The AMO Show

John Yedinak is co-founder and President at Aging Media, a vertical media company focused on the business of aging. With so many people retiring every single day and few b2b companies covering the space, John and his brother have grown into multiple verticals over the years and have even more growth ahead of them.

Julia Beizer is Chief Product Officer & Global Head of Digital at Bloomberg Media. While Bloomberg is primarily known for its terminals, the digital team has built a robust media operation that has now added hundreds of thousands of paying subscribers.

In this episode, we discussed quite a few different topics, but a few things jumped out to me...

On program managers vs. product managers

A big mistake that media companies make is that they hire product managers because they need someone to "get stuff done." But as Julia explained, "everyone can get stuff done."

What companies are actually looking for is a project or program manager. This is a person who is very focused on the delivery of certain features or initiatives getting out the door.

Product management is more expansive. These are people that sit at the intersection of competing business interests: user needs, commercial interests, editorial vision and resources. Product managers synthesize all of these ideas and figure out the best thing to do.

On building a revenue optimization system

I call this a revenue server and Julia calls it a revenue optimization system, but they are effectively the same thing. How can media companies look at their users and determine the right way to monetize each visitor?

Bloomberg is in the early stages of this and it's pretty manual. A few of her people meet with the subscriber and advertising sides in a meeting called "Project Needle" because they are trying to thread the needle of maximizing revenue on both sides.

This refocuses the conversation from RPM (revenue per thousand) to the lifetime value of a user. It's not just about understanding how much a single page makes, but how much a user across the website generates for the business.

On advice from Jeff Bezos

Soon after Bezos acquired The Washington Post, they were discussing a product that was being preinstalled on Kindle Fire devices across the country. They mentioned that they were going to bring the product to user testing.

Bezos’ response was, “hey, that’s great and you should obviously get that user feedback, but you also want to think about, do we love it? Do we love this product?”

This goes against everything taught in product school, but the lesson Julia has taken to heart is, “if you deeply, deeply understand your customer and get in the mindset of your customer, you’re a good barometer of what the right thing to do is for the business.” 

Ryan Selkis is the co-founder and CEO of Messari, a crypto data and market intelligence platform. Ryan and I go way back with him hiring me at CoinDesk nearly four years to the day. Since then, he has gone on to build an exciting and well respected data and research company in the rapidly evolving world of crypto assets.

Packy McCormick is the writer and creator of the business strategy newsletter, Not Boring. Although he has only been doing this full time since April, it has quickly morphed into a project with a loyal audience and an advertising-driven business model that bucks the trend of many of the newsletters launching today.

We discussed a lot about what goes into building these solo products, but a few things jumped out to me...

On building a referral system

The referral system in newsletters has become a favorite way to grow audiences; however, for Substack writers, it doesn’t exist. Packy decided to go around that and build his own, hacked together version of it.

The way it works is straight forward… They use a system called GrowSurf that is plugged into a Webflow landing page. GrowSurf manages the whole process of giving unique codes to everybody.

When people sign up, he has to download a CSV of the email subscribers and upload them into Substack so they can start receiving the newsletter. So, as Packy says, it’s a manual process.

On going ads vs. paid subscription

Most people who have launched newsletters over the past year have gone all in on subscriptions. I, too, have leaned heavily into subscriptions. Packy, though, opted not to go that direction.

Instead, Packy does what a lot of media companies do and sells advertising. He has a couple of different products that range from sponsorships in newsletters to outright, dedicated sponsored content emails.

His logic? He wasn’t sure if an audience would be able to justify expensing his newsletter and he preferred seeing the list grow faster with the free newsletter. And so far, he’s been very pleased with the results.

On staying focused on your passion

Early in his attempts at building Not Boring, he tried to lean heavily into community. But what he found was this wasn’t the right play for what he was trying to do because he didn’t enjoy it. He preferred to focus on the business strategy side of things.

His advice for others is to be very specific about what you want to focus on and continue leaning into this. It allows for more informed conversations with readers and allows you to meet a lot of new people, which is integral to these one-person operations.

However, he also advised creators to experiment with different things. There are a variety of ways your specific focus can manifest itself, so be comfortable with those different potential options.

Neil Vogel is CEO of Dotdash, a series of brands across verticals like food, technology finance and others. What started as About.com has morphed into an incredibly profitable, fast-growing media company. Although Neil has poor taste in sports teams, when it comes to running this network, I have to tip my hat.

In this episode, we discussed a variety of topics, but a few things jumped out to me…

On ad strategy at Dotdash

We all have been to that website that causes the fans on our laptops to go into overdrive. Whether it’s popups, pre-rolls, interstitials… You name it, we’ve likely all experienced it.

Dotdash bet that by reducing the number of ads on the site—2/3rds of what their competitors might have—that the sites would load faster and that would make people happier. That, in turn, would result in people engaging with the content and ads more.

The other part of the strategy is focusing in on contextual advertising. An example Neil shares is if someone is coming for the site on July 2nd and looking for BBQ recipes, they know exactly what type of advertising to deliver to them.

On creating great content & SEO

There is no denying that Google drives a decent percentage of traffic to the various Dotdash sites, though Neil qualified that it’s no more or less than most other publishers on the web.

However, the way he sees it, the only real “secret” to SEO is doing exactly what Google wants: delivering the absolute best content out there. That’s Google’s business. And so, Dotdash invests millions in creating the absolute best content.

But it’s more than just that… In his mind, creating great content is fundamental to the quality of the brands they’re building. I wrote about this on Friday, but because of the quality of the brands built on the great content, he believes people would miss the brands if they went away.

On not chasing the shiny things

Some of the biggest mistakes that they made early on at Dotdash was seeing what other people were doing, knowing that it was the wrong approach, but still trying to do them anyway.

The advice that Neil has for prospective operators is to stay focused on what you know works. It’s easy to get distracted by the shiny things and the press other people are getting, but it’s about staying focused on what works. 

Ben Clymer is founder and CEO of Hodinkee, a media and commerce company dedicated to the luxury watch market. What started as a personal blog thanks to a watch from his grandfather has turned into a highly respected business that can sell millions of dollars in watches in minutes.

In this episode, we went through the many different facets of the business, but a few things jumped out to me…

Jarrod Dicker is the VP of Commercial at The Washington Post, which puts him in charge of a variety of products, but most specifically, the Zeus ad suite. But in his free time, he has become somewhat obsessed with the creator economy and the evolution of media.

In this episode, we discussed quite a few topics, but a few things jumped out...

Where media went wrong

Jarrod got his start in media at The Huffington Post, working on products to help the business be, well, a business. One of the early products that they launched was digital native content.

While HuffPo ultimately sold to AOL for a successful exit, one of the things Jarrod talked about was that the story of media got screwed up. It was no longer about building a great brand, but rather, about being the first and fastest to get a story out, irrespective of outcome.

Additionally, many of these media companies saw the scale that platforms were getting and assumed that was the only way to grow and succeed. Since then, of course, that narrative has changed.

On record labels & media companies

The ease in which individuals can launch their own business is becoming easier than ever before, but we still operate in a very black and white world. You either work for a media brand or you are on your own.

In Jarrod's opinion, media companies need to start thinking about themselves as record labels, which should focus on brand, distribution, services, etc. Rather than letting talent walk away to start their own thing, partner with them.

It's a different notion for media companies to come to terms with. However, in the current state, media companies are acting like factories where they help a journalist build their brand and then that journalist starts anew (see Politico Playbook writers leaving).

On the renaissance creator

In that same breath, this idea that all the very best writers are going to suddenly quit their jobs and go solo is not actually a reality. The reason? It's actually a lot of work.

The promise of going solo is that you can focus on writing what you want to write. That sounds great. However, you also have to edit, design, do audience development, track finances, etc. All the things a media company typically did.

The real benefactors of this new era will be the renaissance creator: an entrepreneurial operator that also wants to create. These are people that understand building a business and then opt to build a creative entity.

Sean Griffey is co-founder and CEO of Industry Dive, a network of business publications covering a wide variety of topics including retail, biopharma and waste management. When I think about a successfully scaled b2b media company, Industry Dive comes to mind first.

In this episode, we discussed a ton, but a few things jumped out…

On expanding into new markets

Industry Dive has a specific playbook that they use to determine what verticals they want to expand into it. It starts with a very simple question: does this fit the business model?

Because Industry Dive is marketing driven, it needs to find industries with high capital spend. That means the executives are buyers that control budgets. A mistake Sean sees many operators make is that they in industries that don’t have this.

The other very important question they ask is whether the industry is being disrupted by technology or regulation. What they’re trying to identify is whether people’s jobs require them to keep up to date on what’s going on day-to-day. If that exists, you’ve got something.

On media’s sweet spot with content studios

Industry Dive recently acquired the content studio from NewsCred in what appears to have been a match made in heaven. NewsCred was moving away from its content studio business while Industry Dive was doubling down on it.

What this reinforces is the sweet spot that media finds itself with regarding to producing content for partners. As Sean explains, any agency can create great content. That’s not the hard part.

They might even be able to create great content and distribute that content to an audience (though not as easily as a media company can.)

Only a media company can take it a step farther and consult their clients on when the narrative has shifted. Industry Dive was able to tell its partners, “hey, the audience is moving away from covid-related coverage” far faster than an agency ever could, which allowed their partners to start creating new content in the new narrative.

On data being the most important thing

Sean offered his big piece of advice for prospective media operators and it’s something that I whole heartedly agree with as well.

Operators need to start collecting user data immediately. You’ll never feel bad having a better understanding of who your audience is. More importantly, the sooner you have it, the better it’ll be when you decide to use it.

And using it doesn’t have to mean advertising products. Having better user data can also mean making better product and editorial decisions.

In Sean’s opinion, too many media companies wait to determine their user data strategy and they’d be smart to start sooner.

Dan Shipper and Nathan Baschez are the founders of Everything, a bundle of business newsletters. What started as their two respective publications, Superorganizers and Divinatons, has expanded to include multiple newsletters.

A few things we discussed in this episode...

On revenue shares

When a user signs up for the Everything bundle and after all the fees are taken out, Everything sends a survey to the subscriber to ask them what newsletter was the primary reason they signed up. Whatever the answer is dictates which newsletter writer gets paid for that newsletter subscriber.

From there, each writer has their own agreement. Some are licensing deals whereas others are built entirely within the network. So, the revenue shares might be different depending on the situation.

The plan is to then resurvey the subscribers and determine whether the primary newsletter has changed. If it has, then the money gets allocated to this new newsletter. This way, the writer is rewarded for keeping the subscriber subscribed. 

On writing & audience development

Both Dan & Nathan agree that one of the most important things they can do is create the best possible writing possible. In their words, this is the best way that they can help create a successful publication.

They also see the current newsletters as a good way of helping to incubate different newsletters that may join the newsletter. An example, Shipper explained, could be adding a new productivity newsletter to the bundle. Superorganizers could then drive audience to it with the goal of getting people to convert.

Where it goes from here

The future looks a lot like where they are now, but with many more newsletters in the bundle. They could expand into industry verticals, such as waste management or space (their examples) to job roles (marketing and product management) and to newsletters focused on specific companies.

What they are also trying is finding the people that have that "twinkle in their eye" about a very specific topic. The idea is that, even if they don't write, they can be paired with great writers. It's unknown if it works, but the idea is that the team of expert/writer could create a great product.

Ultimately, they want to try and figure out ways to identify some of the "best business knowledge that's locked inside people's heads."

Snigdha Sur, Founder & CEO of The Juggernaut, always knew she wanted to be in media. She now runs a subscription media company that is dedicated to creating "smart journalism for the South Asian diaspora” called The Juggernaut.

In this episode, we discussed a ton, but a few things jumped out…

Niche can scale

Under normal circumstances, you wouldn’t expect to see a media company in Y Combinator, an accelerator for traditional tech startups. However, for a variety of reasons, they decided to have Snigdha join the program.

One of the things she said that resonates with me is that niche can actually scale. We think of niche as small, but these verticalized media companies have the potential to really grow into something robust. Part of the way to think about that is about content appearing in multiple places, including on the website, newsletter, podcasts, video & TV deals and various other opportunities.

A classic example that she used is BET, which serves a specific community. Viacom bought BET in 2001 for $3 billion. It was a niche play, but that didn’t hold it back from reaching incredible scale.

On lifetime subscribers & Thursday customer calls

Unlike many media companies, The Juggernaut offers the option for people to purchase a lifetime subscription. For $249.99, you will never not have access to The Juggernaut. It’s an interesting experiment and one that Snigdha is really a fan of in a limited sense.

As she explained, these are the most die hard of supporters. They’re people that really care about the brand and what it stands for. They’re also people that she sometimes uses to bounce ideas off, whether that’s sharing content ahead of time or perhaps taking a look at the upcoming app.

The other part of this is her ritual of taking 5-10 customer calls every Thursday. She wants to hear from people and get their thoughts on how The Juggernaut is doing; the good and the bad.

Audience development with Instagram

I teased this out on Twitter, but I am a big fan of The Juggernaut’s Instagram strategy. Using a tool called Link.bio, they are effectively able to create a clone of The Juggernaut’s Instagram page. Every time they share a new photo, they include three paragraphs of text and then a “link in bio.”

That link in bio is a link.bio URL that then shows all the same images the user had seen previously. This time, though, when a user clicks one of those images, it takes them to the individual story page. It’s a great way to distribute content on a platform that is otherwise not very friendly with distributing content.