Business Model for Content Provider [social media]

While the press media and music industry are still struggling in copyright violation on Internet, whether a emerging Internet media like Youtube could be a monster or be a angel to content providers is still a question. From traditional media point of view, the media creates the content, plays a role on producers and distributors, and has the right to gain the margin exclusively. When we apply the producing process into an audience-driven business, publishers need to take follow mindset into account.

1. The content is no longer the center of publishers’ model.
Usually the newspaper or magazine websites are hard to generate enough traffic by their own to gain the profit on a cost-per-thousand (CPM) basis. (Epps, 2008) Therefore, the nature of content on audience- driven media becomes “aggregated”, “syndicated”, and “social”. “Aggregated” means that publishers should develop the function or interface for audience to bring their content or from other source, which may be needed by others, to the website. “Syndicated” means to extend your usefulness to where your customers spend the most time because the publishers should deliver content to your audience members wherever they are. (Epps, 2008) ex. BusinessWeek publishes its content to BlackBerry users by converting its content into mobile friendly interface. The last one, “Social” means that the new role of editors and journalists are no longer produce content but are likely the moderators and curators.

2. The required capability to evaluate the performance.
Social media usually generate the intangible benefit rather than tangible profit. Therefore, how to evaluate the performance is not straightforward as traditional media. The effect metrics could be a means to address this issue. Publishers should create its own metrics that is meaningful and suitable for its core business or the features that its customers are willing to buy in. For example, an e-commerce website captures margin by selling goods online and it needs the repeating visits from it customers. The simply products information is not strong enough to attract people visiting again and again. In such, the publishers can provide their content associated with the e-commerce websites who share the same target audience profile, creating incentive for their members to establish a more frequently visiting habit.


[Bibliography]
Epps, S. R. (2008). What Does An Audience-Focused Model Really Mean For Publishers? Massachusetts: Forrester Research, Inc.