Success equation for media firms in Swaziland

It almost need not be said, therefore that local editors and media managers must deliver quality content to the Swazi audience, because people will either reject or buy the newspaper, or pay their TV license, based on the perceived value of the content from these media. The value to audiences is created by making investments in the production process of content. For instance, the Times of Swaziland could budget for an ongoing audience research program to ensure that they supply readers with the information they want. Or, the Swaziland Television Authority (STVA) could start a training fund or partner with training institutions as a way of training its newsroom employees towards achieving a standard of excellence. There are many examples of investments in the production process, but generally they include fulfilling human resource needs like:

employing qualified staff,
providing fair remuneration,
developing and motivating existing employees,
providing updated production equipment,

as well as fulfilling audience needs like

conducting audience research
and implementing its lessons

It is also an investment to create and implement an effective marketing plan for the content or product. This can greatly enhance the value of the content of that newspaper, radio or television station. An effective marketing plan has to accomodate the marketing principle of the four P's. Hence, the plan should address:

What the product is – being content which is well-researched, well-presented and audience oriented, a point discussed above

Pricing – which should be fair in order to prevent the target audience substituting the product with another,
Place – how accessible is the newspaper? Does the frequency wave reach far areas? The product must be accessible and timely or the audience will be lost
Promotion – The product must be promoted in different ways to keep target audiences and attract new audiences.

Ultimately, marketing and distribution efforts will yield a result only as good as the product.

Investments like these will improve the value in content, which audiences will see and consequently, circulation, viewership and listenership rates will increase. These increases mean media organizations can charge advertisers more because they will be giving them a wider platform (audience) to market their products. Of course, advertisers will still be careful to analyse the demographics of this larger audience, in order to ensure that they are the right market for their goods or services! Still, the larger the audience, the better for media organisation.

US media researcher, Philip Meyer, articulates the success equation more clearly. In a paper titled “The Influence Model and Newspaper Business”, Meyer suggests that newspapers should focus on producing social influence in order to make profit and not the other way round.

“The way to achieve societal influence is to obtain public trust by becoming a reliable and high quality information provider, which frequently involves investments of resources in news production and editorial output. The resulting higher quality earns more public trust in the newspaper and not only larger readership and circulation, but influence with which advertisers will want their names associated,” (2004: 74).

Not only newspapers ( The Times of Swaziland and the Swazi Observer ), but radio ( Swaziland Broadcasting and Information Service and Voice of the Church ) and television stations ( Swazi TV and Channel Swazi ) in Swaziland need to apply this equation if they are to guarantee their continued success and survival.

© 2007 all rights reserved. This article may be republished online as is. Get more interesting Swazi articles from infoshopswaziland.com For print publication, please contact info@knotell.co.sz info@knotell.co.sz

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By Sazikazi Thabede