Content partnerships do not work

I don’t live in DC, but I’ve been following the dustup about Jim Brady’s departure from TBD.com with interest. The site’s policy of incorporating the local blogosphere interested me as there are constant murmurs of people trying to accomplish a similar goal here in Philly.

The recent news out of TBD mostly caught my eye because, in Technically Philly’s experience, it is often difficult and time consuming to forge partnerships with mainstream media. Of the handful of content sharing agreements we’ve sought out, none exist today. In some cases it was the choice of the partner, other times it was our call.

It appears that TBD is having a similar experience. The company has ceased selling ads for its partners and Brady confessed that the content partnerships were one of the reasons given for his departure:

The new venture needed to slot alongside the existing Channel 7 part of the organisation and it was the relationship between the new web savvy project and the legacy business which proved to be the most difficult thing for Brady to tackle. (as told to the Guardian)

If Allbritton can’t figure it out, what chance do the rest of us have? It’s starting to become clear that content partnerships sound great at conference panels and editorial meetings, but they are rarely executed with any success.

Why? Big sites and small sites simply don’t need one another to survive. For a few reasons:

Pageviews vs Engagement – Most niche sites like the idea and prestige of being published a more established player, but the partnership often does little to help keep the small site sustainable. In Technically Philly’s case, we like seeing traffic numbers grow but we know that a small but dedicated fan base is what keeps us afloat. The drive-by reader may make our Google Analytics spike, but it doesn’t help fill seats when we host a paid event. Conversely, larger sites need traffic to sell more CPM-based advertising.

It isn’t worth it for mainstream media – For sites like TBD.com, it isnt worth the time to sell ads for the little guys. Nor is it worth negotiating individual content agreements. It’s true that a well-executed content partnership can help the big guys fill coverage holes, but no smaller site will give up content without links, ad revenue or similar incentives that just aren’t worth the time it takes to manage.

It isn’t worth it for the little guys – Small news sites are like any other small business: every month is a fight for survival. Small sites are often undermanned and every man hour is valuable. At Technically Philly, we once wasted countless hours negotiating with a larger brand because they constantly thought our stuff was “too insidery.” Of course it is, that’s how we build our audience. We found ourselves rewriting posts and negotiating about what would be relevant to the big site’s audience. While it felt good to be published on the larger site, it wasn’t worth the constant back and forth.

The only content partnerships that seem to work are the ones with nonprofit money attached, like what J-Lab has been doing with newspapers around the country. Without the incentive from J-Lab, I’d bet that most of these agreements would crumble.

I believe that some smart folks will eventually figure out how to make content partnerships work between small and large brands, and Technically Philly will continue to try and work with folks to try new ways of sharing content. Seriously, get in touch.