Sell better, sell differently: Why offering client services is crucial to digital media

Make media, sell advert. Or, make media, sell media.

And that’s it – that’s your digital media business model. There have always been variations on this – the ads might be sold in a real-time exchange or on an affiliate basis; there might be an intelligent membership model with a suite of products to choose from.

But increasingly, instead of saying “we think (hope) we can give you x amount of pageviews if you advertise with us,” digital publishers are saying: “How best can we use our expertise to help you reach your marketing objectives?” Client services is going to be a very big thing.

Turning the ad model on its head

So instead of selling ads on a tenancy basis, or using CPM, CTR, RTB or any of your favourite acronyms, publishers instead offer to create a range of products for clients. You may be familiar with software-as-a-service (SaaS) but how about marketing-as-a-service (MaaS)?

You need some mini-sites creating and managing to fit in with an ad campaign? We can do that. Branded video ads? Not a problem. Oh and we can do banner ads across our sites too if you want.

For example, B2B publisher UBM (it’s more a global tradeshow company these days, but anyway) has been successful in this area, particularly in the technology sector.

As btobonline.com wrote earlier this year, UBM Techweb restructured and grew its marketing services division to capitalise on a renewed demand. The group is offering “social media program implementation, development of applications for mobile devices, creation of on-demand digital publishing products and a broad suite of marketing analytics products and services.”

Techweb makes 60 percent of its revenue from MaaS, according to chief marketing officer Scott Vaughan.

But it’s not just tech. Here UBM’s Built Environment division (home of the Building and Building Design brands) lists all the things it will do for brands in the construction world:

– Print / digital round table events
– Recruitment webinars
– Virtual fairs
– Reader panels
– Podcasts
– Targeted videos streamed through propertyweek.com and interactive editions.

You know those advertorial pull-outs you get in trade mags, it’s like that, but with bells on.

And, theoretically, these are things editors would like to commission anyway. Could you get the win-win of users benefiting from editorial that advertisers are happy to pay for? To get to that equilibrium is the real challenge facing publishers today.

Consumer clients need services too

This week Conde Nast launched its Ideactive client services division. As Min Online reports, the new group will “focus on custom content, social media, experiential executions, apps, data analytics, research and public relations.”

And tellingly, Conde’s chief marketing officer Lou Cona says “We’re really targeting the non-media budgets out there”. In other words, for Conde this is not advertising, this is extra revenue above and beyond whatever brands are spending to get their display ads seen by Vogue and Wired Loading... products wired readers.

Reasons to be cheerful

I occasionally hear – and it is sometimes from very senior media execs – that “there is no business model” for online publishing, as if we’re paddling along in a boat with a hole it in.

But this is an example of using the expertise, skills and knowledge that media companies have in new and clever ways. Perhaps you were once in the news business, but would it be so bad to say you are now in the marketing business if it means your staff get paid and the revenue graph starts to lift by the end of the year?