In a day and age when competition for eyeballs has never been more profound, finding and implementing the best practices on ways to encourage subscribers and more importantly, non-subscribers to pick-up and read or test your product has never been more important.  Kevin Slimp will discuss the methods that are successfully utilized around the country to help you product stand-out in a sea of competition and innovation.  Gone are the days of just utilizing the traditional methods, now is the time to step-up your game and stand-out where others don’t.  This is a session that has something advertising, audience and content creators alike.

When COVID-19 struck, it not only threw our country and every news-media company into turmoil, it devastated many of the industry organizations to the core, some will never recover.  The International News-Media Marketing Association (INMA) was not immune to the turmoil and had to respond as everyone else.  Not only only will Earl share some of the great ‘green shoots’ that have emerged due to of the COVID-19 crisis, but he will also convey the INMA story and how they have emerged as strong as ever despite the pandemic setback. This is one session that is great for the entire company to attend and promises as always to be candid and entertaining at the same time.

Seems that COVID-19 may have been the last straw for a number of non-subscriber products around the country.  Those with the ability to continue to hang in there are likely doing so by their fingernails. In this session, Jim Hart will share many of the best practices and alternative ways a few newspapers are creatively rethinking these non-subscriber products and how they might be able to reduce costs while still satisfying and meeting the demands of their remaining customers.

Where did the day go? This is a question we all ask, especially if we work remotely. Ad sales expert Ryan Dohrn will share his top 10 time management tools that will help you boost your personal productivity by 35% in just one week! This is one of Ryan’s most popular workshops! From creating call zones to time-saving email templates to making better use of your CRM tools – learn expert and well-tested tips to reclaim eight hours every week and win more business faster.

Is it wise to reduce print/delivery frequency? What is the best print frequency to utilize in your market? What are the potential downsides to reducing the frequency? What are the potential advantages of a frequency reduction? These and many other questions are always top of mind when wrestling with this issue. Join with our outstanding panel of experts as they discuss these questions and many others throughout what promises to be a lively session. Regardless of where you sit on this issue, this session is sure to raise your level of understanding awareness that surrounds this difficult and often-times controversial topic.

Join Mather Economics’ president, Matt Lindsay, share his approach to achieving long-term print and digital reader revenue growth. Mather Economics is working with many leading news media companies with their transitions from a print advertising-led business model to a subscription revenue driven business model that maximizes the long-term value of their subscriber relationships. If you are focused on growing your print and digital subscription revenues and would like strategic guidance and actionable tactics for subscriber acquisition, engagement, retention, and revenue growth, please join us for this session. In addition, learn how the pandemic has affected the demand for news subscriptions and actions to grow audience revenue.

What do you do when it appears that you are doing everything in the right way, but nothing seems to go right? That might well describe many news-media companies in today’s world of COVID-19, erosion of print readers and declining revenue.  The first thing we must do is understand that action and motion, while providing the appearance of productive behavior, aren’t always as productive as it might seem. The only thing constant in today’s business climate is change, we must adapt our actions to match the changes occurring around us.  Join Rick Edmonds of the Poynter Institute as he discusses this vital topic.

Are you thinking of selling your newspaper or the possibility of buying one? This is a session that you will not want to miss. Join the panel of industry experts in the field of brokering, buying and/or selling newspapers as they discuss the ‘ins and outs’ of selling a newspaper. Not only learn what the buyers are looking for in a newspaper, but ways you can prepare your newspaper to obtain the maximum dollar amount when you do sell. Some of the information and learning may surprise you.

What is the next frontier for building and maintaining audience in a world ripe with competition for a readers/viewer’s attention? Some will say that establishing a great degree of loyalty is the answer. Join us as three of the best in the news-media industry share what they have learned about loyalty and building membership models. It isn’t always a one size fits all solution, many times it involves unique components and solutions. One thing is certain, if you aren’t in the loyalty/membership game are planning on being there, you will be left behind.  Join us as we discuss the winning elements of an audience/loyalty program.

One thing is certain in today’s news-industry environment, legal issues continue to emerge and challenge the news-media industry. Join with us as Mike discusses the many legal issues that currently face the industry. From union organizing, independent contractor litigation, special editions, and so much more, Mike will touch on it. As a part of the session, enjoy an entertaining virtual mock trial that has become a tradition in the audience events Mike has previously spoken at. A must see session.

It is no secret that texting has become a HUGE revenue opportunity for the news-media industry. Our outstanding panel will dive into various ways that news-media companies can capitalize on this technology in not only effective, but also inexpensive ways. Regardless of how you view texting, you will come away with ideas and strategies in this growing arena that can move the bottom-line needle for your company. Texting is here to stay, the only question remaining is will your company join in the revolution or stay on the sidelines?

Growing revenue is the holy grail in the news-media industry.  Gone are the days where the audience department just produces or maintains an audience. In today’s economic climate, the forward-thinking audience department must not only maintain and hopefully grow their audience, but they must find new revenue streams to contribute to the bottom-line of the company. Join our great panel as they discuss some of the more innovative initiatives that have proven to increase the revenue opportunities from the audience perspective.

Next to the high-level print frequency discussion being held behind closed doors, one of the next biggest discussions is if we should move our product into the mail and eliminate the carrier force and expense altogether. Join our expert panel as they discuss the methods, advantages and disadvantages of converting from carrier delivered product into postal delivery. How does it impact the market? How does it impact the advertisers? How many readers will you lose? Will it even save me money? All of these questions and many others will be discussed in great detail in this very informative and topical panel discussion.

It is no secret the news-media industry has undergone massive change and challenges. What is oftentimes over-looked through all of this is the massive disruption to our esteemed business partners as well. Not only do they get to talk to s many industry executives from around the industry allowing them to have a finger on the true pulse, they also have been forced to modify their business model as well, oftentimes in major ways. Listen as our business partners discuss many of their changes, but more importantly, listen as they share where they believe the industry is headed in the coming months and years.

Let’s all be honest, we all know you can NEVER cut your way to prosperity.  On the other hand, many have cut expenses in dramatic fashion over the past few years, specifically over the past 6 months with COVID.  We are all seeking potential expense reductions that impact the business model as little as possible and might improve efficiencies as well as the product and services that we provide.  You will certainly want to join this session as a group of industry executives share their most unique expense reduction initiatives. The one thing we asked of them, only share ideas that saved you money, but also made for a better product and company while doing so. You will come away with some great ideas that might actually be game-changers for your company. This is a must attend session!

While growing any news-media company can be frought with many challenges, listen to this lively panel discuss the in’s and out’s of growing in a small or weekly market. This panel will cover many topics in a rapid-fire format sure to provide multiple takeaways that can used or implemented quickly if appropriate in your own markets. If you own and/or operate in a smaller daily or weekly (or even monthly) market, this is one of those sessions that you will not want to miss.

It is absolutely imperative that news-media companies find and unlock new revenue streams moving forward. This panel will unlock the keys to several ideas that can be game-changers for your company and community. Don’t join us expecting the normal idea metrics, these ideas are somewhat outside the box and will require some different thinking. Think of our industry as a three-legged stool. We have advertising and audience revenue providing two of our revenue legs, but we still can’t balance very well on only two legs. This panel hopes to unlock what might become a part of that third leg allowing your company to flourish in the future.

Yes, we have all been impacted by COVID-19 in negative ways. The question now not only becomes, how do we move forward in spite of the negative impact that we have seen, but how might have COVID-19 actually given us opportunity and gateways to new ways of thinking.  Has it provided new methods of doing things and new revenue opportunities we might have missed in the past? This is an outstanding panel that is sure to not only entertain, but shed some light on the many positives that have been uncovered during this unprecedented time in our history.

With reduced staff, expertise and time, how do we generate the valuable leads which are the lifeblood of any sales organization? Join a great panel that has been working on this exact issue for years. Learn a few tricks and methods that are used in this space. More importantly, join the conversation as they discuss their weaknesses in this area and attempt to build a bridge that navigates the path forward in this space. They don’t profess to have all the answers, but they are ready to tackle the issue head on.