As a possible deal with Newser falls apart, the online news pioneer ramps up its cultural coverage. The result: an ailing stock price, but traffic’s on the rise.
Kerry Lauerman remembers the time, a decade ago, when he was Salon’s Washington bureau chief and the website had a budget three times larger than it subsists on today.
Now the Washington bureau is toast. “We’re leaner and meaner and we work a lot smarter,” says Lauerman, who took over in November as editor in chief.
Salon made its name as a politically aggressive, staunchly liberal online operation. But in recent months I’ve noticed a very different kind of story often leading the site. There was “Men: The New Romantics,” and “Literature’s Gender Gap.” There was “My Husband, the Convicted Murderer” and “My Son, The Pink Boy.” Not to mention “Grammys’ Most Memorable Red-Carpet Outfits” and “The Hardest Part About Quitting Drinking? Dating.”
So is there a personality transplant going on?
“The identity of Salon is as a political site,” Lauerman says, “but our entertainment coverage has always done pretty well.” Beyond politics, he says, “we are emphasizing everything else more. We’ve staffed up in entertainment. We listen to our readers.”
And are these stories about movies and marriages and sex designed to attract more advertising?
“I’d be lying if I said that wasn’t a consideration.”
Given Salon’s precarious financial state, it’s obviously a major consideration. The struggling site quietly put itself up for sale in recent months, and talks with Newser.com, an aggregation site founded by Michael Wolff, collapsed Monday. The New York Times Dealbook blog reported that Salon board members grew concerned that they might be selling for too low a price after AOL paid $315 million to buy The Huffington Post.
The publicly traded company reported a loss of $4.8 million in fiscal 2010, with two investors making up the gap through loans. Salon’s stock is trading for a dime, down from $1.30 in the summer of 2008.
“It’s not an easy space to make money in if you’re trying to do quality content,” says CEO Richard Gingras, who provided the original seed money for Salon’s launch. “We have beefed up the investment in culture and lifestyle… It is about growing the audience.”
The first duty of any website is survival, and most of the news business—from old-line newspapers and magazines to newer operations such as The Daily Beast—is grappling with how to turn a profit online. The overhauling of Salon’s editorial mix comes as its center of gravity has shifted from San Francisco, where it was born 15 years ago, to Midtown Manhattan. Founding editor David Talbot and Joan Walsh, who stepped down last year, ran the place from the Bay Area; Lauerman, 41, is the first editor to be based, with most of the staff, in New York.
“It’s not an easy space to make money in if you’re trying to do quality content,” says CEO Richard Gingras, who provided the original seed money for Salon’s launch. “We have beefed up the investment in culture and lifestyle… It is about growing the audience.”
Walsh, who had tapped Lauerman as her deputy, was part of the new direction before returning to reporting and a book project. “Our news team is as good as it’s ever been,” she says. “But the political cycle ebbs and flows, and people get more or less interested depending on whether it’s election season and what the crazy story of the week is… We’ve probably gotten deeper into the cultural realm.”
Last week, Novelr profiled Amanda Hocking, whom they dubbed the very rich indie writer. Hocking is a 26-year-old woman who writes “paranormal romance” novels and publishes them herself through Amazon’s Kindle store. She’s been very successful, and has made a lot of money.
Her success has led to all sorts of speculation — as success will do — and comments from folks who think they could do what she does, too. They think she’s an overnight success. She recently posted a response at her website, and I like it. Here’s an excerpt:
This is literally years of work you’re seeing. And hours and hours of work each day. The amount of time and energy I put into marketing is exhausting. I am continuously overwhelmed by the amount of work I have to do that isn’t writing a book. I hardly have time to write anymore, which sucks and terrifies me.
If you read Hocking’s post, you might understand some of my own mindset over the past few years. Imagine that instead of discussing supernatural love stories, she’s writing about an unexpectedly successful personal-finance blog. There are some close parallels. I don’t mean that in a negative, complain-y way. I just mean to stress that yes, you can make it big doing something you love, but it’ll probably take a lot of hard work. (And luck. There’s always a bit of luck involved.)
Speaking of making money: There’s been a small flurry of online info about making more money lately. (You know this is one of my pet topics, right?) For example, Inc. magazine posted an article from Jason Fried about how to get good at making money. Fried’s list is targeted at small-business owners. Trent at The Simple Dollar responded with his own list of five easy steps to make money for average folks. Both articles are interesting.
Moving on: I’ve written before about the value of a neighborhood exchange — an informal system of borrowing and lending goods and services. David at My Two Dollars has a great list of items to share with your neighbors to save money. I realize that not everyone likes to borrow or lend things, but if you live in an area with good social capital, this can be a great way for everyone involved to save space and cash.
Since returning from Africa, I’ve been struggling to get everything done that needs to be done. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. So I was interested in the latest post at Pop Economics, which asks, “How much do you value your time?” Pop says the balance between time and money is tough to find — we want more of both. He’s actually experimenting with a personal assistant, which I like. I’ve been waiting for an average joe to do this and report on how it goes. (As opposed to somebody like Tim Ferriss, who makes it sound like a way to become superhuman.)
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