Empowering News Media Start-ups

Patrick McGee

Fortune favours the bold

Any news media start-up that succeeds will deservingly enjoy any and all fortune that they produce, as the product of news transfers from being a primarily printed product to an online entity that is enriched by skill rather than manufacture.

Established publishers

Established publishers are facing similar challenges to evolve and adapt the business modals that have assisted them in the past, and turn them into sleeker modals to match and improve upon those used by leading social media operators.

New publishers

New publishers in contrast typically have to use creativity and imagination in an attempt to break into the marketplace and build the networks and resources that established publishers have spent years to acquire.

Possible solutionsBusiness Modals

Brokerage

Advertising

Infomediary

Merchant

Manufacturer (Direct)

Affiliate

Community

Subscription

Utility

There is one business modal Michael Rappa identified which stands out and could be utilised to generate additional income streams.

Affiliates

The Affiliate modal is a pay-by-performance business modal where customers are introduced to a third party product or service and if any transactions occur then a percentage is returned in commission to the party who creates the introduction.

Online practise

In an online environment this usually appears as banner ads or hyperlinks that contain smart tags to identify the affiliate operating that site allowing the third parties server to track any transactions.

Extending the process

The power of this modal for news start-ups is that the modal allows publishers to take ownership of the process at no start-up cost and extend the use beyond just embedding the smart tags and use this as an opportunity to test other business modals which require capital to start operation.