How Bloomberg Media hit 500,000 subs | Google updates = publisher meltdown
And what I learned from Press Gazette's autumn publisher events in London and New York
Good morning and welcome to your weekly Future of Media newsletter from Press Gazette on Thursday, 23 November, brought to you in association with Opti Digital, an adtech company developing innovative AI-based technologies designed to help publishers maximise their advertising revenues.
Today I’ve tried to distill dozens of conversations with publishers at Press Gazette events in New York and London into a few key insights.
And I’ve ended up channeling the character Howard Beale from the 1976 film Network. Film buffs will remember he loses the plot on air and goes off script telling viewers:
“Things have got to change. But first, you’ve gotta get mad!…You’ve got to say, ‘I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not gonna take this anymore!’”
Something has happened this year to the plumbing of the online advertising market, and it means that none of the growth in ad revenue is being channelled to trusted publishers. Instead, it’s going to Meta, Amazon, Google, Tiktok and other tech platforms.
If independent ad-funded commercial news is going to survive much further into the 2020s, something needs to change.
Recent changes at Google were a hot topic at both our recent publisher events. We’ve delved deeper into a succession of Google algorithm updates, which have had profound and sudden impacts on the traffic (and so revenue) flowing to news publishers.
And finally, I caught up with Bloomberg Media chief digital officer Julia Beizer to find how they have made it to 500,000 subscribers in five years and what their plans are to grow that number even further.
New from Press Gazette
How Bloomberg Media got to 500,000 subscribers – and how it plans to reach a million
Press Gazette caught up with Bloomberg Media chief digital officer Julia Beizer in New York.
Latest Google updates have led to massive traffic changes for news websites
An autumn of major Google changes has led to despair and confusion at news publishers.
Publishers are mad as hell and they’re not going to take this any more
Sentiment amongst many publishers has evolved from griping acceptance to a determination that something needs to change over the next year.
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Our latest podcast
Podcast 60: How to make local news pay with Newsquest CEO Henry Faure Walker
Last year UK regional news giant Newsquest made £40m in pre-tax profits on turnover of £190m.
This year it is tracking to have ad revenue broadly flat over two years.
CEO Henry Faure Walker spoke to Dominic Ponsford about how the publisher of 200+ titles is bucking the trend on both audience and advertising revenue decline. He also shed light on some fascinating experiments using generative AI in the newsroom.
Must-reads this week from Press Gazette you might have missed
Explained: Why Telegraph sale has been paused after RedBird IMI deal with Barclays
Failings in police-media relations exposed by Nicola Bulley review
Prince Harry to ask ministers for permission to use Leveson documents in Mail case
Fox News reporter Benjamin Hall wounded outside Kyiv honoured by Zelensky
Data privacy and advertising: How marketers are ‘killing democracy’
Guardian gets around readers who reject cookies with new advertising product
