‘Growth of the news business will come from the non-news side of the equation’

In a new year message to the team, Network18’s Managing Director Rahul Joshi said that there is a need to build the non-news side of the business across all media platforms.

Excerpts:

The growth of the news business will come from the non-news side of the equation. News is not what it used to be—the conventional breaking stories, the traditional focus on facts, the incessant chase for the exclusives. It is some of that. But as Moneycontrol has shown, news or information or opinion or insight is merely the funnel that gets people to come to any platform but they don’t necessarily stay there. The challenge is to keep them there and to build engagement around your platform in this schizophrenic world of disinformation. Yes, they come to Moneycontrol chasing news, but they stay on the site to converse (MC Forum); to log in their trades (MC Portfolio); to lock in money in investments (FDs with MC); to borrow some money for this that and the other (MC Lending); to gain further insights and acquire sophisticated trading tools (MC Pro)… the list is endless. That’s building the base for frenetic growth of this platform, giving it an edge that the rivals haven’t been able to keep pace with.

Let’s resolve in 2025 to build unabashedly the non-news side of our business across all our media platforms.

—That brings me to the point that what was working till a few years ago has stopped working today. Look around you: most companies are stagnant or de-growing, doing more of the same and less of the outstanding. But that is not the case with individuals who have compelling stories to tell. Just look at the podcasts, vodcasts, newsletters or online videos notching up views in the millions. Think about it: What have you done different in the past year? Have you tried anything bold at all or have you been running faster on the treadmill to remain at the same place? I repeat again: nobody is watching TV in the way they used to. Appointment viewing is dead. The old, tired formats of TV viewing News@6, Views@7; Debates@8; PrimeTime@9 died long ago, it’s just that we’re refusing to go ahead with the cremation… Ditto digital: the traditional models get disrupted overnight. Artificial Intelligence is beginning to pervade every aspect of the story—all the way from ideas and editing to publishing and distribution.

Let’s resolve in 2025 to turn conventional wisdom on its head—and do this within weeks, not months, because we’re losing time.

—Every time I visit Bangalore to meet the founders of startup companies, be it Meesho, Rapido, Zerodha, Groww, Zetwerk, Kreditbee or the incredible venture capital folks, I come back with many learnings—the most important being that our linear thinking can only lead to linear business models that reflect in our linear thinking in the Annual Operation Plan. We need to think of new ideas and new revenue streams without adding manpower but by deploying tech. The need of the hour is not to think of growing the business in double digits but 2x, 3x…

Let’s resolve in 2025 to build a burning ambition within the group to chase very high growth targets—our four Ps should be Passion, Pace, Paranoia, Productivity.

—That brings me to the penultimate and most important point: to put intuition, creativity, innovation at the heart of everything we do. In a recent podcast, Jeff Bezos says how innovation often requires "wandering" rather than following a “linear, efficient path.” This wandering, often at odds with the efficient way of doing business, allows for the discovery of new ideas that are not obvious in a structured or goal-oriented approach. We should stoke this creativity and intuition and gut feel through high-quality brainstorming sessions, mostly with the young and restless in the organisation. Like thinking of new ideas and revenue streams, a la Moneycontrol; innovation in thinking of new IPs like Future Female Forward; infusing life around old, tired formats like Rising Bharat or IBLA or the number of IPs we routinely do every year; cutting-edge products, new tech, new platforms. Also, reimagine our news channels, the websites and apps.

Let’s resolve that in 2025 we’ll look at old ideas with a new lens, new ideas with a radically different lens, radical ideas with a disruptive and intuitive magnifying glass…

—Finally, this will not happen if we don’t fundamentally change mindsets of the senior leadership as well as encourage a younger crop of leaders to come to the fore. We have to recognise great talent and put them on the fast track with high reward and recognition programs. I often hear colleagues say: “I’ve been doing news for 25 years, this won’t work.” We have to change this mindset. We have to break this thinking. We have to hire not from news companies alone but from a more diverse talent pool.
Let’s resolve, in 2025, that we will put people before process and encourage wandering within the organisation as it significantly steps up its creative game….