Pounds or profiles? The two sides of charging for content.

Back in August, as his News Corporation company reported huge financial losses, media mogul Rupert Murdoch announced his bold strategy for shaking up the newspaper industry: charging for content. It wasn't a new idea, of course; businesses of all types have tried charging internet users in many ways for many products, some sucessfully and others not.

Today, Johnston Press has become one of the first to adopt Murdoch's proposed charging strategy for a number of its local titles. One might argue that comparing the likes of The Times, the New York Post and the Wall Street Journal with the Worksop Guardian, the Ripley & Heanor News, the Whitby Gazette and the Northumberland Gazette is a slightly unfair exercise, but in theory at least the principles are the same.

The question remains: will visitors pay even a small amount for their news content, or will they simply go elsewhere?

A mutually beneficial relationship

We don't advocate charging for content as we believe that success in online publishing stems from developing a mutually beneficial relationship with your readership - and putting them off at the first point of contact with your brand is counterproductive to say the least. In any case, your readers have something much more valuable to you than a few pounds for some news content.

Profile information is hugely important to you and your advertisers, and its something that we have found visitors are more than willing to hand over in exchange for quality content, advice and networking opportunities. We've developed an approach, based on 14 years of experience in our sister company, Sift Media, which helps you identify the high-value content and funcionality that your users want, and build a strategy for monetising it without directly charging visitors for it.

At the same time, we look at the amount of effort you'll need to produce and sustain these high-value items, helping you prioritise your current resource pool and develop a business case for bringing in the right people to strengthen your offer and retain your readership.

A few tips for maximising the amount of profile information you capture:

• Make sure that the value proposition is clear - visitors demand something obviously valuable in return for their data
• Use clear signposting to highlight premium content and functionality
• Initial registration is your prime opportunity to capture profile data - make your process clear, usable, accessible and ensure the right fields are in place
• Show users how much of their profile is complete, and highlight the value of filling more of it in

You can see a great example of a clear and effective registration form on accountingweb.co.uk - there's nothing like practicing what you preach.