Multi-media comes of age Timothy Balding, CEO, World Association of Newspapers The 18th World Newspaper Advertising Conference marks "the coming of age of the newspaper company as a truly multi-media business," said Mr Balding in opening the event in Budapest. "Newspaper audiences are rapidly expanding from a solid base of print readers into new digital channels. Not only do these channels provide new readers, viewers, and listeners for our content, but they are delivering the demographic riches that our advertisers prize," he said. "What we will hear at this conference is how newspaper companies are innovating, how they are developing new mobile advertising platforms, how they are evolving into digital broadcasters and above all, how they are combining all digital and print platforms to deliver true multi-media advertising campaigns," he said. Mr Balding quoted Scott Berg, the World Media Director of Hewlett Packard, who said: "The thing I hate most is for somebody to come sell me a page. I don’t care about ad pages. I care about great ideas and surrounding the consumer with all the media vehicles that newspapers have access to. Newspapers need to start thinking of themselves as content providers." Mr Balding said: "Well, if Scott Berg were here over the next two days, I’m sure he would realise that newspapers are now doing just that. "He would hear great examples of how newspapers are developing their multi-media businesses with their print publications at the core." Pay attention to press freedom Janos Koka, President, Alliance of Free Democrats, Hungary Hungary is only 20 years removed from Communist repression, so the country does not take its freedoms for granted. "Freedom of press is not something we can reach and then we can sit back and relax for the rest of the time. Rather, it is a very dynamic and ever changing thing: something that we always have to follow and ensure its realisation," said Mr Koka, the former minister of economy and transport who welcomed participants to Budapest. It is important to remain vigilant and guard press freedom because there are new attacks against it, both in Hungary and in other western democracies, he said. "This happens when certain people demand the restriction of the freedom of speech, and this happens when under the disguise of ’protection of others’ some political powers intend to impose limitations in regulations of the so-called hate speech. Or, as a more relevant example, this very same ’weed’ is manifested when journalists are accused of violating state secrets in Hungary when writing articles about organised crimes. These examples clearly indicate that we still have a lot to do in this area." The Hungarian newspaper market Judit Kazmer, President, Hungarian Publishers Association As the host of the conference, Ms Kazmer welcomed participants on behalf of Hungarian publishers and provided a snapshot of the Hungarian press market. Here are some of the facts:  Newspapers have a percent share of the Hungarian advertising market, behind terrestrial television (50 percent), cable television (30 percent), and magazines (11 percent).  Nine out of ten adult Hungarians read print media on a regular basis.  Large European publishers dominate the Hungarian newspaper market: Sanoma, Axel Springer, Ringier, WAZ and Inform Media among them. Metro has the largest share of newspaper advertising sales, with 26.3 percent. A New Path to Advertising Revenues Felipe Goron, Marketing & Sales Director, Newspaper Unit, RBS, Brazil When putting together a multimedia advertising package, don’t forget the "live" element, says Mr Goron. Traditional multimedia packages combine newspaper, television, radio and the internet, says Mr Goron, whose company, the second largest publisher in Brazil, includes all those media and more. He presented a case for adding events marketing to then list: it added 5 percent to the revenues of the RBS newspaper unit as well as improving the company’s relationship with both readers and advertisers. It just makes sense for multimedia newspapers to expand into events, Mr Goron says. They demand intensive use of media, stimulate social interaction between customers and readers, promote brands, products and services, reach a wider audience, create new revenues and customers, and expand the concept of the multimedia experience. The goal "is to position the newspaper as a fully integrated communications provider for customers," he says, providing suggestions on how to accomplish this. Mr Goron provided several examples of how events marketing extends the newspaper company’s brand - building a fashion show around a fashion supplement, or a housewares show around a housewares magazine, etc. Don’t ignore the "screen-agers" Robert Stalmach, Director Content Licensing & Mobile, Agora SA, Poland Everybody talks about the revenue potential of content on mobile phones, but few have delivered. Agora in Poland has a three-pronged strategy aimed at doing just that. It starts with a group that Mr Stalmach identifies as "screen-agers" - the teenagers who are twice as likely to use mobile internet than other groups. These screen-agers make up one-third of all mobile internet users and are comfortable with the platform. The three pillars of Agora’s mobile strategy aim to position its brands in the new channel, develop traffic and the customer base, and provide revenue. It uses different content and applications to reach each of its goals. To position its brands, Agora has created a "lite" mobile portal, launched in August 2007, with video and audio, geo-local identification of users and local delivery of content. It generates traffic through games, loyalty programmes, lotteries and by creating mobile communities. Revenue comes through content syndication to mobile operators and other service providers, digital TV broadcasting, mobile advertising and through sales of personalized content. But like others have found, revenues are presently small with vast future potential. Mr Stalmach says the best potential lies in video, music, mobile internet, mobile advertising, games and mobile TV. Some of the present revenue generators such as ringtones are fading away, with the rise of music in MP3 format, he says. Newspaper audiences are growing! Andre McGarrigle, Director of Research and Customer Insight, Guardian News & Media, United Kingdom Guardian News & Media has 1.1 million readers of its flagship newspaper, 1.3 million for the weekly Observer and more than 19 million unique monthly visitors to guardian.co.uk. "But we’re still measured in silos," says Mr McGarrigle - the independent auditing firms provide no combined measurement. The perception is that newspapers are in decline, when in fact the opposite is true, based on total audience numbers, says Mr McGarrigle. And print and web aren’t the only platforms reaching consumers - Guardian provides content through mobile devices, blogs, podcasts and video, e-mails, magazines and more. "Newspapers are no longer newspapers. They are news brands," says Mr McGarrigle. His presentation described the Total Audience UK measurement, a quarterly survey of 2,000 nationally representative respondents who are asked about their reading and usage of all national press titles and their websites. As respondents also provide wealth, age and other demographic information about themselves, the survey provides an accurate and precise picture of total reach, and the wealth and other characteristics of audience that makes them particularly attractive to advertisers. "You can’t define media by their distribution method any more. You can’t measure them by their distribution method any more either," he says. Making sense of changing media Marcus Wilding, Vice President, Carat Global Management, UK/Austria The fragmented media market has created revolutionary changes for media agencies, says Mr Wilding. "What we’re doing is, we’re moving away from, ’here’s a space, we want to buy it,’ to ’here’s a story, what can we do together to amplify it." What’s caused the change is, "people have moved away from a mainstream media to a huge amount of ’mystream’ media," he says. "The book of marketing has been rewritten. It’s all about consumer decisions, and how marketing can help them make the right decisions about the topics that are pertinent to them." Mr Wilding demonstrated several campaigns designed to tell stories, to get people to act and to talk about them. Here are two of his insights and forecasts:  Search engines will become the on-line platforms for all media owners. "Only through them will consumers seek you out and engage with you," he says. "We believe search will be the biggest medium going forward."  Media brands will become increasingly important in this environment. "I believe media brands will act as important lighthouses in the sea of search," he says. Content is still king - on the web Espen Udland, CEO and Editor, ABC Startsiden, Norway For the 47 people who put together the unique web portal ABC Startsiden, it is not technological innovation that leads to success on the web. Content is king. "Our philosophy is to offer a service which is ’straightforward - without unnecessary design features or refinements, with high-quality content and with independent editorial assessment of which content and which Internet sites are highlighted, " says Mr Udland. "With us, editorial content and financial interests are not mixed - you can be sure that our recommendations are professionally rather than financially motivated. ABC Startsiden is therefore a counterbalance to a lot of what you will otherwise find on the Internet these days," he says. The site includes a subject director with 80,000 links divided into 3,000 categories, the news site ABC Nyheter Norway, which mixes articles from a small editorial staff with those of citizen journalists, ABC TV, which provides news and entertainment, and a news aggregation site that gives users news from more than 250 online Norwegian newspapers. The formula attracts 800,000 unique users a day, or 90 percent of every Norwegian logged on during a month. And though profits are still modest - 60,000 , the profit margin is a whopping 58 percent. Ad Sales Lessons from Google Len Kubas, President, Kubas Consultants, Canada "Newspapers cannot expect digital advertising to pull them into the future, when more than 90 percent of their advertising and workflow is based on the past," says Mr Kubas, whose company has been advising newspapers for more than 30 years. He argued there is a serious disconnect between the way that newspapers price and sell print advertising and the way advertisers buy media today, especially digital media. Traditional advertising practices "sabotage" newspapers trying to do business digitally, slow the transition to digital sales, and reduce the ability to leverage negotiations and pricing, he says. Mr Kubas said Google was worth emulating; the company made it easy to do business. Advertisers can buy ads with Google by credit card, anytime, with self-service ad templates provided, and no human intervention. Google also provides real-time measurement tools, a choice of niche or general audience, and makes it easy to change the advertisement and schedule. Mr Kubas provided a checklist of things newspapers can do to improve th sales and buying process. Here are a few of them:  Simplify how advertising is sold and bought.  Eliminate long-stranding obstacles and unproductive practices.  Use print business to fund digital.