Online Registration.Qxd

Volume 2 · Number 2 · December 2003 digital edge report Online Registration: Converting Anonymous Users to Loyal Customers © 2002 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. digital edge report Online Registration: Converting Anonymous Users to Loyal Customers By J.D. Lasica J.D. Lasica ([email protected]) is an independent journalist, former new media manager and former editor at The Sacramento Bee. He is currently writing a book about digital media, and writes a daily Weblog at www.new- mediamusings.com. NAA Staff Acknowledgements: Editor: Rob Runett Layout: Katie Howington © 2003 the Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. No part of this doc- ument may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior, written permission of the Newspaper Association of America. digitaledge digital edge report Table of Contents Introduction . .1 Approaches to Registration . .2 Buy or Build? Vendors and Market Size Consideration . .11 The Impact of Registration on Revenue . .19 Benefits to the Newspaper Enterprise Beyond Advertising . .24 The Legal Arena . .27 Looking Ahead . .30 Additional Resources . .32 Report Sources . .33 For more information about the Digital Edge Report, contact: ROB RUNETT, Director, Electronic Media Communications Newspaper Association of America 1921 Gallows Road, Suite 600, Vienna, VA 22182-3900 703.902.1806 fax: 703.902.1745 email: [email protected] www.digitaledge.org i © 2003 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. digitaledge Introduction During the past three years, a handful of news Circulation, classifieds, editorial and customer pioneers took the first halting steps down the service all stand to gain. trail of online registration. But it wasn't until 2003 that the industry began a wholesale At a minimum, registration has succeeded in move toward user registration, coming to making the online space more tangible to adver- view it as an inevitable step and valuable tool tisers. “When you approach an advertiser to sell in understanding online customers. an advertising campaign, you’re no longer talking a bunch of techno-flap about page views or Today the conversation has largely moved past unique visitors. You’re talking about real people whether to require registration and settled into a and customer characteristics in a language that’s new phase: How can newspapers capitalize on meaningful to advertisers,” said Steve this new wealth of customer data? Leaders in the Yelvington, vice president of strategy and con- field of online registration have begun to mine tent for Morris Digital Works. “That’s a change these registration riches to deploy targeted this industry just desperately needs.” advertising campaigns, launch new e-mail initia- tives and build out sections of their Web sites in This report will look at online registration from response to readers’ needs. top to bottom, with actionable strategies for decision makers who have committed to a registration program and for those who are weighing the pros and cons. The following chapters Registration data can explain the most advanced registration tech- become essential building niques, the various registration models avail- blocks in a paper's efforts able, best practices, new revenue streams, les- sons learned from registration pioneers, added to become an audience- value brought by vendors, and what’s coming focused media company. next. But while registration is rooted on the Web, its benefits extend across the enterprise. If executed with care and precision, and embraced by the publisher, registration data can form the essential building blocks in a paper’s efforts to become an audience-focused media company. 1 © 2003 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. digitaledge Approaches to Online Registration On the Internet, many people still chafe at the Today, with the advent of registration systems, idea of having to walk through a registration Web managers are asking for, and receiving, process to access news. But the complaints are information about the gender, birth year, postal becoming less bellicose now that more news sites address and local media habits of their online vis- have adopted the practice and registration has itors. Besides The New York Times on the Web, taken hold as a familiar part of the online land- which required user registration since its first day scape. on the Web in 1996, other early movers include Belo Interactive, Tribune Interactive and Newspapers of all sizes have taken the plunge Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, all of and now require registration, from The New York which impose access controls on their content to Times (11.7 million registered users) to the spur users to fork over the demographic goods. Watertown (S.D.) Public Opinion (8,814 registered users). During 2003, Advance Internet, Newspapers of all sizes Knight Ridder Digital and Morris Digital Works have taken the plunge began to roll out registration programs. So did USAToday.com, SignOnSanDiego.com, and now require registra- NewsOK.com in Oklahoma City and dailies in tion. mid-size and small markets such as The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle, The Bakersfield Californian, and Carroll County Times in Maryland. There's a new bargain being struck between Internet publishers and site visitors: Publishers Morris Digital Works' Steve Yelvington summed can't afford to provide local content on the Web up the new prevailing mindset this way: "Given for free, but instead of demanding payment, dig- that our business model is built on aggregating ital-media companies want information. And mil- relevant audiences for local advertisers, there's no lions of people are providing personal data in other way to go. My only regret is in not moving exchange for content. ahead as aggressively as we should have in har- vesting this information. I wish we had done this "People have to pay in some form, and the best a year or two ago." way to do that online is to get payment in the form of personal information as a way to increase A year or two ago, most online news managers targeting advertising possibilities," said Rebecca could only glean hints about their audience by Baldwin, director of product development for poring over traffic reports and IP addresses. In Tribune Interactive. truth, they were largely flying blind, unable to ascertain the demographic and psychographic Added Stephen Newman, deputy general manag- makeup of their visitors. Registration doesn't er of NYTimes.com, "From the beginning we felt completely solve that puzzle, but it adds deeper strongly that filling out a form one time was a layers of understanding, especially when com- very small price to pay for the value you were bined with other audience management tools that getting." track individuals' behavior while visiting a Web site. 2 © 2003 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. digitaledge Interestingly, all of these registration pioneers have taken somewhat different paths in how they ask for and use customer data. Different Approaches to Registration Approaches to registration run the gamut from voluntary registration (San Diego), to a quick three-question pop-up approach (Washington Post, USA Today), to a minute-long form (The New York Times), to a lengthier form (Tribune), to a detailed form that takes perhaps four minutes to complete (Belo). SignOnSanDiego.com began to ask users for registration information in July 2003. "We liked the Washington Post approach, but we wanted something still more gentle," said Chris Jennewein, The San Diego Union-Tribune's director of Internet operations. "We didn't want to SignOnSanDiego.com go the L.A. Times route, which we thought was too restrictive." newspapers see it as the first step toward a sub- Through the use of cookies, a user is allowed three scription model." visits to the site before a window pops up to ask for age, gender and ZIP code. Even then, the user can The Washington Post Co. launched its unobtru- click through to the story by choosing, "Ask me sive but mandatory registration program on Aug. 7, later," allowing the user three more visits until 2002. Site visitors were met with a pop-up box that another pop-up window appears. If he or she does asked them to volunteer their age, gender and ZIP sign up, it takes all of 10 seconds. code (or country if they lived abroad). A week later washingtonpost.com began to make the questions San Diego is home to a large military community, mandatory and launched the survey section by sec- which prizes its privacy, Jennewein said. It's also a tion across the site, so that only the front page is destination city where travelers may be visiting the freely accessible. site to plan a vacation itinerary, "so roping off the site would be a mistake in this market," he said. CEO Christopher M. Schroeder said at the time that the site was "committed to better understand- "In an industry like newspapers where growth in ing our audience so we can create a more powerful customers is flat and the one growth of area is user and advertiser experience," and that being online, we think it's vitally important to continue able to target segments of the audience was "an that growth," Jennewein said. "Online is one area exciting and potentially enormous proposition for where newspapers can continue to be a mass medi- Web advertisers. Interactive capabilities such at um. There's a danger in the registration concept if this are not only unique to the medium, they are the 3 © 2003 Newspaper Association of America. All rights reserved. digitaledge Azcentral.com, the joint Web site of Gannett Co. properties The Arizona Republic and KPNX TV, signed up 536,000 users within seven weeks of launching registration on Sept. 2, 2003. Like USAToday.com and washingtonpost.com, it asks for a user's age, ZIP code and gender.

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