Newspaper + Business = Ad revenues sunset and future of the journalist job

6 months to lose $3 billion in advertising. That’s what the US newspaper business has scored this year. For the big picture, it’s an unprecedent loss of revenue since 2006. Have a look at the chart below and you will understand. The question now is what would be the result of the loss. Would newspaper business become more and more trashy and uninteresting than ever since there’s less cash or would it make this business move to a new breed of revenue model? And what about the journalists?

If you’re thinking online newspaper revenues can make the printed version useless, the web results aren’t any better with a loss of cash according to TechCrunch. Serving ads isn’t the cash machine that business has expected due to the fierce competition with niche websites that address specific content to people. So how can the newspaper business get better? I don’t have any idea but one thing is clear, their value added is fading and they have to rework their distribution model and the advertising integration to reverse the trend.

Digital may become one of the solutions using a device like the Amazon Kindle to change the distribution process, or work more hand to hand with companies to generate content for them as part of their job (which is for the moment not their job but should become). No one seems to have the answer but they really have to think about it.

More resources:

• Reflexion of a newsosaur
• Newspaper Association of America

To read more on that topic:

• Social Media + Users behaviour = Would it change it all? (Part 2)