I recently had the opportunity to attend the PPA Festival in London. The PPA (Professional Publishers Association) is the trade body for specialist media businesses in the UK with members including the likes of Bauer Media Group, Condé Nast, Future PLC, Haymarket Media Group and Hearst UK. The festival was a dynamic event with impressive diversity both in the themes covered and the backgrounds of the speakers and it prompted me to reflect on some of the key questions that media organisations should be asking themselves:
1: Will AI destroy Search?
There was a lively debate between Ricky Sutton, author of the Future Media newsletter and Stuart Forrest, Head of SEO of Bauer Media. Ricky was bearish on the outlook for Search, speaking about the rise of ‘no-click search.’ This is the view that experiences like ChatGPT and Perplexity will encourage readers to consume information within those ecosystems, eliminating the need for referral links. Stuart’s more optimistic argument is that Google is unlikely to prioritise SGE as it could cannibalise Google’s core advertising business.
2: Will B2B face more disruption than B2C?
Katie Vaneck-Smith, CEO of Hearst UK thinks that B2B has more to lose than B2C when it comes to AI. She expressed her view that B2B is “ultimately about analysing large datasets” and that AI is going to make this much easier whereas B2C readers will continue to look for more human-led and human-curated experiences. While her co-panelist, the Managing Director of the B2B-focused Haymarket did not argue this point, they later had an intriguing debate about revenue diversification (see below).
3: Can Social Media make you money?
This packed session focused mainly on the referral opportunity presented by Influencers. An example from Pepper, a marketing agency, was a campaign Steven Bartlett did to prompt The Financial Time’s new App: FT Edit. The ‘Diary of a CEO’ star was shown as an example of a way to access an entirely new market and grow your brand. Attribution can be a challenge, but the presenters spoke about the idea of a ‘halo’ of influence that has an indirect but tangible effect on KPIs.
4: Are memberships and subscriptions the same thing?
This discussion brought up several interesting examples from outside of publishing, such as the National Trust - one of the most successful member schemes in the UK. Author Robbie Kellman Baxter felt that many companies misuse the word membership in their marketing. The panellists agreed that memberships are held to a higher standard. As Tony Lewis of CAMRA put it, a member should be treated “like a stakeholder.”
5: Does it matter how a media business makes money?
The CEO of Hearst UK, Katie Vaneck-Smith and the Managing Director of Haymarket, Phillip Swinden, exchanged thoughts on revenue diversification, a theme we will be discussing in detail at our upcoming webinar. Phillip was of the view that his company should focus on making their core activity (selling subscriptions) profitable. By contrast, Katie spoke about the importance of events and other ancillary activities, posing the question “Does it really matter” where the money comes from?
To conclude the event, there was a remarkable, moving discussion featuring Jo Hamilton, former Sub-Postmistress, about the Post Office Scandal - a story brought into the National conversation thanks to the recent ITV drama- but one that Bryan Glick and his team at Computer Weekly reported tirelessly on for years. It was a powerful reminder of the importance of specialist journalism and why I got into this business in the first place. As Jo put it, “We finally have a voice. Without journalism, none of this would have happened.”
Photo from Aliya Itzkowitz
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