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Why Barack Obama Matters to Transatlantic Brands

Editor’s note: This post was originally written during the primary season, but for some reason fell to the cutting room floor.  We’ve decided to publish it in its original form, as looking back, it was right on the money.  The election of Mr. Obama as President has profound and global implications – for us as citizens and marketers.  Please also refer to our post on the impact of currency fluctuation and marketing investment; the rise of the dollar has benefited global marketers as we predicted. 

It may be time for U.K. and European  companies to reassess cultural assumptions regarding their communications within the United States.  We are witnessing a profound shift in demography and attitudes, perhaps more profound than the election of our first baby boomer president, Bill Clinton.  The returns in the South Carolina Democratic primary held no surprise in terms of the black vote; it was strongly in support of Obama.  But the fact is that younger voters, those 30 and under, were also swayed by his subtlety of intellect, and messages of hope and inclusion.  Super Tuesday primary results, which have propelled Obama to the lead toward the nomination held plenty of surprises to political pundits and pollsters alike.

As baby boomers move into retirement, they grab headlines for their purchasing power and staying power – and do remain a force in our market and politics.  But they are akin to a setting sun.  If you take an intermediate to long term view, as significant brand owners must, their influence and interest in current affairs and setting trends is waning.

The America of 10 years from now will be a very different place than it is today.  Teenagers of 2008 will be advancing their careers (and those now in their 20’s and 30’s will be running the show).  This cohort is more eco-conscious and service-oriented, and less biased than any generation before it (those who grew up in the 60s may bridle at that suggestion, but it is fruit of their struggle, not a discount of it).  They also understand that the world is a much smaller place than it ever was, and this creates opportunities for brands to extend their transatlantic marketing reach; this generation will be more open than any before it to becoming global consumers and citizens.

So what inspired this post?  As someone who became aware during the latter years of the civil rights movement,  I can’t help but be moved by images of a black candidate for President of the United States standing in front of series of mostly white audiences celebrating a series of stunning electoral victories. 

While I am moved emotionally, the context for Swelled Head readers also is striking.  Thinking larger, many of the U.S. leading men in Hollywood also are black.  Wesley Snipes, James Foxx, Will Smith, Denzel Washington, Samuel L. Jackson, Morgan Freeman – these men lead many of the largest grossing movies.  They set trends and make money for producers of their movies.  Their endorsements, paid and unpaid, move markets (think Ray-Ban and “Men in Black”).

Black executives loom large in financial services and entertainment as well (although still under represented as a percentage of the U.S. population, they are influential).  The Oprah Winfrey Network will extend Oprah’s power and influence further into television.  The presidents of American Express, Time Warner, Aetna, Sears and Symantec also are black.

The fact is that America is becoming the melting pot it promised to be.  We aren’t color blind, but are becoming color-neutral.  Role models are defined more by what they do and say rather than their ethnicity.  And this trend is accelerating.

So what about your marketing?  Are you selling to the new America?  Does your advertising that targets teens and those under 30 relate to the way they see the world?  Do you embrace a more inclusive worldview, or are you “traditional?”  And by traditional, I mean stubbornly adhering to “the way it is done,” or “we’ll educate those Americans,” two paths to sure disaster for transatlantic brands.

How others see us. How we see ourselves.

Each quarter, Director magazine - the publication related to the UK's Institute of Directors - includes the "After Hours" supplement. Brimming with charming advice, such as how the weather impacts the British summer social scene or how to cruise Scotland to find the finest whiskies, the latest issue takes a look at British national identity.

Interesting to SwelledHead was the comparison drawn by how the British see themselves and how they're see by others:

The British see themselves as:                Others see the British as:

Rational and fair minded                          Reactionary and slightly bonkers

Passionate                                               Cold and aloof

Adaptable and accommodating                  Quaint and charming

Humorous                                                Funny

Culturally fragmented                               Civilised and cultured

Polite to a fault                                        Polite to a point of rudeness

Ironically amusing                                     Sarcastic and ridiculing

Understated                                              Ambiguous

Is this a fair or accurate assessment? To my mind, on the whole it would seem to be, but as an invented concept, being British - or indeed "Britishness" - is something that is difficult to define or agree upon. It's an elusive notion that alters with whomever you ask. It's definitely there, and it can be a real moneyspinner both at home and overseas. You may know it when you see it, but you'll never pin it down. Perhaps therein lies its allure.

A great opportunity to sponsor a U.S. sport in the U.K.

Our agency, Austin Lawrence Group, recommended to a U.S. financial institution that it become the title sponsor of baseball and softball in the U.K.  Unfortunately for us, BaseballSoftballUK, thousands of British kids and this particular firm, the sponsorship didn’t happen.  It was intended to burnish the reputation of this company in the local market, aid employee morale (a community service concept was part of the program, whereby its employees would act as coaches and umpires with a great reward event at the end of the season) and make baseball accessible to British youth who might not have had a prior interest or the ability to pay for the equipment and/or coaching and umpires needed to have an organized team and league. 

We also recommended to start a “City Softball League” to raise money for a teenage crisis center in London – elements of which seem to have been taken up by BBSBUK with its “London Corporate Games” initiative.

I’ve posted this item because I believe so strongly in the value of such a program to the kids who could be served by it…hundreds or maybe even thousands of children could be positively impacted by an investment well within the reach of most City financial firms.

For a U.S. securities broker or money manager this would be a transatlantic sales, marketing and branding initiative that would more than pay for itself in terms of enhanced reputation among clients and peers, and a unique way to make a difference in the community.  As I write, there is no title sponsor for this organization, so a close and possibly exclusive relationship should be possible to negotiate.

And baseball represents a lot of what is great about the United States.  It’s a wonderful game that teaches many important life lessons, and for the British, a chance to experience a bit of our culture firsthand, instead of through Hollywood or McDonald's.

If you think there’s no market for U.S. sports in the U.K., consider: more than 300,000 British kids play baseball every year.  And, U.S. football is making noise about greater activity in the U.K., with the New York Giants and Miami Dolphins playing in London in October.  Check out the NY Times article today for more info on U.S. football in the U.K. and beyond.

If you’re interested and would like to learn more about our program design, contact me at k.lempit@austinlawrence.com or James Ollerenshaw, at james@austinlawrence.com.  You can learn more about baseball in the U.K. at http://www.baseballsoftballuk.com/

Ten Golden Rules for UK Business Success in the US

Last fall, I met HRH Prince Andrew at a transatlantic business event sponsored by UKTI. Prince Andrew is one of the best listeners I’ve ever met. He worked the crowd of more than 100 in groups of five to eight, asking each person to share an insight or story relevant to his talk on US – UK relations. My "five minutes of fame" was devoted to the first three of these Ten Golden Rules for UK Business Success in the US. Let us know what you think; we’d welcome your comments.

British brand owners aiming for success in the US market need to do more than spell a few words differently. A common language masks differences in business and consumer culture that are equally as significant as between Britain and anywhere else in Europe. Every individual company or brand will require its own approach, but there are some simple rules of which every arrival to our shores should be aware.  If your business is already here, these rules apply to you, too...are you doing everything you can to succeed in the US?

We'll work some of these themes in greater detail over the next weeks and months. Stay tuned!

1. Don’t open your first office on the West Coast.

It’s too far from the UK in terms of both distance and time zones to make day-to-day business practicable. If your company has a specific need, such as access to Hollywood’s movie industry or Silicon Valley’s tech sector, then fair enough. Otherwise, stick to the East Coast and save yourself a lot of missed phone calls and time in the air.

2. America is at least 25 markets.

Never be tempted to treat the US as a homogenous market. It isn’t. There’s coastal vs. inland; north vs. south; ultra rich, rich, middle-income and poor; white, black, Hispanic and others; legal and illegal residents (at last count more than 12 million are here illegally); seniors, baby boomers, generations X and Y and teens; left and right (politically); gay and straight; religious and secular. And then there are the myriad permutations these create. Get advice on where and to whom your product or service will appeal. It may surprise you. Regional differences in US culture can be explored in great depth; a convenient place to start is the US Department of State’s information web site, a chapter from a book on the main InfoUSA site.

3. Don’t underestimate America’s size.

It really is huge – almost eighteen times the land mass of Europe’s largest nation (France) and five times its population. There are now more than 300 million US residents according to census figures. From New York City to Los Angeles is 2,790 miles (4,450 km). You can drive for hours in some states, mostly out west, and never see another living being. Logistics dictate how you might roll out a retail or wholesale business; locating retail operations too far apart reduces efficiency, while B2B sales teams need to be spread out among major business centers to make it possible for sales reps to effectively cover a territory. A great place to start to understand the magnitude of the country is at the US Census Bureau’s Quick Facts site. This bigness impacts every aspect of your business, from operations to marketing.

4. We can’t (won’t) be educated.

We love to sample the international (just look at the size of our trade deficit), but understand that it’s on our own terms. This can be confusing when we tell you that yours is better than ours; it leads many to attempt to educate us dumb Americans in the "proper way" of things. Well, guess what: We’re not interested. And trying to teach us any different will either (a) cost way more than your budget, or (b) annoy us (we hate imperialism). We’ll probably buy what you’re selling, but we’ll consume it in our own way – and you may need to describe it more fully than is necessary at home – I still don’t know how to prepare Christmas Pudding. Certain UK marketers may wish to initially target British expatriates (there are close to one million in the US – see http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=731995 for great stats on those born in the UK living in the US).

5. We’re all Anglophiles.

To us, there really is nothing cooler. When they announced the new actor playing James Bond, it was massive news here. There was front page coverage everywhere about one actor replacing another in a foreign movie series! We revere everything that has British connotations, assuming that it must be better than anything we produce. At the same time as hating imperialism, we also think the British can sometimes be too apologetic, so show us what you’ve got. Odds are we’ll like it.

6. America has a more advanced consumer culture.

And that means we have much higher expectations. We demand more choice, greater speed, better service and lower prices. Constantly. We tend to be more technologically advanced as well. Be prepared to reassess your offer and adjust it upwards to succeed in our market. That said, there are a few conspicuous anomalies. The British supermarket, mobile telephony and airline industries are all more advanced than ours in one way or another. Oh, and if your customer service is sub-par, don’t be surprised to find complaints out in the blogosphere – and if your service is poor enough, to have a dedicated blog on how terrible you really are. On the bright side, fan sites can emerge for something truly wonderful.

7. Americans comparison shop.

And we expect you to compare yourself as well. It’s common to see advertising in the US where one brand openly pits itself against another. That goes against the grain somewhat in Britain, but in the US it’s central to buying behavior. Dyson stands out as a UK firm that did a great job with this, in our market as well as yours. Sites like epinions.com and shopping.com (similar to Ciao) demonstrate not only our appreciation for the best deal, but our desire to share our opinions with others (some say that shopping in the US is a "contact sport"). Adjuncts to this rule: testimonials never grow old, and celebrity endorsements work.

8. Our business culture and history are different.

It is tempting to think that because you can speak our language that our market operates under the same principles as yours (this advice works both ways across the Atlantic). Doing business in the US is just plain different than in the UK. For example, some businesses (especially in the Midwest) still operate without written agreements, while others are so detail-oriented and over-lawyered as to be offensive (I’m thinking software). Americans are very comfortable talking business over a meal, in fact "breaking bread" is a major step in developing a relationship with a prospect or client. Lesser commitments, say for a coffee, indicate caution is still being practiced. The written word has lost its value here, perhaps more than in the UK or Europe. Proposals for fairly significant initiatives can be delivered in electronic form.

9. You need more advice than you think.

Recruiting key advisors and employees who can accelerate your market entry is a must. We’ve seen plenty of communications and go-to-market planning that, controlled by UK headquarters, missed the mark here in the US. There are myriad ways you can fail, including thinking cultural references translate (most don’t), indiscriminately applying British humor to your advertising, printing anything on A4 paper, sending condescending executives to meet with our press or your client executives, media plans that are much too small to make the desired impact (see size of US, No. 3 above), retaining UK spelling, underestimating the advantage of an indigenous competitor, centralizing your sales office and flying reps to their meetings, maintaining a too-conservative posture, and more.  Local knowledge also can save you massively on your outlays for media and creative services - our largest agencies are not always our most creative, efficient or aggressive.

Get the most out of institutions that assist UK businesses in the US, including UKTI and British American Business Inc. (the US/UK Chamber of Commerce).

10. Be willing to reinvent your brand.

What may seem sacrosanct in the UK may not be relevant elsewhere. Sometimes it’s very hard to work out what really is important; marketers put a lot of time and effort into understanding their core brand values and these would seem to be set in stone. Beware; differences in cultural frames of reference and buying behavior can mean they don’t translate, though it can be almost impossible to know this from the outside. Get advice, and then once you’ve figured out what really matters, see how that affects the business your in. The results can be very surprising and you may find that you need to do something else altogether.

Is your head swelling yet?

For advice and insight on your marketing initiatives, give a call to Ken Lempit at +1 203 391 3006 or email k.lempit@austinlawrence.com. In the UK, contact James Ollerenshaw at +44 (0) 20 7403 2888 or james@austinlawrence.com.

A tasty bit of British pop culture

If you’re a US executive who owns UK marketing for your brand, I’m certain that you are immersing yourself in UK culture.  But most of you are likely outside of the demographic for the zany UK Channel 4 comedy “Peep Show,” which features two young men who are flatmates and their insanely awkward path through diametrically opposed lives and lifestyles.  Good news for fans of this offbeat and innovative comedy: it’s been renewed for a fifth season that starts filming this month.

It’s often said that US culture is conveyed through our TV and Hollywood.  For transatlantic brand marketers targeting the UK, Channel 4 and BBC television show DVDs and BBC America on US cable and satellite TV, would seem a likely way to get a feeling for the difference between our culture and that of the UK…at least it’s a start.  And with Peep Show, you’ll be laughing your arse off.  I got my first taste of this only slightly naughty adult comedy on a recent Virgin Atlantic flight.

For US readers, you can buy season one of Peep Show here.

Interestingly, the two lead actors are in Apple UK’s PC and Mac ads which are a bit edgier than ours here in the US.  You can see one of the Apple UK TV ads here that builds on these popular characters.

For those who would like another approach to building a cross cultural frame of reference, a good place to start is a book like “Bridging the Culture Gap: a practical guide to international business communication,” by Penny Carté and Chris J. Fox.  It’s available on Amazon.com and a great preview is on Google books.

Lessons for UK and European brand marketers in the Don Imus debacle.

The US continues its intolerance for intolerance, even when shrouded in the veil of comedy as was made clear by the cancellation of Don Imus’ Imus in the Morning Show on WCBS-AM radio and MSNBC cable television. Imus and his on-air producer exchanged very offensive remarks regarding the Rutgers Women’s basketball team last week, and a firestorm of protest has resulted in ending, for now, his 30-year radio career.

The judgment of whether this episode is worthy of canceling Imus is beyond the scope of Swelled Head. You can see the offending segment here on YouTube and decide for yourself.

 

What’s important for Swelled Head readers from the UK and Europe who own their companies' transatlantic marketing roles is to realize the risks associated with the speech and actions of your executives traveling and working in the US. What might pass for funny or inoffensive at home could generate a lawsuit, loss of business and damage to your reputation here. Society generally in the US has become very protective of people's feelings and there are consequences for those who “cross the line.”

And, crossing that line may not be as obvious as Imus’ remarks are to you and your colleagues. When we meet a prospective client from the UK or Europe who will have exposure to journalists, we strongly recommend media and cultural sensitivity training. The reason is that your instincts, successful behaviors and speech might not be acceptable here.

Has your spokesperson ever put his/her hand on a journalist’s wrist, shoulder or knee while making a point? Assumed a journalist was a liberal and talked politics during an interview? (While more journalists do lean Democratic than Republican, most prefer to keep their political views out of the reporting process unless they are political reporters.) Made a provocative remark about the appearance of a colleague? We’ve seen all these and more from company representatives who were unwilling to participate in training, and none of these episodes ended well.

The way in which the Imus matter unfolded has important implications as well. Today’s Wall Street Journal article describes how this 30-second segment of a four-hour radio show became an Internet cause célèbre, beginning with a single blog post on mediamatters and leading to national media coverage, debate, protest and ultimately the downfall of a top tier U.S. media figure. If you ever doubted the relevancy and power of blogs, those doubts should be erased forever.

In a culture where even the mighty can fall from one slip of the tongue, being prepared and aware makes more sense than ever. Have your executives been media trained? If not, and you need help, feel free to give us a call or contact us by email.

Technorati tags: don imus, MSNBC, CBS, media training, cross cultural training

It's official: London is better than New York - and other links

No really - New York says so itself. Well, New York Magazine more precisely, which says "London is shaping up to be the capital of the 21st century."

• London 21st century capital: http://nymag.com/guides/london/29431/

The same publication also asks if London is taking over as the world's financial capital and debates whether its dining and dinner guests have more to offer.

• London, the world's financial capital? http://nymag.com/guides/london/29440/
• London, the world's dining capital? http://nymag.com/guides/london/29444/
• London, the world's dinner guest capital? http://nymag.com/guides/london/29432/

And if having the best in terms of money, food and everything else wasn't enough, how about having the best voices, too? Stephen Fry has claimed that Americans are too easily taken in by a British accent. BBC News Online Magazine looks into the matter.

• London, the world's best accents? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6470095.stm

Finally, if this excess of praise has put you off, it now looks as though it will become easier than ever to espace the world's best of everything. The European Union has backed a controversial deal to open up transatlantic air travel. It should mean greater competition and therefore lower ticket prices, but some say it leaves the US market unfairly protected, including the continued prevention of foreign ownership of its airlines.

• London, the world's best flight options? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6477969.stm

Climate change is a big opportunity for European and American business

Served up with breakfast this morning was news of millions being displaced as islands in the Bay of Bengal are swamped by rising sea levels. Later, on the way into work, the newspaper delivered a fresh batch of doom-laden headlines on global warming and its effects.

Self-flagellation over climate change, along with stacks of worrying statistics about how it's getting ever worse, is now part the daily discourse in British media and increasingly in US media as well. Fair enough - I'm sufficiently concerned that we have a big problem on our hands and that we need to get much more serious about addressing it. What I don't see however, is much coverage being given to how we might achieve this.

Advice on using low energy lightbulbs and taking a shower instead of a bath is all very well, but I don't think most people are convinced that this will change the world. Though it’s nice to feel a little effort from everyone will do the trick, that sentiment is soon undone when one reads about giant forest fires in Asia that emit more carbon-dioxide in two weeks than the whole of the UK in a year.

I don’t know whether that’s accurate or not, but the effect of stories like this is to make people feel powerless in the face of change. The danger is (and I admit I’m starting to feel this way myself) is that people begin to believe that there’s nothing that can really be done, that climate change is now inevitable, and that we’ll just have to live with the destructive consequences of our own actions. In the meantime, we might as well enjoy low-cost flights, leaving the TV on standby and driving two minutes to the shops. It’s time for the positive news agenda on climate change.

So what’s this got to do with transatlantic marketing?

I believe that business in the US and Europe is failing to act on a massive business opportunity. The will of European consumers to change their buying habits for the better has never been stronger. The feeling in America is catching up fast. Corporations serving these markets would do well to design-in environmentalism and sustainability and reap the rewards of selling this to a eager market.

• Environmental pressure groups need to change their tactics. Instead of condemning big business, they need to start working with it to help it improve its green credentials.
• Business and environmentalists need to act together to lobby governments to deliver the right legislation to create significant and sustainable change. This is in everyone’s best interests; business likes predictability so setting out the future now will make it much easier to deal with.
• Business and government need to act together to stimulate new markets. For example, green power generation is far tinkering at the edges of our massive and growing needs. New markets are waiting to emerge, but need an initial boost to make costs attractive to consumers.
• Positive communications about what can be achieved to limit climate change needs to be expanded to counterbalance the weight of depressing, lets-give-up-now media agenda.

Encouragement and practical alternatives need to be delivered alongside chastisement.
The US and Europe should be leading the charge on these fronts. Our consumerism is the most developed so green improvements will have quick effect. Our public is more ready and willing to change than anywhere else. We have an opportunity to spearhead new industries in a time when emerging economies threaten our existing ones. And we have the strongest worldwide voice to communicate our successes elsewhere in the world.

British Invasion into US Late Night TV: Not Quite a Smash Hit – Yet.

Playmania, the interactive televised game show based on the UK’s Quiznation has aired on Game Show Network since April 6, 2006. Unlike Quiznation, The Mint and Quizmania (the big three ITV game shows in the UK), however, Playmania and its ilk haven't become a huge commercial success in the US.

TV shows imported from the UK demonstrate the potential of Transatlantic marketing; and there is quite a long line of successes (more than you might imagine although very few shows migrate from the US to the UK, as this Wikipedia entry points out).  The most successful have benefitted from substantial tailoring to suit the taste of US TV viewers.

Producer Optimistic Entertainment remains, well, optimistic on the participation TV format, and has opened a Los Angeles satellite office headed up by John Gypton to pitch new shows to US TV networks. GSN seems to share the positive view on the show’s and format’s outlook, as it has expanded Playmania to six two-hour episodes a week.

For those not familiar with the format, viewers are invited to call in or text message (for a $.99 fee in the US) to enter a queue to participate in a variety of quiz-format trivia games of varying difficulty. Winners (those correctly guessing one of a handful answers to category question) are rewarded with cash prizes.

In the UK, Quiznation and its cohort are very popular, with viewers queuing up to play and most not getting a chance on-air. In the US, the few shows I’ve watched seem to have had far fewer contestants; the on-air host has to coax the participation of what appears to be only a handful of viewers (although there is some reporting that this dearth of viewers is a come-on to motivate a greater number of callers to vie for what appears to be an open line to win, only to find out that they are in queue and have paid their $.99 for naught).

I like the participation TV concept, especially as implemented by GSN. Its multichannel presence (Web, TV and Phone) place it directly on-trend for how media are being, and will be, consumed in the US. Its downloadable games for mobile phones are a prime example of tapping into the emergence of mobile phones as the next big thing in advertising and revenue generation.

Broadcasting & Cable reported September 25, 2006 on the competing entry from TBS called Midnight Money Madness, and elaborates on the format’s appeal to networks. Callers are charged $.99 for a chance to compete. As the games gain traction, thousands do text or call 900-numbers (also at $.99 per call), creating a significant revenue stream. Deal or No Deal reportedly earned NBC as much as $4 million last season, on approximately 15 million text messages sent to compete for prizes touted on-air. American Idol generated 65 million text messages last season, creating a major revenue source for Fox. The danger for the producers of these shows and the networks is that regulators could come to view them as a form of online gambling and shut the whole thing down.

TBS decided not to renew MMM beyond its initial 8-week test (possibly due to GSN expanding Playmania to six nights a week), but the B&C article cited a figure of one million paid entrants on Midnight Money Madness, which should have earned TBS and its producer-partner roughly $400,000 (figures are not available publicly for Playmania, which has no live West Coast feed; MMM aired live nationwide). So maybe the format travels well, but needs to be on a network with enough viewers to create a critical mass – or maybe GSN (and TBS should it revisit the show/format) need to do more promotion to generate awareness of this fun late night distraction.

An issue for the participation TV format is that just like game shows generally, it is easy to over-saturate a market, which is what has happened to this innovative TV format in the UK, where it was invented. An advantage in the US market is that in addition to revenue from the callers, the networks also air commercials throughout the broadcast (which I don’t recall seeing on the UK’s The Mint).

The integration of call- and text-in to top-rated TV shows is the bigger impact of shows like Quiznation on US TV programming for now. But if Playmania and Midnight Money Madness gain traction, we might see this entertaining format move to major US TV networks and closer to prime time. As an anglophile and believer in the prospect of transatlantic marketing of UK brands, products and services here in the US, it’s another British Invasion that I’m happy to see – now all it needs is some good old fashioned American promotion and distribution to become a huge success.

Thanks for Playmania image goes to Brian Peek -- www.brianpeek.com/blog/

playmania

interactive tv

Old Media Implosion Coming to a City Near You.

If I had any doubts about the inevitable decline of printed newspapers and magazines, they were dispelled last week. First, while following the story of the new Apple iPhone, I was drawn to the site Gizmodo.com, where in addition to the details of the phone, I noticed a sitemeter icon and clicked it (sitemeter is a popular Web site traffic reporting and analysis tool).

Gizmodo received more than 4 million page views the week I visited and was on track to have 20 million page views (and a like number of visitors) for the month of January. No US print publication has 20 million readers that I’m aware of, and certainly Gizmodo’s costs of delivery are a lot lower than if were a print publication. For the last year, Gizmodo has never had less than 10 million page views a month. Just spectacular. You can see its site statistics here.

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to attend an iBreakfast special event with Craig Newmark, founder of craigslist.org, the world's leading online classified advertising site and community. Along with the lore of the early days of Craig’s List, he talked about the current state of the business, its relationship with newspapers, which have the most to lose to Craig’s List free classifieds, and his support for journalism as it responds to the new opportunities online. 

For marketers, perhaps the most intriguing statistic was that in January 2007, craigslist.com expects to receive 6 billion page hits, one for every human on the planet. Newmark was unapologetic about his small company’s (they have 23 employees) impact on old media. Also interesting is that the "Craig’s list effect" has not been as profound outside the US, at least not yet. Newmark mentioned that while London was coming along OK, it wasn’t growing all that fast.

A short reprieve for UK and Europe.  But the clock is ticking...

Newspapers in the UK and Europe are fortunate that since Craig’s List is not an aggressive marketer, they still have the opportunity to put strategies in place to blunt the effect of this company on their businesses. They can and should use their proprietary content and relationship with their readers to get in front of this juggernaut, motivating their readers to use their Web sites to post classifieds and create a community in the same manner as one does on craigslist.com.

Crystal ball time.

My prediction is that the days are numbered for the printed newspaper. Digital distribution of news, on a new class of handheld device called electronic paper, will make digital content as portable as current newspapers or magazines. I figure that by 2011 daily newspapers will be moving from paper to digital-only formats with many newsmagazines not far behind. The next few years will be a painful transition to all-digital delivery, with continued contraction in old media companies that fail to embrace the new mechanism and create business models that make it profitable. And new, all-Internet news organizations, and the old media companies that innovate successfully, will expand to fill the void.

Thanks to Rick Maiman, photojournalist, for the photo of Craig Newmark.  Rick can be reached at 917 405-8416 or nyp797@gmail.com.