Here are four things we learned from News Corp CEO Robert Thomson’s interview at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media & Telecom Conference on March 4, 2021.
Digital Subscriptions Continue to be Key for News Corp, Readers and Advertisers
Dow Jones had reached a record 4.03 million average subscriptions for the quarter (Q2 fiscal 2021). That quarter’s results showed that digital only subscriptions grew 29% YOY. Digital only subscriptions to the Journal grew 28% to more than 2.46 million average subscriptions for the quarter. Digital only subs represented more than 3 in 4 of total Journal subscriptions.
Thomson says the vast majority of these subscriptions are coming from individuals. The average age of subscribers is coming done from 56 to 49 years old in the past 4 years. The CEO reports that average pages viewed by digital subscribers is higher and churn is lower.
“Premium content deserves a premium,” Thomson says, “Advertisers understand that a paying co-hort is a buying co-hort.”
Dow Jones has been able to upsell once a reader subscribes. “We’re able to take advantage of incoming subscribers to maximize their reading experience – providing wisdom and insight to them- and to our revenue experience,” says Thomson.
For example, with the newly launched Marketwatch premium service, over half of those subscribing are also signing up for Barron’s.
History Was Made at the United States’ Oldest Newspaper
Thomson mentioned that the New York Post reported its first profit in modern times. The Post was founded in 1801 by Alexander Hamilton.
“Hamilton, the paper, isn’t as profitable as Hamilton the musical, yet”
News Corp CEO Robert Thomson
The New Google Partnership Is a Reset
We knew News Corp and Google agreed to a global partnership on news in February 2021. It was described then as a “historic multi-year partnership with Google to provide trusted journalism from its news sites around the world in return for significant payments by Google.”
Thomson called the partnership a “reset” between the companies. News Corp is working with Google to create new content sets across financial, audio and video.
“The pandemic has prompted introspection. It’s a catalyst for contemplation.”
News Corp CEO Robert Thomson
The partnership with Google is “a very textured and thoughtful deal.” By working closely with Google and having the privilege of proximity with the Google team, Thomson says they are getting a much better sense of what the content landscape will look like in the future.
The Google revenue deal is important because, according to Thomson, “Journalism has to be sustainable. The Fourth Estate is about to get a second wind.”
News Corp is Preparing For the Evolution of the Advertising Side of the Business with the Death of the Cookie
Thomson commented that the fiscal Q2 2021 quarter saw “reasonable” digital advertising revenues. Digital advertising was up sharply and, while Thomson can’t comment on future revenues, he hinted that Q3 ad results should be “reasonable” as well.
Preparing for the evolution of the advertising market with the “death of the cookie will be an important moment” for News Corp, Thomson says. His firm has the advantage of being able to aggregate audiences across their network. For example, The Wall Street Journal, Realtor, the New York Post Network and Marketwatch give them unique scale.
News Corp is using insights from their audiences to find co-horts with shared interests. For example, a Mansion reader may be looking at similar content as a Realtor user. News Corp can introduce Realtor content to them.
