Posts tagged Rupert Murdoch
Can MySpace really pull off a re-launch?
Apr 9th
News Corp is attempting to re-launch its ailing social network MySpace. After a management shake-up and brand rethink, can it be done?
A re-launch is about to happen which MySpace execs hope will claw back some of the ground the site has lost to Facebook in the last two years, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.
MySpace co-president Mike Jones said: “I know that when that relaunch comes I’ve got a great product, I’ve got a global audience that at one point used MySpace… I think I can make the old new again for them.”
There is one clear fact that is on the side of News Corp – eight in ten Brits use and are a member of one or more social networks. In the US, the percentage of Americans age 12 and older who have a profile on one or more social networking sites has reached almost half (48%) of the population in 2010. And in Asia-Pacific, social networking penetration has reach 90%.
However, when it comes to social networks, Facebook is king with more than 400 million users worldwide. MySpace memberships sit at around 200 million – but the site has been going much longer.
The social media space is somewhat dominated by Facebook. It has almost forced FreindsReunited out of the market and this week we heard that Bebo is to shut down due to declining numbers.
MySpace is up against a fierce competitor. But then again, it has one of the most powerful media moguls on its side – Rupert Murdoch.
Earlier this year I saw the Adam Sandler film Funny People. MySpace also starred and I thought to myself, ‘How did MySpace score that gig?’ Easy, Murdoch owns 2oth Century Fox, the film studio which produced it. Read the rest of this entry »
Will advertisers benefit from The Times’ pay-walls?
Mar 30th
News that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp will be erecting pay-walls around two of its flagship UK papers – The Times and The Sunday Times – should be well received by advertisers. After all, they’ll finally have some definite demographics to work with.
The pay-walls will also coincide with the launch of the Apple iPad, which goes on sale next month. It is predicted to revolunitonise media and marketing by allowing advertisers to serve up interactive and engaging campaigns meaning that now, more than ever, it is most important to be delivering the right ads to the right audiences.
With subscription based content comes details. Those details mean more targeted, more effective advertising. And with that comes better, more traceable ROI.
And advertisers are looking to spend money this year.
According to Aegis-owned media agency Carat, global ad spend will increase by 2.9% this year and by 4% in 2011.
The agency’s global ad spend forecast for 2010/2011 reveals that the advertising market, which has suffered the worst decline since the 80s over the past year, is recovering, albeit modestly.
But there are a number of global events taking place this year that should help boost ad spend including the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, the World Expo in Shanghai and the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.
After losing a combined £88 million last year, The Times and The Sunday Times are desperate for a recovery in revenues.
If the News Corp papers can get advertisers on board by selling their position as having absolute data on their readership, then the mastheads have a good chance of recovery.
A good example of well-targeted advertising is the Financial Times. The paper has a very specific readership and thus allows advertisers to reach their intended audience. Its advertisers include those expensive watch brands, investment banks and first class airline seating. The likes of The Times, however, includes advertising ranging from supermarket brands, holidays, cars, TV programs and economy class.
When the pay-walls go up, The Times will be able to tell exactly who is reading, where they live, their age, their professions, their marital status, and the list goes on. There’s no limit to the amount of information the papers, and subsequently the advertisers, will have access to.
The Times is just the first of many that will implement pay-walls. It’s now up to advertisers to figure out how they can benefit.
72m read their news online. Will advertisers stick around after pay walls though?
Feb 4th
Guess what? Newspapers and online media sites aren’t dead. And what does that mean, marketers will be coming back to them in droves over the next few month, but will pay walls see a decline in the numbers?
Newspaper websites in the US have attracted an average monthly unique audience of 72 million visitors in the fourth quarter of 2009, representing 37% of internet users, according to new figures from Nielsen Online.
Newspaper websites users generated more than 3.2 billion page views during the quarter, spending more than 2.4 billion minutes sites.
The results come as News Corp reports a net profit of $254m for 2009. It’s CEO – Rupert Murdoch, who is the main voice behind the push for pay walls by the year 2011 on major newspaper websites – said that “content is not just king but the emperor of all things electronic,” reassuring advertisers that consumers “will pay for content”.
So the world is going digital, this is not news. What is interesting to note though is how multiplatform the media industry has become and the variety that advertisers are now presented with.
Furthermore, with online newspaper figures so positive, it brings further confidence to the market that devices such as the Amazon Kindle and Apple’s iPad will be able to succeed.
As the economy begins to stabilize, newspaper companies are in position to leverage their trusted brands to reach a highly engaged audience and deliver maximum value to advertisers, according to Newspaper Association of America.
News Corp will be announcing within two months its model for charging for the online content of the New York Post, Times of London and all its other newspapers.
While today’s Nielsen figures sound impressively up 5.5%, it is still not known if advertisers will be willing to pay to have their ads behind paid-for content given the negative reactions from readers.
Asked what they would do if their favorite news site suddenly began charging, 74% of online news readers said they would “find another free site,” according to a Harris Interactive study commissioned by PaidContent UK. Only 5% said they’d pay to continue reading for fee.
The debate continues…
Bing appears to be winning the search engine battle, why?
Dec 1st
Is Google’s 13 years of dominance about to come to an end as we switch to the cool new Bing?
It may have only been launched in June this year, but already Microsoft’s “decision engine” Bing has already increased its usage by 7%. Google however, has seen the number of searches conducted slip by 1% - could this signal the beginning of the end of Google monopoly?
According to new research from Hitwise, Google accounted for 70.6% of all US searches in October.
Yahoo! Search, Bing and Ask.com received 16.14%, 9.57% and 2.62%, respectively.
The launch of Google’s first global advertising push, which will include the UK, France, Canada, Japan, Australia, and Singapore, came as a surprise considering the search engine king built its entire empire without a single advert, relying only on word-of-mouth.
Google is feeling the heat from rising competitors for the first time with Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing sparing nothing in their assault on its market share.
Microsoft is next year launching its first true web version of Office that will complement its traditional Office apps. Google, with its global campaign, is attempting to steal a march on the competition before it even launches, which is smart. But will businesses ever see Google as a serious competitor and software solutions provider looking beyond its search engine capabilities?
Microsoft isn’t doing this all alone, remember. It partnered up with ailing search engine Yahoo just a few months back and although the deal is currently awaiting approval over competition concerns from the US Justice Department, it already has the backing of advertising heavyweights including WPP, Publicis Groupe and Omnicom.
Google has also been slow to make as big as an impact as it was hoping for with its browser Google Chrome. It holds just a 2.59 per cent share, well behind Microsoft’s Internet Explorer which has 67.7 per cent of the market share.
While this may be the first global campaign from Google, it certainly can’t be the last.
Google has not only lost its stranglehold in western nations, but also in emerging markets such as China. In fact, China’s Baidu now holds the title of ‘the world’s largest search engine’ (given China’s 1.3 billion strong population) despite Google’s presence there. Google’s struggle to crack China is just one of the giant’s many anxieties over the past few years.
Google has always maintained that it isn’t worried about competition, but perhaps this is starting to change. Tell us what you think below.
Recent Comments