In this podcast, I want to give you another reason to control your  advertising sales. The digital advertising environment is filled with  toxic, fraudulent advertising. This advertising feeds off of fraudulent  websites. This is why news sites with a public service mission need to protect their credibility by controlling the advertising that appears on their pages. An excellent study of how this works is by Joshua A. Braun and Jessica L. Eklund (2019): Fake News, Real Money: Ad Tech Platforms, Profit-Driven Hoaxes, and the Business of Journalism. For journalists to understand the ad ecosystem better, perhaps the best study available is by Elizabeth Anne Watkins for the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University: Guide to Digital Advertising Technology. 

DigiDay just described how the New York Times now has 71 newsletters, which have been critical in converting users into paid subscribers. If you want to know more about some of the questions about digital advertising, I recommend Something is Rotten in Digital Advertising, by Rand Fishkin, and two Freakonomics Podcasts, “Does Advertising Actually Work”, Part 1 and Part 2.

This episode is based on a blog post on my website, Entrepreneurial Journalism. If you liked this episode, please share it. You can also leave me a  voicemail message with your recommendations and comments. And if you  have suggestions for media entrepreneurs you would like me to interview,  or topics that you would like me to cover, please email me at  jamesbreiner@gmail.com.

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