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Embracing the Executioner?
For now, at least, ‘traditional' media wax enthusiastic about the Internet as a powerful tool to enhance their reach
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Business New Haven
2/22/1999
By: Sharon Cohen
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The Internet's impact on present-day life would have been difficult to envision even as little as five years ago. Today, the Web informs, entertains and connects tens of millions of people across the globe.
But what about this new arrival's impact on traditional media - newspapers, radio and television?
It's a two-sided coin. Local media agree that online technology must be viewed as a threat: One should always take action when new competition sets up shop. However, they also concur that the Web presents numerous opportunities to each medium and its particular audience.
Based on some of the latest market research, television may have the most to fear from the Web. Studies conflict regarding whether online surfers view less TV. A recent America Online study by Nielsen Media Research reported Internet households watching 15 percent less television than their non-online counterparts.
By contrast, a study commissioned by Discovery Communications Inc. looked further into this Nielsen data and found that TV use actually increased by every Web visitor except teenagers. An MTV Networks study showed the same: “People don't quit watching television because they go online. They do more of both,” notes Betsy Frank, executive vice president for research.
“TV didn't kill off print and radio; it added another medium to fill the audiences' information and entertainment needs. The Internet does the same,” says Mary Lee Weber, director of marketing for WTNH-TV in New Haven.
Channel 8's own Web presence provides both a promotional and informational tool for the station. “Our site offers great added value to our advertisers and gives us another way to communicate with viewers,” she adds.
WTNH promotes its Web site on air to tie the two media together, says Weber. Likewise, commercials reach the viewing audience and corresponding Web banners link visitors directly to the advertiser's home page. The www.wtnh.com site, for example, currently includes a box with a clickable logo sending onliners directly to the home page of Madison bookseller R.J. Julia.
A matching promotion on TV and the Web for the Shubert theater's production of The Civil War announces a student essay contest about this historic event.
Channel 8's site also gives viewers and surfers an opportunity for input and feedback, as well as around-the-clock information-gathering. Through “8 Interactive,” viewers may e-mail their opinions on the day's most pressing issues. Some of these comments are featured on the 5 p.m. news. Viewers can go also on site 24 hours a day for updated news, weather reports, school closings and specials such as a “Real Video” of the city of New Haven from Chopper 8 Live's cockpit-cam.
“We give the news on television and then suggest that viewers go online for additional information. It's a way to connect to us - even after we're off the air,” adds Weber. “We've always done tie-ins with local radio stations. Now we can do the same with our Web site, which keeps our audience in the WTNH domain despite their using a different medium.”
Channel 8 webmaster Jeff Bailey says that his site is serving up more than three times the number of pages this January vs. March of 1998. The number of visitors often depends on factors as prosaic as the weather. The Doppler screen that's updated every 90 seconds becomes a great hit during storms, again demonstrating WTNH's value to its local audience.
An online article by Steve Outing of Editor & Publisher magazine says that the number of people going to Web sites for news is closing fast on those getting that same news in print.
These growing numbers of online news-seekers do not necessarily mean reduced newspaper readership, however. A study by Pew Research Center reports that 75 percent of Internet news consumers say they get “more” of their news from traditional outlets.
The growth of online news comes as no surprise to newspapers worldwide that have posted their own online sites over the years. Actually, it's difficult to find any streetwise daily that doesn't have some Web presence.
Howard Griffin, vice president of advertising for the Journal-Register Co., the Trenton, N.J.-based parent of the New Haven Register, says that the Internet is becoming a bigger part of the company's business all the time. It's viewed as an opportunity to further support and supplement newspaper advertising and content products.
The company's www.ctcentral.com includes an array of services including news from Journal-Register papers statewide as well as the Associated Press, classifieds, horoscopes, puzzles, comics, continuously updated weather, personals ads, as well as dining, sports and entertainment guides.
The Hartford Courant went online five years ago, says Mark Del Vecchio, the paper's general manager of electronic publishing. “We felt that if we viewed ourselves as information providers, we must give this information to our readers any way we can,” he says.
In those early days, the Web wasn't seen as a threat, only a way to extend reach. Now, it's different, he explains.
“Today you have to view the Internet as a threat like any new business that comes into your territory,” says Del Vecchio. “If you don't, you're not looking ahead.”
This oldest continuously published U.S. daily takes the offensive by using the Web as an opportunity to fulfill its mission of providing readers with the most up-to-date information on Connecticut. People go to the Courant site for news as well as services such as classified searches, statewide movie times, restaurant listings, a Connecticut Internet directory, audio sports updates and five Web-only columnists' features. “Page views are increasing about 100,000 per month,” says Del Vecchio.
Visiting times to the Courant's site shed light on how readers are using both print and online media for their information needs. The Hartford paper has its highest print circulation and lowest Web usage on Sundays, for example.
The profile of surfers is well-rounded: E-mail comes in equally from female and male users, and the site serves both younger and older Web travelers.
And, of course, the site generates an additional revenue stream for the Courant. A paid news library service brings in additional dollars, as do the classifieds. The paper also builds Web sites for customers and, if necessary, hosts them on its own server. In addition, advertisers buy banners or sponsor pages.
The paper's first advertisers were online businesses that wanted a link from the Hartford Courant Web site to their own home pages. Many Web businesses can presently be found on “The Mall” feature. Local retailers have also been joining the ad effort, putting marketing moneys into online advertising as well as print.
Wagner Nissan of Simsbury contracts with a national online service that links anyone requesting information about Nissan automobiles in Wagner's selling area to the dealership's home page, explains Bruce O'Brien, the dealer's general sales manager.
In addition, the dealership “decided to advertise on the Hartford Courant's site because of its high number of classified users.” O'Brien quickly discovered that online advertising could increase business “dramatically.”
O'Brien also discovered, however, that his advertising had to be rotated to get the best payback. The bites from the Courant were highest when the ad first appeared, diminishing over time as they reached many of the same users again and again.
O'Brien is now contemplating advertising on Channel 30's Web site to try to duplicate the Courant's early performance. “So you don't become invisible after time, you have to travel around to different locations,” he says.
The Courant's Del Vecchio says his paper continually seeks to enhance its online offerings. In the future, he expects increasing e-commerce with national retailers, a growing number of local retailers going online, a big push with the Patriots' arrival in 2001, and always more features on UConn Huskies hoops, male and female.
Like its TV and print counterparts, radio outlets are also building web sites. The WKCI site was launched about four years ago, says Carl Osgood, the station's webmaster. The main purpose was giving listeners another way to get in touch with the station.
“We found that many of our listeners would rather use e-mail to make requests or play contests,” Osgood explains.
The site's design, he says, is kept simple without features like Java so that pages load quickly. “We offer a highly interactive site in a friendly, low-tech way,” he says.
All music requests go directly to the music director and the deejays' e-mail is delivered right to them, not lost in oblivion. Shows such as Glenn Beck's “The Impeachment of Character” on sister station WELI generate a lot of interest online by those individuals who would rather use e-mail or have problems getting through on the telephone,” says Osgood.
All of the Web site's construction and updating is done in-house, Osgood explains. “We control everything to guarantee it's kept current and gives our listeners what they want,” he says. “Radio is immediate and live, and so our Web site should be the same.”
The site also provides other services to listeners such as online registration for events like the annual Bridal Fair at the New Haven Coliseum, a list of area concerts and a music trivia search. The radio station's site also offers 50 streams of real audio, which are almost always in use by people on computers at home or in the office.
Osgood doesn't view the Internet as competition for the radio station. If anything, listenership is increased since people at work will go online if they don't have a radio.
Interestingly, the site is most active from 4 to 5 p.m. at the end of the work day, dips down at 6 p.m. during dinnertime and then rises until the early morning hours. Online listeners come from as far away as Brazil, the UK and Singapore.
What does the future hold for these TV, newspaper and radio sites?
Presently, Internet users approach news on the Web as a tool for supplementing, not replacing, their traditional media sources. Only time will tell if this trend continues.
In the meantime, the Internet will further grow in popularity and available services. To remain competitive, traditional media will need to refine their online strategies to ensure they can provide added value to their advertisers, readers, listeners and viewers.
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