It’s no secret that the emergence of news-hosting platforms such as Google News, Facebook and Twitter are biting into the revenue of traditional newspaper outlets, but new research says it will cost UK newspapers £500m by 2026.
OC&C Strategy Consultants embarked upon consumer research of 10,000 people to find what the extent of the damage was in the UK, and revealed that such platforms were projected to gain a more dominant hold of news streams and traffic, costing the traditional newspaper industry around 10-15 per cent in revenues by 2026, based upon analysis of their impact upon the industry so far.
Online disruption has cost the UK news industry nearly half of its revenue (46 per cent) in the last decade. News reading habits are remarkably different amongst millennials than their older peers too. 41 per cent of UK millennials rely on social media or links shared by friends to find news content, compared to just eight per cent of over 55s.
Toby Chapman, associate partner at OC&C Strategy Consultants, said: “News publishers need to think hard about their brand, a strong and distinct editorial voice will be crucial to achieve cut through in the platform era.
“Next, publishers need to partner with, not work against, platforms to help them develop their news offer. As the traffic to platforms continues to grow and as they develop an increasingly important role in categorising and curating content, working with them will ensure content is used effectively.”
He concluded however that publishers should guard their customer data in order to retain authority with advertisers.
