Roger Fidler delivers presentation at NAA mediaXchange
In a March 9, 2009 PRESSTIME NOW! report:
If you’re taking a wait-and-see attitude on mobile, it’s time to rethink that strategy.
Panelists at the “Mobile: Revenue, Readers and Reality” session Monday afternoon urged attendees to make some bold moves.
“Try a lot of things simultaneously and see what works,” said James Jackson, vice president of new media and product development for The Cincinnati Enquirer.
Tim Repsher, managing director of Media General Mobile in Tampa, said the market’s readiness for mobile delivery of news and advertising is no longer “theory but practice.” He cited the post-Christmas activation of iPhones and the resulting increase in access to Media General’s mobile sites.
“Bundle mobile with everything you do,” Repsher said. “Always market your product as news anywhere, anytime.
Mobile also can be a great testing ground for the emergence of e-readers and digital ink, “which can take our platforms, market share and audience to the next level,” Jackson said.
Regarding digital ink, Roger Fidler, program director for digital publishing for the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri in Columbia, said he once thought it would take 25 to 30 years for newspapers to make the transition to all digital. The economic crisis has moved up that timetable.
“We need to have true digital alternatives, and newspapers need work together to make that happen,” Fidler said.
To see more of the PRESSTIME NOW! blog, click here.See Roger Fidler’s presentation: SLIDE SHOW (download pdf)