The Rebooting Show Brian Morrissey

Publishing is shifting from prioritizing breadth to rewarding depth. That starts with understanding the audience — and its segments — more granularly in order to create a more sustainable and varied business foundation. Cory Munchbach, CEO of BlueConic, shares her view of the next chapter.
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00:00 Introduction and Media Challenges01:02 Welcome to The Rebooting Show01:44 Discussion on Audience vs. Consumer03:38 Key Takeaways from the New Growth Agenda07:22 Challenges in Media Transformation09:37 The Role of Technology and Organizational Structure13:01 Existential Threats and Industry Nostalgia18:22 Adapting to a Consumer-First Strategy25:59 Navigating Data Collection and Audience Insights30:16 The Role of AI in Audience Understanding36:00 The Future of Personalization and Content Delivery38:55 Transparency, Privacy, and Value Exchange44:47 The Future of Advertising and Publishing

Scott Porch, founder of Big IP, which operates the business side of several popular lifestyle podcasts like The John Campea Show, Happy Sad Confused, Star Wars Explained, discusses that state of podcasting, and how it is morphing. He acts as something of a talent manager in expanding these podcasts into more well rounded media companies, with revenue coming from memberships and events. The growth of these businesses will not be driven by ads necessarily. "Podcasters are influencers in a lot of respects and they monetize like an influencer in a lot of respects,” Scott noted.
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00:00 Navigating the Complex World of Podcasting and Monetization01:25 Introducing Scott Porch: The Podcasting Pro02:31 The Intricacies of Podcast Production and Distribution07:33 Exploring the Podcast Landscape: Growth, Challenges, and Opportunities15:25 The Evolution of Podcasting: From Audio to Multi-Platform Engagement19:30 The Future of Podcasting: Diversification and Creator Economy26:25 Understanding Podcast Subscriptions and Membership Models35:06 The Realities of Podcast Touring37:52 Monetization Strategies in Podcasting42:14 AI's Impact on Podcasting and Content Creation48:36 The Debate Over Long-Form Podcasts53:23 Challenges and Strategies in Podcast Distribution58:50 Sponsorship and Monetization in the Podcast Industry

Detailed.com's Glen Allsop breaks down the massive Google update roiling the publishing world as Google attempts to gain control of spammy results. Glenn breaks down the winners and losers, why big publishers have come to depend on SEO and often push the envelope with sub-standard content and brand arbitrage.

Emma Tucker was named the editor-in-chief of The Wall Street Journal (and Dow Jones Newswires) in early 2023. She was brought in with a mandate to shake up the Journal in a media market that Emma describes as changed “beyond recognition.” The Journal itself has its own challenges: an aging subscriber base that’s pushing 60, a stodgy internal culture and often convoluted editing process that’s exacting yet hard to square in the current realities of publishing. Like other publishers (and companies), it also has a restive workforce.

Emma and I discuss the changes she’s instituted since joining, from the small bore like doing away with honorifics (RIP, messrs) and putting a cat on a front page to the more substantial changes in top personnel and overhauling the WSJ’s DC bureau. Her moves even led to a New York piece that wondered, “Who is going to get Tucked next?” (Her deputy is apparently known as an “angel of death,” which is a catchy LinkedIn endorsement.)

Some key takeaways from our conversation:

Transitioning from a “print ethos.” Print still gives publications heft, and I suspect that will become more valuable in a world filled with synthetic content, much of it utter crap. But that role is more of being a “shop window,” Emma told me the Journal needs a “definitive move away from print” to serving digital audiences rather than seeing the newspaper as a central distribution channel.

Adopting an audience-first mindset. It sounds obvious, but the challenge for many publishers is adopting audience-first strategies rather than trying to be all things to all people (and all algorithms). That was the main takeaway from a content review Emma commissioned soon after taking on the top role. Those exercises are usually preludes to organizational change. The main theme highlighted in the review: being an “audience-first publication for people that mean business.” Translation: more investigative pieces, less filler content, more “constructive journalism” that serves audience needs instead of winning Twitter/X.

Engagement is the new uniques. The traffic era of publishing has ended. Nobody brags about their ComScore uniques anymore; engagement is the new North Star. That’s particularly true in subscription models, which are natural outgrowths of audience-first strategies. With subscriptions, churn is the boogeyman. I found it telling Emma didn’t cite traffic numbers but highlighted that the Journal had decreased churn by 6% in the past year. The Journal has a newsroom dashboard that measures KPIs like guest visits, conversion rates, female readership, and young readership. 

Other topics we discussed:


Why American journalists are prone to navel gazing


Balancing the need to attract younger readers without alienating the old codgers


How to prepare for the “seismic changes” of AI


The need to focus on what makes you irreplaceable

Jay Rosen, a professor of journalism at NYU, discusses the diminished state of the industry, promising nonprofit models and new funding models that subsidize public service journalism since the economic foundations supporting it have crumbled, and The New York Times has strayed farther into progressivism since Trump’s ride down that escalator.



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I’m joined by Matt Cronin, founding partner at House of Kaizen, which works with publishers and other companies with recurring revenue businesses to align their business goals with audience needs through customer experience frameworks. Some highlights of our conversation:


Shift to audience-centric approaches: There's a significant shift towards understanding and directly engaging audiences rather than relying on platforms for traffic, which involves a fundamental transition to being audience-centric. A key part of that: Realizing an audience is not a monolith but different groups with different needs.


The importance of intentional audiences: Publishing became a (big) numbers game. That’s changed, as every publisher now much compete for “intentional audiences.” These are people  you have a real tie to, who subscribe to a newsletter, follow a podcast, visit your site directly. This is what Business Insider is after with its shift to focus on “digital go-getters.”


Looking beyond efficiency with AI: Synthetic content is about to overwhelm the internet. Many publishers are focused now on the efficiency gains of AI, as all businesses are and need to be, but stopping there is a mistake. AI needs to be harnessed to – you guessed it – provide added value to audiences.