Indian Media Leaders eSummit 2022 conveys importance of content & trust for growth
The third edition of Indian Media Leaders eSummit (IMLeS) 2022 by WAN-INFRA was held virtually from June 28 to 30, with the presence of over 250 news media executives from more than 40 organisations.
Themed ‘Ideas for News Realities’ the conference covered a range of news publishing topics, such as digital transformation, changing audience engagement trends, business innovation, newsroom leadership, and diversity and inclusion.
DAY 1
Opening day of the virtual conference kicked off with Stig Ørskov, CEO, JP/ Politikens Hus, Denmark and Vice President of WAN-IFRA, sharing insights on the recipe for growth of the news media business. He said, “It is really about the true value of content and how we monetise it. Publishers should take steps to build subscriptions wherever possible which consequently raises trust in media.”
The keynote speech was followed by a fireside chat between Raju Narisetti, Leader, Publishing, McKinsey & Co., and Ritu Kapur, Co-founder of The Quint, highlighting the trends and emerging opportunities in the news media business. Raju said publishers have to create a layer of experience that is unique to their brand on the stories they publish. This will create value and bring people back to their brands, and help publishers monetise the content. She also said contextual advertising is going to become a lot bigger and publishers have to think about it.
The post-pandemic world has seen a rebound of advertising and stabilising circulation. However, macro economic Indian Media Leaders eSummit 2022 conveys importance of content & trust for growth The third edition of Indian Media Leaders eSummit (IMLeS) 2022 by WAN-INFRA was held virtually from June 28 to 30, with the presence of over 250 news media executives from more than 40 organisations.developments such as inflation and newsprint prices are impacting the news business. How do South Asian CEOs respond to these developments?
The first day closed with a panel discussion among Dhruba Mukherjee (CEO, ABP), Dr. Bhaskar Das (Director, Unica Token Pvt. Ltd.), Sarmad Ali (Managing Director, Jang Media Group), and Rajeev Beotra (Executive Director, HT Media Ltd), moderated by Pradyuman Maheshwari, Senior Editor & Media Commentator. The speakers agreed that to be successful in the future, media companies have to pivot to the business of content (not restricted to format) and change their business model.
Earlier in the session, Mohit Jain, Executive President of Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd., Board member of WAN-IFRA and President of Indian Newspaper Society, opened the summit and shared his optimism for news media and newspaper business in particular. “Till the time the curiosity in human nature will survive or remain, content will never get out of fashion,” he said.
DAY 2
Under the theme, ‘Addressing challenges within the newsroom’, second day of the summit started with Singapore Press Holdings’ Gaurav Sachdeva sharing how the brand’s audience helped it create products to meet real needs and expectations. He mentioned the product development process is a combination of technology, viability of business and empathy for people.
The second day of the conference also played host to a panel of eminent journalists including Kunal Pradhan, Managing Editor, Hindustan Times; Harsha Mathew, Chief Resident Editor & Director, Malayala Manorama Co Ltd; Debarati Guha, Director of Asia Programmes, Duetsche Welle; and Parikshit Bhardwaj, GM and Head – Content & Strategy, Jagran New Media. The panel discussed the challenges of working in and running a post-pandemic newsroom. They shared how news content and format changed because of the pandemic, making way for data-researched and video stories. Post pandemic, it has strengthened the belief of newsrooms on the choice of stories, focus on the more relevant ones and making the newsrooms more efficient.
The second day closed with a session on the business case to build a diverse and inclusive newsroom and diversity practices at German broadcaster Deutsche Welle by its editor Akansha Saxena.
The conference included with a session by Google News Initiative on sustainable growth pillars and news consumer insights. It would also see a session on changing consumer and advertisers needs at DB Corp. The closing session had Schibsted’s Tor Jacobsen talking about digital subscriptions and the brand’s overall revenue strategy.