‘Scuba diving for classified gold’ and other sport
Great blog post by INMA's executive director Earl J. Wilkinson on how Schibsted-owned Finn in Norway breaks tradition with other classified operators -- especially newspapers.
"What Finn does well, strategically, is relentlessy burrow into classified categories," he writes. "The initial Finn strategy was to optimize existing verticals. Yet it's not an optimization most newspapers would understand. By attacking sub-categories deeper and deeper, Finn discovered under-served segments such as boats, snowmobiles, theme travel, agriculture, and more."
He quotes Finn's COO Frode Nordseth: "No money is too small for us to pursue.”
"In short," Wilkinson continued, "newspapers snorkel the classifieds; Finn scubas the classifieds."
Wilkinson begins his post by saying he felt a bit "freaked out" trying to come up with a way to explain what Finn does to traditional publishers. Actually, he does so quite eloquently.
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And here's a good read from John Temple, former editor of the defunct Rocky Mountain News, on what newspapers need to do to save themselves.
"Make the classifieds a separate, standalone business," he writes. "Instead of trying to beat Craigslist from within a newspaper operation, free the people running classifieds to do what's best for that business or hire new people to take the business in a different direction."
Among other things, he writes, it would make it clear to everyone left at the newspaper that they have to come up with new revenue streams, instead of waiting for a turn-around that isn't going to happen.
