Time to change my anecdotal references to India a little bit in my presentations in workshops.
I maintain that there will NOT be printed newspapers Monday through Friday in many markets around the world, but that when this will happen will vary from one region of the world to another. I always say that in India, for example, this may happen last, as in 25-30 years from today.
Not so, insists the writer Aakar Patel, writing for Mint, a financial daily (and one that we at Garcia Media had the honor of designing from scratch when the newspaper premiered in February 2007).
In fact, he quotes a source, an editor, who told him that he gives print newspapers in India about four years.
To hear Patel describe it, the newspaper feels like an anachronism, the era of the newspaper is over and for the first time, Indian newspapers have registered decaying readership.
Patel blames two inventions in software and hardware for this decay: social media and smartphones. He shares some numbers:
“The era of the newspaper is over. A survey in the fourth quarter of 2012 and the latest one for 2013 show this for the top three English dailies. The Times Of India has fallen from 7.6 million to 7.2 million readers, the Hindustan Times is up from 3.8 million to 4.3 million while The Hindu is down from 2.1 million to 1.4 million.”
While Patel describes the gloomy state of printed newspapers in India, he does not say much about where these newspaper readers are going, while we assume that they are, like the rest of the world, going digital, getting news from social media, and keeping their phones close to their bodies most of their waking hours.
What great opportunities for publishers and advertisers, I’d venture to say. I also feel that it will be many more years before newspapers in India cease to be. If I were a publisher there, I would be contemplating ways to make that great mass of young readers take to my brand, in whatever platform they prefer.
We have not seen the best digital editions of newspapers in India yet. Time for that to happen. With it, many opportunities will arise, which is why I disagree when Patel writes that, with the decline of newspaper circulation, “some of us are soon going to be put out to pasture, and about time too.”
Quite the contrary. More storytellers are going to be needed. They just simply must be able to tell stories across platforms.
More about Mint:
http://garciamedia.com/blog/pindias_mint_six_years_later_its_indias_best_financial_newspaper_p
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/have_a_live_mint_indias_newest_business_news_site
http://garciamedia.com/blog/in_india_mint_premieres_new_lounge_mag
