The iPad and the Wall Street Journal

As both a print and on-line subscriber to The Wall Street Journal, I am occasionally asked to participate in their on-line surveys. Often, these are done for the benefit of advertisers, to get a read on how well their messages are getting through.

Other times, the surveys are about the Journal itself – the kinds of stories I like, what needs to get more coverage (or less), and other issues along those lines. But a recent survey piqued my interest and, in my mind, showed how on-the-ball the people at the Journal are.

The Wall Street Journal is available in three different media: conventional newsprint, the WSJ.com web site, and the fairly new WSJ iPhone app. If you’re not familiar with the latter, it’s a nifty little app that includes breaking news (of all kinds, not just business news), stock market quotes, video, and even WSJ radio. It can be customized to suit the whims of the user.

The survey I completed asked a series of questions about how I use their web site vs. their print edition vs. the iPhone app. How does their iPhone app compare to other news apps, including The New York Times, FOX News, and AP's "Mobile News?" What is better about one or the other? Etc. Do I ever click on advertisers' banners?

Then they wanted to know whether I was planning on buying an Apple iPad within the next six months. I’m undecided on that question, but because I was curious why they were asking, I checked the “yes” box.

Therein ensued several specific questions about how I expected to use the iPad: whether to read books, magazines and newspapers; play games; watch movies; send and receive email, etc.

Would I welcome a special iPad WSJ application? (Yes.) Would I be willing to pay extra for it? (No, I wouldn’t.) Would banner ads be okay? (Sure. Why not.) And how would I prefer the app to be formatted: like the iPhone app or like the print edition? (Print.)

The survey was striking because it shows how Dow-Jones is continuing to stay ahead of the technology curve. Remember, they were the first major player with a subscription-only web site, and they're one of the few (if not the only) media companies actually making money on web site subscriptions.

(One of their chief competitors, the New York Times, has long been struggling with “monetizing” its web site – an effort that has been marked with fits and starts the past few years. For a time, the Times tried to charge for access to certain columnists. That failed and the experiment ended. They recently announced that, commencing next year, access would be strictly by paid subscription. I’ll believe it when I see it.)

At heart, the poll about the iPad once again demonstrates why the Wall Street Journal and Dow-Jones are about the only successful news media company today. While other newspapers lose subscribers and advertisers, and grand old names in the business fall by the wayside, the Journal continues to add subscribers and grow. It’s understandable why News Corp. was willing to pay a premium for Dow-Jones.

Here is a product – the iPad – that won’t even be available for another month and the Journal is trying to figure out how best to maximize the new medium's potential. Everyone fully expects that the iPad will succeed, just as the iPod, iTunes, and the iPhone have.

Businesses like Dow-Jones would be wise to hitch a ride on that anticipated success. I look forward to seeing which other businesses are as wise as Dow-Jones.

Bringing the Inside In

One truth I’ve learned in my years in employee communications – a truth often cited here – is the value of bringing the outside in. For a business to succeed and thrive, its people must remain ever aware of how external influences impact their organization, both directly and indirectly.

Of particular importance are the shifting paradigms that can mean new competition, changing consumer tastes and unexpected economic forces that result in new demands on employees and their companies. It might also include competitors’ actions (new products, etc.), the state of the economy (a persistent recession), and regulatory changes and new taxes that can complicate business.

While that’s of central importance, equally critical is a group's ability to bring in other functions within the company itself, to cross-fertilize internally as well.

People in one function need to have an on-going awareness of what other functions are doing, particularly as they may impact their own area. At the same time, their own unit’s operation ought to be better understood across the business.

For instance, do people in marketing really understand the challenges faced by R&D, or manufacturing? And vice-versa? Do the people in R&D have a keen sense of customers’ desires and the kinds of features they may be expecting in the next product iteration? Is the product development operation conscious of the fiscal constraints that an ailing economy is placing on the company?

Does finance have an appreciation of why product promotion might cost as much as it does, or why procurement costs are rising? Does finance understand why the human resources department needs an increase in its recruitment budget during an economic recession?

No doubt the senior managers in those functional areas know, but what about the people within their units? Is everyone operating in a vacuum?

I'm reminded of this old Dilbert cartoon:

Communications professionals play a central role in helping create and open up the avenues between functions to assure that people understand what's going on in other parts of the organization; that they fully grasp the evolving internal dynamic and how what they do and the decisions they make may impact what goes on in other parts of the company.

In some quarters, this is referred to as “breaking down the silos” that exist in every organization. But it’s more than eliminating the silos. It’s reaching out across those natural divides, and not just at senior management retreats where the functional VPs share ideas, insights, challenges, and opportunities.

It must be a robust, ongoing dialogue at all levels. It needn’t be time-consuming. Maybe it’s no more than managers establishing the links and encouraging dialogue. Maybe it’s an occasional spur-of-the-moment lunch between a half-dozen people from different departments, just to shoot the breeze. It’s amazing what those informal, friendly conversations can open up, the kinds of ideas they stimulate.

When functions operate independently, it can only spell trouble. In September 2004, Oprah Winfrey gave away 276 Pontiac G6s to members of her audience. Pontiac scored quite a PR coup. But it was a short-lived coup. When intrigued Oprah fans went to their local Pontiac dealers hoping to test drive or buy a G6, they were disappointed. None were available, nor would they be for several months. What might have been a huge sales surge for Pontiac fell flat on its face.

Apparently, GM’s promotional gurus didn't coordinate their planning with manufacturing. Production of the G6 was not going to ramp up for another half-year. If they had postponed Oprah's give-away until the following year, Pontiac likely would have sold several thousand more cars. Need I point out what has happened to Pontiac in the intervening years?

This needn’t be overly complicated. It simply requires an attitude of curiosity across the organization, where people want to know what is going on around the company, not just what the guy in the next cubicle is doing.

There can and should be numerous ways to oxygenate the organization – no one way is right or wrong. An internal newsletter helps, as does a robust and frequently updated intranet news service.

But nothing can substitute for actively getting to know the other guys and what’s on their minds. It’s amazing what you can learn just by talking and listening.