Case Analysis Note

On
Digital Transformation at La Presse:
Crafting a New Digital Strategy

Group 3 – H Section
Gokhul S A (PGP/23/440)
Bhanu Nelavalli (PGP/23/454)
Adithya Palakurthy (PGP/23/459)
Vishwanth S R (PGP/23/469)
Ranjith Roshan (PGP/23/470)
Shabnas C (PGP/23/476)
1. How would you describe the newspaper publishing industry in 2009?
A. There are three types of publishers in the newspaper industry during 2009.
 Those who have only printed form of newspapers ; These are the companies who
are still printing newspapers to the readers and not started online editions or
forms to attract new kind of modern readers but sticking to the traditional kind
of readers. Their operational cost is high due to printing and logistics and is facing
troubles in managing finances.
 Those who have both printed form and online forms : These are the companies .
serving traditional readers who are mainly dependent on printed newspapers for
obtaining news and serving millennial readers who are depending online sites or
applications to receive the news. They are taking care of all kind of readers in
order to achieve profit. Online forms helped to receive news in simple clicks and
it is instantaneous. So more people are shifting to online forms which are utilised
by this kind of companies.
 Those who have only online forms : These companies have only online forms of
newspapers like offering news through interest. They are solely focussing on new
kind of readers and avoiding traditional readers. Their operational cost is low but
facing high competitions as it is easy to start online platform without much
capital.
2. How has La Presse+ addressed the threats and opportunities in the newspaper
publishing industry?
A. There was a trend of decreasing circulation of daily newspapers, and even though
most of the publishers had moved online, revenue streams from these online channels
were not sufficient enough to compensate for losses due to declining print circulation.
Revenue sources for the industry were declining. Internet advertising, with greater
advantages than print advertising, was growing at a rapid rate and cut into the
advertising revenue of the print newspapers. Also, digital platforms catering to specific
clienteles came up that made classifieds moot.
La Presse had high operational costs, found a need to attract young readers who
preferred to get their news online, and these online readers were less lucrative than
traditional print readers. This was because even though online media reached a wider
base of audiences, it brought in significantly lesser revenue than print media did.
 Additionally, about half of the marketers’ digital advertising budget was set aside for
SEO, which made this amount inaccessible to digital media.
Most newspapers used paywalls (hard or soft) for their digital operations to ensure
the creation of a monetization channel. But newspapers that did this had been
observed to have low chances of success. Besides, only newspapers that published
specialized, business-oriented content tended to succeed, according to the president
of La Presse.
While most newspapers had simply digitized their offline content, La Presse+ gave an
equal importance to ensure content was engaging and that the UI was user-friendly
and interactive. La Presse+ was designed for tablets as increased touchscreen
interaction (compared to mobiles) could be leveraged to integrate advertisements and
content better. This required the creation of media rich ads specific to La Presse+. To
address the paywall issue, the company initially offered the app free of charge on the
iPad platform. This was done because young adults, whom the company wanted to
target, desired access to free information and to cater to this the barriers to readership
and audience growth needed to be removed. Subsequently, it also became the first
tablet media company to get its advertising impressions certified by the AAM. This
validation was crucial for advertisers to drive home the product potential.
3. Which direction should Crevier take when developing the La Presse+ further?
A. Advancements in screen size and quality helped the smartphones to overtake on
tablets, in their ability to reach more audiences. According to statistics, Phablets are
now leading the growth in mobile device adoption. Adoption of infinite (end to end)
display and high-quality display (QLED, 4K) has been on the rise. La Presse+ now needs
to focus squarely on how to adapt to these new generation smartphones and deliver
better value to the readers. La Presse needs to stop the print paper and completely
transform itself into digital gradually. La Presse+ needs to dedicate a team to revamp
the design and display of the app which will be compatible with the emerging
smartphones. In order to increase the readership and to take La Presse+ into
smartphone users, several design elements have to be added and modified.
Millennials, mainly the working-age population, prefer the content to be more precise
and to the point. Hence, short news features have to be incorporated. Users should
have the provision of sharing articles and news which would further increase the
outreach. Features such as stories should be implemented to show breaking news or
trendy news in the app, to improve the user experience. Podcasts are another
disruption, which brings up a change in the medium/channel and also cater to a
specific user segment. La Presse+ should continuously adapt and evolve with the
trends and incorporate technological additions. Advertising technology (Ad Tech) is
another disruptive space which can improve audience targetting as well as ad revenue.
It will enable recommendations to individual users based on their historical usage and
preferences. This will further enhance the overall value. AI and Machine Learning can
also be incorporated to give auto recommendations based on user profiles which can
be understood using data available with La Presse+. Furthermore, La Presse+ can be
integrated with assistants like Siri or Alexa to deliver news to the users based on voice
commands.