“Measurement drives profitability and market performance”

News publishing is a mix of creativity, complex operations and processes, and a unique urgency.

Media companies have been forced to make enormous, and painful cuts in costs, while seeking long-term viability and delivery of quality news services. Yet few seek benchmarks or introduce deliverable performance programmes.

STRATEGIC ISSUES

When editors are confronted with issues of business economics – cost, they say it will affect their market effectiveness. When the business generally is confronted about its efficiency, there is an immediate contradiction with the resources to be flexible and creative. Both assumptions are wrong.

When advertising revenues hit a downturn, management resort to staff cuts. One of the main reasons that newspapers have failed to recover after the last three economic downturns is that they do not have enough staff to recover their client base.

FACTS

1. ‣There is a direct correlation between circulation and editorial staff numbers.
   

1. ‣There is a direct correlation between advertising revenue and editorial staff numbers.
   

1. ‣There is no correlation between pages produced and staff numbers.
   

1. ‣As a newspaper’s audience profile becomes wealthier, so advertising revenues grow exponentially. But costs, particularly in the newsroom increase exponentially faster; which is why many quality newspapers lose money.
   

1. ‣Quality newspapers want to produce far more content despite the fact that their readers are less loyal, and have less time to read.
   

SOLUTIONS

We offer a performance programme, drawn from detailed examination of dozens of news media companies, which defines continuous improvement at four levels as shown in the graphic below:

The model addresses the dichotomies that have afflicted the media industry for years.

1. ‣How does a news company protect is traditional news values, while trying to respond to the shifts in revenue from the traditional “collegiate” media product, to highly vertical category products, that separate revenue streams from news services?
   

2. 
   

3. ‣What are key performance indicators that drive continuous improvement, and how should they be measured and applied?
   

MATERIAL

Editorial measurement - report

The last great shibboleth of our industry, that editorial activities are somehow unmeasurable either in terms of quality or efficiency, is debated and analysed. The study includes a series of research and reporting tools that can be applied to measuring and improving editorial output.

World Association of Newspapers

Staffing conundrum bedevils publishers - report and article

It's one of our industry's imponderables. Suggest to the editor that he needs to cut costs, and he immediately responds that his quality will be affected (until he/she is made publisher, then sit back and watch!) Can one predict what editorial staff numbers should be? Yes. But many editors will argue that you can't. I will demonstrate that you can. Here is an analysis based on 20 newspapers (of different kinds) in seven European countries.

Report by Jim Chisholm. January 2010

News and tech February 2, 2010

PROJECTS

A range of benchmarking projects for different publishing companies and trade organizations, across all areas of the newspaper business including comparing companies in different countries.

The development and implementation of a range of Key Performance Indicators and reporting systems, designed to energise and focus sales staff on continuous improvement.

An innovative P&L structure that enables publishers and managers to track the true efficiences and effectiveness of their performance over time, in terms of revenue, variable and fixed costs, and direct contribution to the business.

Jim Chisholm, Newspaper Consultant and Analyst

email: jim@jimchisholm.net. Telephone: +33 6 40 42 72 32. Mobile, +44 77 75 81 77 97. Skype: jpchisholm