I am receiving calls suggesting that AccountingWeb – at least it’s IT end – is requesting a 50% cut in the rates it pays its freelancers. One presumes that’s in response to a fall in advertising rates. Is this a bad thing? I’ve argued before that the model AW follows no longer makes sense in the emerging new media/information world. AW counters that it has many thousands of subscribers and that represents a valuable commodity. The implication is that there is significant volume which it can leverage for vendor campaigns. There are several problems with this argument.
- As any accountant will tell you, stats can be manipulated to say whatever you want
- Numbers of subscribers bear no relationship to pages visited (see graphic above comparing AccMan and AW.co.uk but bear in mind 1. above!)
- What is the value of a page view on a broad appeal site compared to one that is tightly focused?
- Who is being influenced by those same page views?
- Regardless of volume, what is the site’s reach in a globally connected world?
Most important – what does this mean for information consumers and vendors?
Sift Media says that it has 600,000 names across all its communities. Sift says this represents all sorts of opportunities for cross/up-selling. In other words – readers are a selling opportunity. The accounting end represents around 90,000. I’ve not asked the question but my media experience says that constant subscription list maintenance is essential because sub lists are almost always out of date. How real is the list? On this scale it may not matter too much. A vendor who pays say £1,500 for a small campaign can pretty much assure some leads from ad placement, repeated mail shot mentions and so on. If that’s what they want to do.
More important is what you see happening in and around the different sites. The graphic above can be interpreted to say that roughly 12-14% of AW’s claimed subscribers are accessing the content. That assumes each visitor is unique. Again, there are problems with this analysis because both sites have groups of regular visitors. I’m trying to be generous. In other words, AW is heavily dependent on the quality of its sub lists. However, if it is being forced to reduce freelance rates that has to reflect in both content quality and quantity. Their real problem comes in five parts:
- Unlike the FT which is charging for online access, AW cannot claim quality content. At least not on the IT side. There just isn’t enough depth. As one person said to me: ‘People will pay for knowledge.’ Even if AW could charge – the numbers suggest it is not viable.
- AW is a closed network where AccMan is connected to multiple networks. A good example is my Enterprise 2 post. While there were only a handful of conversations, there were 21 Tweets about the piece from consultants, vendors and end users. Each of those who Tweet are network nodes. A very quick calculation suggests those network mentions will have reached around 16,000 people. AW on the other hand only has its own closed network within which to operate and that means it only gets page views based on what it can entice people to click upon from the base site.
- Unlike AccMan, AW only uses its Twitter account as a way of pimping its stuff. For AW, it’s an advertising channel. AccMan is in conversations not necessarily connected to content. In the eyes of at least one student of new media, this makes me ‘social media personified.’
- In talking to my sponsors, it is clear they see 2010 as the year when they up their own blog efforts. Xero has done an outstanding job. It uses its blog as a way of keeping customers informed on new things, discussing issues that matter to its customers and attending to questions about the service. I know that others will do the same in 2010. Who needs AW when you can generate great content that customers like and which help to spread the word?
- In the last month, AccMan has been included in five ranking lists. AW? Lists always have a self serving element and so I never read much into them. But those mentions are not only impacting traffic, but opening new doors. One guy, a couple of blogs ranged against a 12 year established media property?
What can we discern? I am one of a smallish minority that believes 2010 will see a double dip in the recession. That spells huge opportunity for smart practices and the SaaS market. If you accept my assessment of the market then AW/Sift has to get serious about how it adapts and gets away from dependency on advertising based models. My sense is it knows there are things to be done but is flailing around trying to figure what to do next. Cross/up-sell alone will not cut it. That is treating your readers as an extension of the vendor PR machine rather than delivering value. Like them or not, AW is an important part of the landscape so any positive changes will be welcome. What’s certain is that despite a great re-design, content counts and they just don’t have it.
For media buyers, this is good news. If AW really is making deep cuts then vendors should negotiate hard.
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