Gulf News losing its battle against The National
Posted on 12 October 2009 with no comments from readers
The National is winning the circulation war against the No1 English language newspaper in the region, Gulf News. The latter has struck back today with a snazzy new Internet portal.
But Gulf News is still getting it wrong. The problem is its content not the delivery mechanism. The money spent on the new portal would have been far better spent on better salaries and conditions for journalists.
Content is king
The National appreciated very early on that even in the Internet Age, and perhaps even more so because of this technology, content is king. The newspaper that gets the stories will get the readers. Actually it is incredibly old fashioned.
You can blame government interference in the media if you like for the poor record of the Dubai media in covering the economic slump since last autumn’s global credit crunch. But then The National is 100 per cent Abu Dhabi state owned, so that is hardly relevant.
Clearly given the right parameters then state ownership of media can work. The BBC does a world-beating job under public ownership with its own charter.
Journalism standards
Where The National has really got it right is by investing in its content, and that means in its journalists, recruited from major newspapers around the world. They have adapted admirably to local conditions and produce a world class newspaper.
By contrast Gulf News is struggling to maintain the standards of a US or European provincial newspaper. And all those articles saying that everything would turn out fine during the recession have just looked more and more foolish.
Will a new Internet portal do anything to address this problem? Probably not as it encourages a complacency among management and a feeling that innovation is still happening and ought to be given a chance to prove itself.
Circulation war
By then the circulation penetration of The National will really be knocking at the door and the big switch in annual subscriptions grow, although with an increasingly user-friendly Internet portal a subscription will no longer be necessary.
Gulf News also faces competition from the down-market 7-Days free tabloid owned by the publisher of the UK’s highly successful Daily Mail. And as the quality of journalism in Gulf News has declined this low-resource product has gained in market popularity, and with it won many advertisers.
Recessions can have some interesting effects on local media markets and the UAE is no exception, and The National looks a well capitalized winner in this fight.
no Comments posted by readers:
The gulf news has a fairly better beat reporter staff than the national does. The same applies for its coverage and commentary on the Indian subcontinent- a section where I see most readers turn to when I’m at the airport lounge or waiting at receptions. Additionally, it is questionable how long the national can sustain itself with the high salary structure it currently has (see the wiki leaks scandal on the national). Newspapers are generally an industry where it takes years to break even, and in this case, when the advertising market is in a slump, I still see the gulf news not having to worry that much about the drop.
Ed Note: You have a point about foreign coverage but then surely the Khaleej Times beats Gulf News for coverage of the subcontinent – as for paying high salaries to journalists I think this is the way to improve standards, and paying more to fewer journalists has always worked in my experience. Gulf News has quite a bit to worry about, and if it does not the outcome is obvious.
the khaleej times does have better analysis and commentary, but have you seen the amount of errors in spelling and grammer as of recently?. Its painful to the eyes to just go through page 2!. that is a newspaper that should be worried after the trials and tribulations of the former management!
“The money spent on the new portal would have been far better spent on better salaries and conditions for journalists.”
I think you mean “The money spent on the new portal would have been far better spent on hiring better journalists.”
The conditions are fine it is just the fact that the majority dont speak English as their first language and they produce articles full of big words used incorrectly. Time for regimen change I think.
Regimen – now there is a word I only ever see in Gulf News…
A little ott with the gushing tributes to The Nationa. It is quite a good read but they are not in any way brave with their editorial position and their circulation is still very small. When they sell more than 1,000 copies a day ( not including the huge amounts of subscriptions to govt departments ) and print more than 30,000 copies then they might start worrying Gulf News but then only if they publish some properly audited circ figs. Say what you like about GN but they are adapting to the changes here.
If Khaleej Times was an animal it would have been shot by now to put it out of its misery – nuff said on that.
7Days is what it is and although it is the strongest in Dubai it needs to do something in AD if it is going to cut into GN’s dominance in the market.