The session I gave at Podcamp Toronto 2010 was titled Saving Newspapers Using Search & Social. It was all about how newspapers could use a blend of SEO, social media, and mobile apps to increase their audience and offer more diversified and targeted ad buys. Some of the audience seemed to thinks that I was on to something, and some of the audience thought I was dreaming.

On the last day of PCTO, I met Dave Coleman. He’s the Director of Marketing for Spreed Inc, a company that’s already working with newspapers to provide the mobile component of what I recommended in my presentation. Spreed is working with some major newspapers, such as the Globe & Mail, which served up 7.5 million page views a month last month through their iPhone App alone.

iPhone Version

So it looks like newspapers aren’t f**ked, after all. They just need to start looking at themselves as Social News Organizations rather than suppliers of physical, printed artifacts. Because, frankly, their business model hinges on providing authority, printed content, and there’s nothing in that which stipulates that that content has to be delivered via a berliner, tabloid, or broadsheet format.

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Fighting for Every Inch

February 27, 2010

I used to work with this biz dev guy who was a negotiation genius. He also used to say how his ability to understand the other guy’s position was both his biggest strength and his biggest weakness.
On the one hand, he could anticipate where the other guy was coming from, and craft his pitch around [...]

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Don’t Give a Sh*t

February 13, 2010

It’s terrible and wonderful at the same time! It’s like freedom in a cup!
– Elliot

There’s a samurai adage to the effect of “he who ceases to fear death becomes invincible.” The idea is that if you stop giving a shit what happens, you become free. Free to speak your speak your mind and follow your [...]

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Tribe, Trusted, and True

February 3, 2010

The annual Edelman Trust Barometer is out, and tech journalist Tom Foreski did some digging into the findings. As Tom points out, the news isn’t good for PR agencies, “social media experts,” citizen journalists, or media companies of any kind:

Trust in information from friends and peers, “people like me,” dropped by 20 points, from [...]

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Interview with Chris Hill, CEO of FundScrip

February 3, 2010

This is an interview with Chris Hill, the President and CEO of FundScrip, a company that helps non-profits raise money by obeying the 13th Law of Power: When Asking for Help, Appeal to People’s Self-Interest, Never to their Mercy or Gratitude. Basically, FundScrip helps these non-profits raise money by selling gift cards — instead of [...]

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Calling in the Chips

January 28, 2010

The really great thing about online communities is that they let us connect with like-minded people along the lines of share common interests. But what good are those connections if you can’t ever leverage them? After all, like the old saying goes: “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”
But how do you go [...]

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The Nouveau Media

January 22, 2010

For the most part, old money looks down on new money, and when old money uses the term nouveau riche, it’s for a reason. For starters, the nouveau riche tend to lack a lot of the manners and tastes that come with generations of refinement. But more importantly, the nouveau riche lack longevity. You see, [...]

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