Ensuring the economic survival of a regional newspaper is not easy. Even more when this newspaper, as is the case of the Sul Informação, which is based in Faro, it is assumed, since its foundation eight years ago, as only and only online.
And when you bet, as we do, on free access content, a decision that I will explain later.
O Sul Informação it was created in September 2011 by a group of three journalists who parted company with another newspaper in the Algarve due to salary arrears. Since the beginning, we have established ourselves as a newspaper in the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo, two regions that are naturally linked, not only geographically, but also in terms of problems and experiences.
With online-only editing and no paid content or subscriptions, how do we survive? This is the exercise we have been doing for these eight years, with increasing success.
The solution has been, for example, for not stopping, for constantly improving both the journalistic service offered to readers and the platforms on which we work.
In terms of digital support, we have taken advantage of all the financing tools that are made available, namely the Regional Press Incentives, managed by the Regional Coordination and Development Committees.
On the other hand, contrary to what is happening more and more, even with national media, we do very little desk journalism.
O Sul Informação, even though it is a newspaper with little money, it goes to places to do reports, to talk to the protagonists of the stories and learn about their problems. We are going to Alcoutim or Aljezur, we are going to Barrancos or Odemira. All of this entails more expenses, but we see this part of our work as an investment we make in more readers and more quality.
The solution for us to finance ourselves is also to expand our services. This is what will happen this Friday, with the launch of our subpage Alentejo | Sul Informação, which is the result of the application we presented to CCDR Alentejo, under the Regional Press Incentives.
And then, you might ask, why did we determine from the beginning that the content would be free? Because the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo do not have enough audiences to justify paid content.
The Algarve has 450 thousand inhabitants, the district of Beja has 152 thousand inhabitants. Putting this together, there are more than 600 thousand inhabitants, which, at first glance, for those who do not know the reality of these regions, may seem a lot and, above all, may seem enough to justify the bet on a paid newspaper.
But the Algarve never even had a printed daily newspaper.
Even the Algarve's printed weekly papers, which are now just two in the entire region, in their most vibrant times, in the early and mid-2000s, had ridiculously low print runs of a maximum of 10 copies…and it wasn't every week, it was just in a few special weeks, like Christmas.
In other words, there is no newspaper-reading public in the Algarve region. Why? This will perhaps be a good topic for a master's or even a doctoral thesis...
However, if there is no public reading newspapers, if we were to create barriers to access the news, the reports, the stories we publish, we would be shooting ourselves in the foot. And running the risk of quickly running out of feet and falling.
So what do you live on? you might ask me. We live off advertising. But when we started we didn't have a penny of advertising, so for a few long months we had to invest money from our pockets to survive and grow.
Today the Sul Informação has an average of 30 thousand pageviews daily, that is, close to 900 thousand views per month. Last August, we totaled 1 million pageviews. But we have days when we hit 50, 70. We've already reached 102 thousand pageviews in just one day...
These are low numbers when compared to the national media, but they are very high numbers, even the highest, in the context of the regional press in Portugal.
Despite these very encouraging metrics, which have maintained a consistent upward trend, in the Sul Informação we don't focus on the “click dictatorship”. We know from experience that news from misfortunes represent a lot of views and a lot of interaction on social networks, especially on Facebook.
Obviously we have to report on everything that happens in the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo, but we prefer to focus on deeper themes, on our own reports, on stories we discover. Because if the misfortunes They bring us many immediate readers (mostly just “touch and run readers”), it is these works of greater quality and depth that earn us the respect and preference of those who read or see us. And that cause the Sul Informação is, today, the reference newspaper in the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo.
You might ask: have so many pageviews does it guarantee you direct advertising return? This is really one of the factors that weighs, both with regard to regional advertisers and large advertisers.
Another factor as or more important than the number of pageviews is to continue to ensure that the Sul Informação is the reference and most read newspaper in the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo. The newspaper's prestige also attracts advertisers. And keep us.
In terms of funding, we also have a system, since last year, to facilitate donations from readers, based on our home page. There are now just over a dozen people who make monthly or yearly voluntary contributions to the Sul Informação, as a way to support our work, but still do not generate a very significant financial amount. However, this could be an area where we can bet more in the future.
Also, because the Sul Informação is a title held by a cultural association, we also have protocols with public entities to support the production of content in certain areas of Culture and Heritage.
We have also already started to structure a kind of support fund for our journalistic work, to which regional companies or companies with interests in the region that they consider important would contribute – as we do! – that there are strong and independent media in the Algarve and Baixo Alentejo.
This fund, to which the companies would act as a kind of patrons and would contribute annually, would serve to finance more extensive research work.
But let one aspect be clarified right away: the sponsoring sponsors would not have any interference in the themes to be chosen and, even less, in the approaches chosen for the works that would help to finance...
We have already made several contacts with entrepreneurs, namely those who often pat us on the back saying we do a good job (and send us their press releases for us to publish)…but so far, what we've heard is just a series of “nins”… But we don't give up!
As for this pressing issue of media funding, I have been following with interest the proposals that have emerged in recent times, from the Portuguese Press Association, the Christian Inspired Press Association and re/media.lab, which suggest support measures to the media in Portugal.
Of some, I think online regional newspapers, like the Sul Informação, would benefit little or nothing, as in the case of paying for digital signatures, among others similar.
But there are interesting suggestions, one of which is just the fact that the State complies with its own laws – as in the case of publishing Institutional Advertising, which obviously should also have a significant amount of money for regional media, contrary to what currently happens. And that you should not forget regional digital media.
Other suggested measures, relating to projects to promote media literacy and greater media connection with the community, schools, etc., are aspects in which the Sul Informação it already works and that, therefore, we will look favorably if there is more support.
In addition to the media literacy projects we promote, with a network of schools, in 2018/2019, across the Algarve, there is not a week when one of us is not invited to speak at a school or we do not receive visits to the newsroom. . This is also media literacy work, which should actually be paid for, because we are providing a service to the community.
Indirect support, such as hiring young and younger journalists, tax and contribution exemptions, may also be good measures to implement.
And now back to the beginning: will we ever have paid content? Perhaps, in the future, in some content said premium.
But we continue to think that the ideal would be that advertising, donations from readers and some corporate or individual patrons could be enough to keep access to information free and free.
It may be idealistic, but if we don't have dreams, what's the point of being here?
Author: Elisabete Rodrigues is a journalist and director of Sul Informação – full version of the intervention presented at the conference on Media Financing, promoted by the Union of Journalists, on December 2nd and 3rd, at Palácio da Cidadela in Cascais.
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