Papers - Appointments section dead? Is the entire paper too far behind?

A couple of clicks around planet blog (not to mention The Economist….) you’ll find just about everybody saying that the newspaper industry is on its last legs. You can find this on digital recruiting, Cheezhead and many other online recruitment sites (these are two of my favourites mind you..)

Will checking RSS readers replace getting your paper delivered? On the face of it, why shouldn’t they? All of the information that you can get from the paper is on the website, free. Surely its common sense to stop buying the daily. On the move? Get an i-phone…

Not quite so simple though. Culturally we like to read the paper. Most of us have grown up reading the paper. Its a hard habit to break. Scary concept for newspapers 9and their investors is what happens when the dreaded Generation Y move into the slot those of us over 35 occupy today (a big thank you to marketeers who have branded this age group “reborn digitals” - if you can cope with the changes in the internet age… Great, just love being categorised and boxed….) - are these guys likely to be buying papers. I think not….

Not hard to make a comparison with the recruitment market. With all of the tools available (and a downturn in the market sure to make candidates more available - more on that later this week) then companies should be able to source more direct, yet they don’t (currently) - people like the tried and tested recruitment consultant route, they like the people contact, the feeling that they’ve got the best in the market. They like the service element. Correct me if I’m wrong but I’m not convinced any of the disruptive recruitment media out there can replicate that just yet. If they could, I wouldn’t want to be holding shares in a contingency (or selection) recruiter.

So what are newspapers doing about it. Approach seems to be “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.” Nothing wrong with that! Think about the amount of job boards that are now owned by Trinity Mirror Group - if you’re not aware you can see the list here. As well as straight acquisitions there’s one or two pretty smart alliances. New York Times have announced a deal with LinkedIn - details here .

In addition, newspaper companies are dipping into the online market. They are after gaps left online - the most obvious (and profitable)one it seems is the local online ad space. Internet is global.. nothing says local like the local paper.

Looks like newspapers are on the right road - being flexible, adapting (not doing U-turns) and integrating. Remind any repeat readers of anything? A clue at the bottom of this post…