Day two of the conference opened with news that Norske Skog record a double digital decrease in newsprint sales last year, and saw no end to the decline.
Day one opened with keynote speaker and industry consultant Ken Doctor telling the assembled delegates that printed newspapers would be ‘something you tell your grandchildren about’ by 2020, but conversely Jim Chisholm, industry consultant with WAN / Ifra flown in from Paris for the event said that printed newspapers ‘would continue to pay the salaries of everyone in this room and buy the BMWs for the internet brigade for as long as I’m alive’, which he quipped would be about four weeks due the excellence of Sydney beer.
The onset of the digital media age was top of the agenda, and newspaper publishers’ headlong charge into digitising content was highlighted by keynote speaker and CEO of News Limited Kim Williams, who said that ‘News is aiming to embed digital at the centre of everything we do.’
However the ongoing conundrum for newspaper publishers is monetising the internet, which with few exceptions, has remained a puzzle for publishers the world over, and the conference, held at Darling Harbour in Sydney, provided little insight into how this may be achieved.
Several speakers tried to put digital media in context, Chisholm reckoned digital revenue remained a tiny fraction of newspaper companies’ income, accounting for just 2.1 per cent of revenue, or $2.1bn from the $96bn he said the newspaper business generated.
Megan Brownlow, executive director with accountancy consultancy PWC reckoned that in Australia digital advertising accounted for seven per cent of revenue, and said this would rise to 14 per cent in four years time.
She urged newspaper bosses to invest in their brands, as her research showed big brands were trusted and valued in the world of online media.
Researcher Rebecca Huntley told the delegates that the digital world would only increase, and newspaper publishers had to find ways of making their content attractive and accessible.
Bob Lockley, CEO print and production at Fairfax gave an overview of the investment in Australasian newspaper plant over the past year, which was extensive. At the print seminar Andy McCourt and Jim Chisholm urged publishers to think small.
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