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Journal Register Co. CEO John Paton addresses Editor & Publisher conference
Here are Bill Densmore's running, unedited notes of a keynote talk on Wednesday morning, June 16, 2010, to participants in the the Editor & Publisher Interactive Media Conference & Trade Show at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nev.
You can follow the tweet-stream from the conference at either of these hashtags:
Audio available
LAS VEGAS, Nev. -- Listen to Journal Register Co. CEO John Paton's talk to the Editor & Publisher Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow in Las Vegas today. A few points: Turn over the keys to the newspaper business to people who know interactive media, give all reporters new laptops and Flip cameras; get rid of infrastructure costs by outsourcing or multitasking.
You can list to a audio stream of Paton's address this morning from this URL:
What Paton said
Put chief digital officer is in charge of all sales.
John Paton: How do you know what the argument is when the argument is no longer in the newspaper? It's increasingly on the web
We are going to have to spend a lot of money. How are you going to know what to build if you don't know what people want. How do you know what type of information they want?
Research has to be your tool.
You have to create a new business model. You have to allocate resources solely on the new news ecology.
You can no longer dominate, but you can become the core of a local network of bloggers.
We need to get our priorities straight. We do need to be digital first.
two thirds of all your costs are in legacy infrastructure, not in the three things that build value: content, advertising, marketing.
You are going to have to get rid of those infrastructure costs.
Need a 25% EBITA from digital in four years.
"There is no 10 year plan here anymore."
YOu get rid of the bricks and iron and focus on core competencies. You reduce it or stop it or oursource it or sell it.
Outsource consolidate printing and mailroom services outsource/consolidate delivery outsource/consolidate all pre-press
You have to multitask in ways you never though possible; train, if they can't, let them go
Lousy it, lousy tools, one of the worst-designed newsrooms you have seen anywhere. Need better laptops, better broadband, Flip Cams.
It paid for itself in four weeks with video advertising just sold on Flip Phones.
LAS VEGAS, Nev. -- Listen to Journal Register Co. CEO John Paton's talk to the Editor & Publisher Interactive Media Conference & Tradeshow in Las Vegas today. A few points: Turn over the keys to the newspaper business to people who know interactive media, give all reporters new laptops and Flip cameras; get rid of infrastructure costs by outsourcing or multitasking.
You need to become the core of that network in your communities. Establish community media labs at six of 18 dailies, which bloggers can come in and use.
You can have more people curating the news than anyone else.
They have partnered with SeeClickFix and Growthspur to tap into that new news ecology.
Did a deal with their 18 dailies and SeeClickFix, producing six-figure revenue for JRC.
He is going to talk about idea lab and his benjamin franklin project.
What to expect:
Initially, lots of failure.
We are living in a revolutionary time for legacy media, much of what we do is breaking down, much of what we know is less valuable, we need the courage to experiment and the experiments will point the way.
In the 1980s, if you weren't around there you have no idea how much money there was to get the job done.
The Ben Frankin Project
Declared they would no longer be dependent on out of date thinking or on costly, outdated systems. ON July 4, across their 18 dailies, we will assign, source, report, edit, produce, web and print products using only free, web-based tools. No proprietary systems allowed. WE have 3,116 people working on this.
The real reason for doing this is culture change. We are starting the very first steps for changing the culture at Journal Register Company.
We have people who are dying to be empowered, freed up to make the necessary changes.
They build a customer management system using GoogleDocs and an iPhone.
They have printed a newspaper page on a press using ony free non-proprietary tools.
We have harnessed the power of our employees and we have started to create a culture where they are empowered to innovate.
benfranklin blog on WordPress. Puts EBITDA profit targets on the blog. The institute profit-sharing.
Paton encourages folo of JRC's progress to open-source publishing project July 4 Ben Franklin Project http://bit.ly/dhuLOx #2010_IMC #eppy
If you care about journalism, I urge you to take a big, deep dive into the digital dive, I mean well beyond what your companies are doing now.
I am not a net native, I have to play with every part of this ecosystem.
His daughter tweeted: Mayday, Mayday, dad's on Facebook abort.
I don't think print is going to go away anytime soon, it just isn't going to be as a big a part of what we do.
Questions and Answers
They've instituted "digital run sheets" at JRC and it has tripled the run rate of digital ads in three weeks.
Paywalls: "Are as a dumb as a big bag of hammers," for newspapers that don't have deep, rich, content. There are big streams from search and aggregators: "I'm not about to put a paywall between me and it . . . it's a walled garden, and if you know anything about gardening, they force the nutrients and eventually take everything out of the soil and they take a lot of work."
We are trying to change the wheels on a car going down the turnpike at 60 miles per hour. We've got to do it, but we can't stop.
You need to get rid of the legacy costs; it gives you the profit you need to invest in these next steps. It means outsourcing what you don't do well and cost effectively -- lay out pages, make up advertising. There are companies that just do this now. You need to invest in research, and it's costly.
UPDATE: John Paton supplies his own notes
Here are John Paton's own notes of his talk, and a link to a PDF of his slide presentation.
Most Of Our Industry Looks Like This ….
- Stating The Painfully Obvious
- Re-Set: �Traditional Media Is Losing Share
- Re-Set: �More People Get Their News From The Internet
- Re-Set:�The Business Model Must Change
- How Do You Change?
- How to Build Value?
- How to Build Value?
- What Is Journalism Today?
- Research
- What We Must Do
- Priorities
- Get Rid Of The Bricks And Iron
- Invest
- Old Model: Print to Web
- Why the Old Model Is On Life Support
- Survival of the Fastest
- Different Platforms, Different Audiences
- Supply The Tools
- Better I.T.
- Better Laptops
- Better Broadband
- Journal Register Company Bought Every Reporter a Flip Cam
- Better Attitude – Let Them Experiment
- Allocate Resources To The New News Ecology & Protocol
- Video: Editorial Process
- The New “Link Economy”
- Bringing The Outside World In
- Video: Bringing The Outside In
- What To Expect
- Initially - Lots of Failure
- We Are Living In A Revolutionary Time For Legacy Media
- Much Of What We Do Is Breaking Down
- Much Of What We Know Is Less Valuable
- We Need The Courage To Experiment
- The Experiments Will Point The Way
- An Experiment – The Ben Franklin Project
- Video: Some Are Getting There
- impreMedia Today – On It’s Way
- Thank You
