What I’ve been reading: Non-profit journalism revenue strategies, lessons from grant funding hyperlocal publishers + 2024 the year of elections

Good morning. This will be the final what I’ve been reading post of this year, although there may be a couple of deep-dive posts to come over the Christmas period.

I’d like to thank everyone who has taken the time to subscribe to my newsletter in the past few months, read the blog posts, share them or get in touch to discuss something.

Here’s a few interesting bits from around the web I’ve spotted in the past few days to share…

Nonprofits embrace profits – Adam Thomas – part of the Nieman Lab series about predictions for 2024, this is a good read about how for non-profit media titles then this next 12-months will see an acceleration of diversifying revenue streams. With advertising and philantrophy called out as two of the biggest growth areas. I think having a pie chart for revenues that has multiple areas is the key, some will be steady state but others need to be bolted on or growing. I thought Adam’s point in particular about how brands are now seeking out what they describe as ‘micro-influencers’ so brands between either 1,000-10,000 followers or 10,000-50,000 followers in a niche was interesting both for emerging media like hyperlocal titles but also established media too. It all comes down to, if you’ve got an engaged audience, that you can demonstrate with metrics or impact, then you’ve got something you can turn into a business.

Direct funding alone does not make a news business more sustainable – Lisa Heyamoto, Lion Publishers – and linked to the above, there are a lot of calls for more direct subsidy funding of news outlets (particularly start-ups) and this piece from Lion Publishers (which represents independent local media in the United States) shared their lessons from direct-funding to 12 member publishers. Does giving a handout of between $65,000-$89,000 immediately make a title sustainable? Not quite was the answer. As with most projects/initiatives, there’s a whole host of factors – the person involved, the market they are operating in, the tech they utilise, these all have a bearing beyond the funding coins. This was aligned with a post from Jonathan Heawood, the Public Interest News Foundation executive director, who appeared to suggest his thinking was changing from just a pure charity-type/direct funding model. I think this is positive, we need to inspire and encourage entrepreneurship and innovation within the local media sector. It’s about creating conditions, and supportive environments, for individuals to take risks. It is taking risk that creates investment and opportunity, but the nature of risk means that some enterprises will fail and everyone has to become comfortable with this.

U.S. political ad market projected to reach record $16 billion in 2024 – Sara Fischer, Axios – next year is set to be a bump for subscriptions, advertising and digital audiences as both the UK and the US experience elections. There are also major elections in South Africa, Brazil, India, Sri Lanka, Finland, Iceland and Russia. Talk about a turning point year. This should be a healthy shot in the arm for most publishers, of all sizes, strategies and scales. The key is thinking now about the content and audience strategy to take advantage of this and ensure you’re ready for the audience-interest burst and then retaining those readers who re-discover the publication during the election. It’s also about purpose too, covering an election is always thrilling and why so many journalists got into doing what they do.

One of the many election counts I’ve covered in Preston over the years!

But how do we ensure the election supports the chosen business model of the publication? If you’d like to tap into my strategic experience of covering and planning for many a UK general and local election then drop me a line on ed@almaonline.co.uk

And that’s a wrap on the round-up posts for 2023. As I’ve mentioned previously then TinyLetter is turning off so over Christmas I’m going to be attempted to migrate my blog and newsletter to a new service – so things may well look different in 2024.

Have a fantastic Christmas and hope everyone gets an opportunity to switch off and recharge with family, friends, loved ones.

Ed