold is okay with me ;)
This relaunch made me think that the main publishers are taking entertainment pretty seriously for 2008.
Sites such as Perez Hilton and TMZ have definitely shifted the way we pry into the lives of movie stars, b list celebs, heiresses etc and the success of Perez Hilton in particular (91,000 AU users according to Neilsen Netview, December 2007) have shown that people now expect gossip to be reported in a different way.
They want it instantly, quickly and easily digestible. Most importantly it needs to be visual - video and slide shows. They also want the editorial to have an opinion - they don't just want AP feeds and Reuters reports. For evidence of this check TMZ and Perez, as well as the local version of the excellent Defamer - http://au.defamer.com/
Interestingly when you look at the top Entertainment sites across the major players (excluding Yahoo as they still don't allow third party site side measurement - ie Neilsen), it's the ones that are doing the above that are finding success.
The Fix - http://thefix.ninemsn.com.au/ - is flying with 699,000 UBs already in the first week of January. The average session is over 2 and a 1/2 minutes - the lead amongst the big players.
News Entertainment - http://www.news.com.au/entertainment has had just over 255,000 UBs so far in January. However they are doing only 53,000 on average per day (compared to 144,000 for The Fix)
Fairfax's flagship entertainment properties (http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment and http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment) are hitting 276,000 and 171,000 respectively. Brisbane Times is sluggish with just over 14,000 UBs so far (around 2,000 a day)
So why is The Fix working ... well lets go through the above again ...
- It is instantly and quickly and easily digestible.
- Most importantly it needs to be visual - video and slide shows.
- They also want the editorial to have an opinion - they don't just want AP feeds and Reuters reports.
On top of the gossip/news that draws people in, Fix has loads of depth across film, music, dining out etc ... which makes it sticky. They also have outrageously strong SEO for their review content across yourguides which would be delivering strong UB numbers. They also have the relatively unique luxury of three absolute beasts of traffic drivers - Hotmail, Messenger and the ninemsn homepage.
Personally, I think for Fairfax and News to catch up they need to look at doing the above - showing some opinion in editorial (which Fairfax does well with blogs and reviews) as well as strong visual content. Yes, gossip isn't really Fairfax's core strength, and I am sure they are happy with their numbers ... but News as a business is built on this sort of content ... so it will be interesting to see how they look to leverage their pedigree in this area online and adapt their content and editorial style to how people wish to digest their voyeuristic content nowadays.
Begs the question - will the right (read new/incremental) advertising dollars follow the eyeballs?
So anyway, I was checking out news.com.au the other day and noticed that they have also given their Entertainment properties a spruce up (further to their consolidation of their gossip sections into the Confidential section last year). Check - http://www.news.com.au/entertainment
The relaunch looks good - brings a lot of the content to the fore ... only downside is the page is way too long and perhaps is trying to cram too much in. Still - any site with an MREC and a Leaderboard above the fold is okay with me ;)
This relaunch made me think that the main publishers are taking entertainment pretty seriously for 2008.
Sites such as Perez Hilton and TMZ have definitely shifted the way we pry into the lives of movie stars, b list celebs, heiresses etc and the success of Perez Hilton in particular (91,000 AU users according to Neilsen Netview, December 2007) have shown that people now expect gossip to be reported in a different way.
They want it instantly, quickly and easily digestible. Most importantly it needs to be visual - video and slide shows. They also want the editorial to have an opinion - they don't just want AP feeds and Reuters reports. For evidence of this check TMZ and Perez, as well as the local version of the excellent Defamer - http://au.defamer.com/
Interestingly when you look at the top Entertainment sites across the major players (excluding Yahoo as they still don't allow third party site side measurement - ie Neilsen), it's the ones that are doing the above that are finding success.
The Fix - http://thefix.ninemsn.com.au/ - is flying with 699,000 UBs already in the first week of January. The average session is over 2 and a 1/2 minutes - the lead amongst the big players.
News Entertainment - http://www.news.com.au/entertainment has had just over 255,000 UBs so far in January. However they are doing only 53,000 on average per day (compared to 144,000 for The Fix)
Fairfax's flagship entertainment properties (http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment and http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment) are hitting 276,000 and 171,000 respectively. Brisbane Times is sluggish with just over 14,000 UBs so far (around 2,000 a day)
So why is The Fix working ... well lets go through the above again ...
- It is instantly and quickly and easily digestible.
- Most importantly it needs to be visual - video and slide shows.
- They also want the editorial to have an opinion - they don't just want AP feeds and Reuters reports.
On top of the gossip/news that draws people in, Fix has loads of depth across film, music, dining out etc ... which makes it sticky. They also have outrageously strong SEO for their review content across yourguides which would be delivering strong UB numbers. They also have the relatively unique luxury of three absolute beasts of traffic drivers - Hotmail, Messenger and the ninemsn homepage.
Personally, I think for Fairfax and News to catch up they need to look at doing the above - showing some opinion in editorial (which Fairfax does well with blogs and reviews) as well as strong visual content. Yes, gossip isn't really Fairfax's core strength, and I am sure they are happy with their numbers ... but News as a business is built on this sort of content ... so it will be interesting to see how they look to leverage their pedigree in this area online and adapt their content and editorial style to how people wish to digest their voyeuristic content nowadays.
Begs the question - will the right (read new/incremental) advertising dollars follow the eyeballs?
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