WSJ and Facebook: Bad Strategy or Good Faith?

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Permalink Reply by Kyle Lacy on February 1, 2008 at 8:43am

This is an example of a MEATBALL. Thank you to Seth Godin for writing Meatball Sundae. This is an example of an old school informational source with a demographic of my father trying to resort to new media marketing to increase readership.

Frankly, I don't think this is going to work.

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Permalink Reply by David Anderson on February 1, 2008 at 8:59am

To steal a bad pun from IBM, no doubt they ideated that one on a slow day.

Actually, my guess is that they looked at the fact that their core readership is the baby boom, and in 10 years those folks will be finishing their cycle as 'leaders' of the business community and heading off into the sunset. The generation that comes behind the baby boom gets information in a vastly different manner than their parents. No doubt this dynamic is putting a bit of fear into the more traditional forms of media. As the Internet generation grows up, and us lagging boomers are forced to assimilate or die, traditional institutions like the Wall Street Journal will be forced to look beyond the business model that served them so well for so long.

I think you'll see a lot more of this to come. The WSJ's value proposition is still valid - that is delivering business news - it is just their methods and compensation model are being challenged by new media. Viva the revolution!

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Permalink Reply by Joe Wikert on February 4, 2008 at 8:52pm

Maybe I'm out of touch but I think this is the start of an exciting trend in the content world. (Full disclosure: My day gig is as a publisher at John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) I've been blogging about the importance of content owners opening up their IP and making it more shareable, particularly via social networks. I also think mashups are a critical component of this as well; readers/consumers will want to be able to add to, edit, etc., the content as they pass it around.

Are we anywhere near this level of content malleability? No way, but initiatives like the WSJ's are a good start. Think of the iRead app on FB and consider how more powerful and interesting it would become if book content was available to send around with it...

(Btw, Sarah, I meant to congratulate you on your "Second Life For Dummies" publication -- I got my copy a couple of weeks ago, hot off the presses, and it looks great! My group handles the official Second Life guides at Wiley. We've published 3 different titles so far and hosted another in-world author event last week.)

Now I'm off to install that WSJ app on my FB page!

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Permalink Reply by Chris on February 6, 2008 at 9:30am

I actually think this is great. Although I myself am not sold on the quality FB brings, I see it as a potentially powerful social application. This is probably a very easy hedge that the WSJ makes, in terms of time/money and could potentially lead to more readers. True the demographics aren't aligned yet, but the strong force of FB users are college kids (despite our efforts to overtake them) and they are the business leaders of tomorrow. As corny as that sounds they have to know that being able to put their content out to such a huge population could have some serious impact on their future readership and therefore the ad dollars that go with it.

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Permalink Reply by Erika D. Smith on February 6, 2008 at 5:51pm

Personally, I think it's a great idea. You'd be surprised how many Facebook users actually do read the Wall Street Journal. Remember, Facebook isn't jus for college kids anymore. There are plenty people in their late 20s and early 30s that are on there, and actually do want to read business news. Being able to sharing it easily among friends just makes it easier.

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Permalink Reply by Dustin Sparks on June 12, 2008 at 12:01pm

I know alot of people my age (early 20's) that read the WSJ.

ALL of these people also have facebook accounts, and 90% use facebook daily.

If this is anything like the rest of the world, I think there is a great market for the facebook app. I'm glad they are being proactive enough to put money toward a facebook app.

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