Latest E&P Exclusive Content on Revenue

Revisiting WEHCO Media’s tablet program

Implementing new revenue streams, from events to newsletters to podcasts to philanthropy — and even T-shirts — has been the goal of many news publishers for several years. Some don’t require much investment, while others require a major commitment in money and staff time. Some have worked, and others haven’t.
Ad Sales Life

Synergy in sales through discipline and creativity

Discipline serves as the foundation for creativity to thrive. The key is consistently maintaining focus on creating vibrant communities through insightful reporting while having the creativity to celebrate the positivity within the community. This ensures the development of resourceful content and attracting revenue sponsorship opportunities.

Add generative AI to your sales toolbox

As the entire world seemingly rushes to embrace the latest iteration of generative AI, whether ChatGPT, Bard or the many similar apps, media sales teams must take a more measured approach. That starts with realizing it is a tool and is not the answer to all needs and challenges. Additionally, the parameters of its use and protections from its erroneous and malicious misuse are not yet set.
More E&P Revenue Exclusives
Ad Sales Life

Elevating sales: Trends and pillars of 2024 growth

Richard E. Brown, senior director of retention for The Daily Beast and a columnist with Editor & Publisher, is convinced that 2024 will be a year dedicated to strengthening the bond between advertisers and audiences, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and collaboration. He says this commitment will ensure that "the future of local news media remains vibrant and aligned with the diverse needs of the communities served. Furthermore, emerging trends complement this dedication, promising continued growth and a positive, sustainable trajectory."
E&P's January "Revenue Roundup"

Monetizing video. The next opportunity and challenge.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, newspapers have delivered both types of content for over a century. Television took content one step further with motion, sound and color. Today, video content has exploded across multiple TV platforms and escaped from the TV environment to be available almost everywhere and created by almost anyone.
Ad Sales Life

2024 Media Sales Superstars

2023 has been a year rife with layoffs, buyouts and a continuation of a difficult media sales environment. It takes resilience, grit and out-of-the-box thinking to succeed. The 2024 class of E&P Media Sales Superstars stand out in their ability to stand up against these challenging times, stay focused and get the job done for their customers, their communities and the companies they represent.

Maximize media sales by understanding what local advertisers are buying

Advertisers, especially local advertisers and local media sales teams, must understand consumers' spending priorities. However, it is equally important to know where those local advertisers spend their ad dollars and plan to spend future dollars. Without these insights, media ad sales teams can’t help local advertisers maximize their sales and gain a greater share of their ad spending.

How to leverage the "budget season" to maximize your top line

Although daunting for some, budget season has always been a therapeutic and comforting time for me. It’s when our focus shifts to the outlook for the upcoming year. This is when we create comprehensive game plans involving contingencies, market nuances and gap analysis and align projects to meet potential objectives and stretch goals. We diligently put everything in place to view things in three dimensions: mitigate risks, address issues head-on and navigate relationships that contribute to the community's perceived value of the organization.
Revenue Roundup

Re-opening the recruitment gold mine with a job board

Once upon a time, newspapers had an easy-to-work gold mine: classified advertising. Then, the internet and new technologies made the recruitment process more accessible, and suddenly, the gold mine’s ceiling collapsed, and newspapers lost a lucrative revenue source. Fast-forward to the 21st century, and there are more sophisticated technologies and opportunities for newspapers and all media to re-open the recruitment gold mine with a robust job board.

Newspaper companies are finding a boost in their ZIPs

Industry executives in circulation audit and data mining say ZIP code-level data tied to e-editions have sparked more advertising interest. Newspapers armed with the correct data can report larger penetration numbers in crucial ZIP codes and recapture national advertisers who dropped their inserts.
Ad Sales Life

Impressions to impact.

Throughout my career in revenue generation, I have analyzed this situation from various perspectives, encountering both benefits and challenges. The print versus digital argument in local news media revenue has posed challenges for decades. However, one positive aspect has been the ability of any advertising to generate desired outcomes, including customer conversions, business transactions and income generation for local advertising sponsors. It is crucial to incorporate more impactful digital advertising that can replicate the sense and experience of a print ad.
Ad Sales Life

Puzzles and games. Relief from the news creates a monetizing opportunity

To brand themselves as a primary voice in their communities and appeal to the broadest audience, newspapers have included games and puzzles in their entertainment content for over 100 years. Readers continue to enjoy games and puzzles, but now there are opportunities to monetize that content.
Ad Sales Life

Mastering renewal sales. The key to exponential growth

The path to revenue growth lies in mastering the strategy behind renewals, whether in advertising sales or subscriptions, while driving new acquisitions and assessing their long-term impact on the bottom line. It’s an area that combines strategy, sales and financial analysis and presents a compelling model for outlining the foundation of revenue growth in news media organizations.
Ad Sales Life

A proactive approach to winning political advertising

The circus is coming to town — to every city in America. And only the donkeys and elephants will be performing in the center ring. It’s America’s quintessential, quadrennial big show — the 2024 presidential, congressional, state and local elections. Despite how little attention and money print media and newspapers receive from many political campaigns, there are still opportunities to generate additional revenues — especially suburban and small-market newspapers with hyper-local reporting.
Ad Sales Life

Merchandising builds brand awareness, generates news subscriptions and maximizes retention

Merchandising has become a valued revenue stream for many newspapers and news outlets to generate new subscriptions, increase awareness of their quality journalism, promote community identity and boost the bottom line to expand newsrooms and coverage. Although the purpose of merchandising promotions is extra revenue, they are also often fun — for the community and newsrooms.
Industry News on Revenue
In what may be a first for an advertising conference, Borrell Miami brought a group of media finance execs together to talk about digital ad products from the bean counter’s perspective. Topics covered included digital profitability (it’s growing), sales commissions (they’re lower than for linear media) and digital’s revenue contribution (going up and up).
This new report from the LMA Advanced Fundraising Lab describes the significant changes in the landscape for philanthropic support for local news since 2020, and adds detailed case studies about the ways local newsrooms have sustained philanthropy as an ongoing source of support for essential civic journalism. 
Digital audio ad spending continues to grow, with estimates that it will make up a fifth of all time spent with digital media in the U.S. this year. But where are the ad dollars coming from to support the medium?
The Deseret News launched a free monthly compendium of its best journalism in September. It’s been profitable since October.
NPQ has long tracked changes in the business model of journalism, including the rise of nonprofit journalism. In this interview, Monika Bauerlein, who has worked at Mother Jones since 2000 and has been its CEO since 2015, shares her perspective.
Roughly one-third of all digital reader revenue at The Guardian now comes from the United States.
Here's an idea to steal and adapt: The Henrico (Virginia) Citizen added 9,000+ email subscribers and generated $34,000 in reader revenue in one year.