With all the talk about usability, technology and killer applications there is still one thing that stands above all others: content. Content is still king.
“Content is where I expect much of the real money will be made on the Internet, just as it was in broadcasting,” said Bill Gates in his infamous 1996 article, Content is King – nine years ago.
In reality, most of the money is still being made on transactions. But content is delivering the transactions. The Wall Street Journal Online sells the content directly. Giants such as Google and Yahoo! sell targeted advertising based on content. Amazon sells goods but uses content to drive those goods.
But we’re not all in agreement here...
“Content has never been king, it is not king now, and is unlikely to ever be king,” wrote Andrew Odlyzko, Head of the Mathematics and Cryptography Research Departments at AT&T Labs, in his article Content is Not King. Odlyzko argues that a massive portion of the traffic and transactions on the Internet is still represented by e-mail, corporate intranets and other non-content related transactions including instant messaging and electronic data interchange (EDI).
“The Internet has done quite well without content, and can continue to flourish without it. Content will have a place on the Internet, possibly a substantial place. However, its place will likely be subordinate to that of business and personal communication.”
And yet companies continue to invest huge sums into content on their respective websites. Yahoo! is a prefect case in point. Yahoo! is investing in news. The portal has hired a roving war correspondent, CNN and NBC veteran journalist Kevin Sites. Sites will spend the next year traveling to 36 war zones around the world, reporting on those ‘hot spots’ and what is transpiring.
Why is a portal company that earns billions on aggregating other organization’s original content now starting to invest in original content? Because content pays. Users want to read it; advertisers want to pay to reach those users.
Outside the free content that advertisers support, consumers are also paying directly for content. In 2002 consumers paid more than $1 billion on pure content and the expenditure is growing at a huge clip. Total consumer e-commerce purchases on the Internet this year are expected to surpass $13 billion. And of those that aren’t purchasing online, many are using the Internet to research their purchase.
A Unity Marketing survey of affluent consumers found that the Internet is the media that has the most influence on luxury purchasing. The Internet was cited by 44% of luxury consumers as very or somewhat important in influencing their purchasing. Articles and reviews are second, with 42% reporting being influenced by editorial matter. Traditional advertising is well behind: newspaper ads (31%); television programs and commercials (28%); and magazine advertising (24%).
Internet authors and pundits will continue to dominate popular discourse with talk of usability, technology and applications – all of which are less important to consumers and are merely princes to King Content.
