Promoting new journalism business models

Attending the workshop were journalist Le Quoc Minh, member of the Party Central Committee, Editor-in-Chief of Nhan Dan Newspaper, Deputy Head of the Central Propaganda Department, President of the Vietnam Journalists Association.

Speaking at the conference, Editor-in-Chief of VietnamPlus Electronic Newspaper Tran Tien Duan said that in the 2024 trend report, WAN-IFRA said that global news publishers expect 20% of their total revenue to come from new sources, in addition to the two traditional sources of advertising and profits from readers. Specifically, the new business models for newspapers mentioned are organizing events, calling for investment capital, partnering with digital platforms, e-commerce, affiliate marketing or data business, etc.

Delegates attending the workshop "Technology promotes revenue diversification for journalism".

According to the largest-ever survey announced by the Vietnam Journalists Association on the occasion of the 2024 National Press Festival, the three main sources of revenue for press agencies in Vietnam are still traditional models, including: print advertising, state budget, media contracts... The remaining sources of revenue that the world press is promoting have not yet been implemented by many editorial offices in Vietnam, revenue is still quite low, and even the fee for reading electronic newspapers has not met expectations.

Meanwhile, most of the new revenue sources listed by WAN-IFRA are the effects of digital transformation. In other words, digital transformation has helped many press agencies explore new lands, which may not be as fertile as expected, but show real potential. The Digital Transformation Strategy for Press to 2025, vision 2030 issued by the government last year has also paved the way for newsrooms with the direction of helping press agencies optimize revenue by switching to new business models in the direction of digital journalism.

Journalist Tran Tien Duan emphasized: The workshop "Technology promotes the diversification of press revenue sources" is expected to introduce many new press business models, lessons learned, and innovations from leading press agencies in the world as well as in Vietnam.

Editor-in-Chief of VietnamPlus Electronic Newspaper Tran Tien Duan delivered the opening speech at the workshop.

At the workshop, journalist Le Quoc Minh assessed the current use of technology by press agencies, talked about trends in journalism, media and technology in 2024; the issue of technology creating fake news; and how press agencies are looking for sources of revenue.

According to journalist Le Quoc Minh: The story of revenue sources is a hot story, receiving a lot of attention, especially from the press. We know that the press has made an irreparable mistake, which is to put all the content online. It makes users have a habit that when they go online, there will be content and information.

For a long time, we have relied on Facebook and some other social media platforms in the hope of gaining more traffic. However, with reports from the beginning of the year until now, "marrying" with social networks is full of risks. Facebook constantly changes its policies. Or TikTok is currently growing very quickly, Youtube also has certain growth levels, ... all show that we have been and are facing challenges to change our attention if we want to continue to take advantage of our relationship with social networks.

Journalist Le Quoc Minh, member of the Party Central Committee, Editor-in-Chief of Nhan Dan Newspaper, Deputy Head of the Central Propaganda Department, Chairman of the Vietnam Journalists Association shared a lot of information about revenue sources for the press at the workshop.

Talking about another source of income for the press, journalist Le Quoc Minh shared: In 2012, we started to mention the issue of collecting fees on electronic newspapers. Many people were sarcastic and said that with this kind of press, who would pay? Of course, if the content is not good, who would pay? However, collecting fees now also faces many other challenges.

According to the latest survey by Reuters, 55% of respondents said they would never pay a penny to read newspapers online, or if they did, 20-30%, a very small percentage, would accept spending from 10 to 20 dollars a month. Besides, after the COVID pandemic, the economic situation became difficult, many people cut spending, including expenses related to journalism. Although they can pay for other income, the psychology of readers paying to read online newspapers is a huge obstacle.

There is also a growing trend of news avoidance. Although the number of people who "unplug" and avoid the news is a minority, this is a worrying thing for journalists. They do not want to read the news not because we are bored with the news, but because when they open the news, they see negative things that make them unhappy. Among them are wars, epidemics, conflicts... this is also a very worrying trend that makes many people not want to update the news continuously.

Journalist Pham Anh Tuan - Director of the Department of External Information - Ministry of Information and Communications spoke at the workshop.

Also at the conference, journalist Le Quoc Minh took the time to share about the use of AI by press agencies today. He emphasized that AI is increasingly superior to the point of being able to fabricate true stories, quote very convincing quotes, and worse, AI produces fake news thousands of times faster than humans. The more people are flooded with fake news, the smaller our press becomes, and the fewer people read it.

“We encourage press agencies to boldly have multiple sources of revenue, each press agency ensures 3-4 sources of revenue, in which revenue from readers is important. To have revenue from readers, we must retain data and information from readers, the more the better, and continue to rely on social networks. In addition, it is necessary to diversify revenue sources, such as organizing events, marketing partnerships…” - journalist Le Quoc Minh suggested.

At the workshop, speakers also presented technological solutions to help newsrooms develop readers, improve the efficiency and effectiveness of information as a lever for the press economy. They proposed effective measures to help press agencies perform their political tasks well, promptly spreading the policies of the Party and State to the public.

Journalist Le Trong Minh, Editor-in-Chief of Investment Newspaper, spoke at the conference.

Journalist Le Trong Minh, Editor-in-Chief of Dau Tu Newspaper, believes that press agencies need to find ways to diversify their revenue sources. Specifically, based on the reality of the shift in advertising from traditional newspapers to digital platforms and social networks, press agencies also need to approach many other ways to increase revenue. Diversifying revenue sources does not mean switching to new sources of revenue, but the core of journalism is still the quality of the products that press agencies bring to the public...

In addition, leaders of some press agencies such as: journalist Nguyen Thanh Loi, Editor-in-Chief of Economic and Urban Newspaper shared about the development of digital advertising in the current trend of digital transformation of newspapers; Ms. Nguyen Ngoc Diep, Deputy General Director of Business of Vietnam Economic Magazine also shared the unit's experience in press economic activities...

Also at the workshop, a number of experts from domestic and foreign enterprises such as Google, Techcity, Akamai... shared technology solutions to support operations, press publishing and finding business opportunities on digital platforms.

Guests experience augmented reality (AR) technology from Techcity.

On the sidelines of the conference, delegates also had the opportunity to experience augmented reality (AR) technology from Techcity, or GenAI technology through smart speakers using voice-controlled virtual assistant Maika from VietnamPlus. These are technology products that help press agencies improve the quality of multimedia news, act as a bridge for ideas to diversify revenue sources...

In particular, at the Conference, representatives of Google News Initiatives presented guests with the annual report on Digital Journalism conducted by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism and Oxford University, which was just published globally on June 17.

Source: https://www.congluan.vn/hoi-thao-cong-nghe-thuc-day-da-dang-hoa-nguon-thu-cho-bao-chi-cac-mo-hinh-kinh-doanh-bao-chi-moi-post299817.html