Pol Deltour is chairman of the Journalist’s Union in Flanders. Every month the organization publishes a magazine called ” the Journalist.” It offers great insights on the curious specie we deal with every day: journalists. In this month’s issue Deltour has written in which he says publishing houses didn’t figure out in time how they could do business in a world where people go online more and more. He might have a point.
Peter Vandermeersch, editor-in-chief of dailies De Standaard en Het Nieuwsblad has invested a lot in the websites of his newspapers, with a relaunch this weekend. Vandermeersch was elected marketer of the year in 2008 and during a presentation on the future of newspapers he said that : “The walls between Editorial and Marketing/Sales must be torn down”. I am sure Pol Deltour will have his own thoughts about this. And so do I.

Clo Willaerts, is Marketing Manager at Sanoma Magazines quotes Netpop Research on her blog Bnox.

“Stated simply, 7 million people in the U.S. are contributing content online through six or more activities (uploading photos, publishing blogs, posting ratings/reviews, etc.). These heavies are also connecting with 248 people in a typical week, on average.” This is an important trend for publishers: if they want to keep their online reach, they are forced to serve their content as a constant stream of social objects. These objects are easy to pass on, to comment, to rate, to re-mix and to track. Launching an entertaining, one-purpose Flash site for a campaign will no longer do.

In other words content is King. As soon as you let marketing and sales get into content, you are bound to have problems. I admit : I am not free of sin. I hate it when a journalist says:”I don’t think this will be of any interest to my public.” But in the long run it gives messages that do have the journalist’s stamp of approval, more authority. I have a firm believe in this gatekeeper role for journalists, also in online publishing. Content will become the new gold and independent journalists will dig it. It’s up to publishers to figure out how to turn it into cash.

UPDATE: looks like the Netherlands is faster then Belgium again: daily NRC Next has changed its website into a blog. No more website.