The regional newspaper industry value chain in the digital age
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The regional newspaper industry value chain in the digital age Gary Graham* and John Hill Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, Booth Street West, Manchester, M15 6PB, UK. E-mails: [email protected], jdhill@coachhousecottage. freeserve.co.uk *Corresponding author.
Abstract
The literature on electronic commerce has bombarded managers with various suggestions and recommendations as how to understand and manage the Internet from the perspective of value chain management (Choudhury and Karahanna, 2008; Stone, 2003). There is however limited academic research on the newspaper industry. Our research sought to answer the question of how the Internet is impacting on the processes of creation, production and distribution in the newspaper industry value chain. In order to answer this question 15 semistructured, in-depth interviews were conducted at three regional newspapers. The potential operational and strategic benefits from the Internet have been well documented in the literature (Cao and Humphreys, 2002; Anketell, 2003, 2004), but our findings showed that it was met by initial fear and rejection. Newspapers are now starting to use the Internet as an operant resource and are working proactively with consumers to develop various forms of relationship value. We highlight the role of consumers in the creation of news (editorial) content and consumer-driven moves toward a multimedia platform of distribution (including television, online, mobile and printed forms). Insights from the findings are used to generate comparisons between traditional and Internet age newspapers. Finally, the paper concludes by presenting some interesting implications for managers. OR Insight (2009) 22, 165–183. doi:10.1057/ori.2009.5
Keywords: regional newspapers; internet; value chains; consumer interactivity
& 2009 Operational Research Society Ltd OR Insight www.palgrave-journals.com/ori/
Vol. 22, 3, 165–183
Graham and Hill
Introduction The Internet has the potential to fundamentally change the structure of value chains, but only if consumers choose to adopt electronic channels (Anketell, 2007; Choudhury and Karahanna, 2008). The advance of the Internet is leading to significant disruptions in the newspaper industry value chain (Economist, 2006). Schonbach and Lauf (2005) note that the Internet increasingly operates as an early warning and monitoring system for breaking news. Digital news and newspapers are among the most used Internet services, second only to e-mail (Newspaper Association of America, 2003; Eveland et al, 2004). As Carlson (2007) notes, the advent of the Internet is fundamentally altering the newspaper value chain model. Their way of doing business is being revolutionised: resulting in significant changes in organisational processes, structure, culture and power distributions (Cao and Humphreys, 2002). Journalists and editors can no longer publish news for a passive consumer audience: instead the Internet is contributing towards a much more participative dialogue between the purveyors and consumers of n
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