Minneapolis – To survive in the digital age, newspapers will have to deliver news, entertainment and advertising to consumers through websites, iPods and other media platforms besides newsprint, retail-industry veterans told members of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers at the group’s annual convention.
“It’s not that your content is bad,” said Love Goel, chairman and chief executive of Minneapolis-based Growth Ventures Group and an Internet retailing expert. “It’s, how do you share that content in a way that people want it?”
Goel pointed to MySpace.com, the social-networking website that claims tens of millions of users. Its parent company was bought last year by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. for $580 million. Goel said newspapers would be more effective in reaching younger readers by delivering targeted content to MySpace rather than reinventing the printed newspaper.
“If you had a link on there, it would be more effective,” he said Monday. “The advertisers will follow.”
The chase to serve and capture consumers on the Internet is intense. Yahoo.com on Monday launched a new technology section on its website intended to guide consumers through the complexities of evaluating and buying consumer electronics.
Macy’s North chief executive Frank Guzzetta told the business journalists that the consolidating department- store sector is seeking outlets other than newspapers in which to advertise. Minneapolis-based Macy’s North oversees 62 mostly Midwestern Marshall Field’s stores that will be converted into Macy’s this fall.
Yet Guzzetta said there is a natural alliance between department stores and newspapers because of the audience they serve.
“We both have a local aspect of who we are,” he said. “Together, we should be able to figure out what local needs are.”
Macy’s is part of Federated Department Stores Inc., which is based in Cincinnati and New York. Last August, Federated completed its merger with the May Co. The merger will entail the conversion of several hundred stores – including Foley’s in Colorado – into Macy’s this September.
Business editor Stephen Keating can be reached at 303-820-1306 or skeating@denverpost.com.
