bosacks – From Pixels to Particles

Crisis Mode: Why Small Publishers Should See Opportunity in the Chaos

Every now and then, I read something from a media veteran that feels like it’s aimed right at the big players — but still lands squarely in the lap of small and niche publishers. That’s exactly what happened with Chris Duncan’s upcoming keynote at the FIPP World Media Congress.

Duncan’s career is full of steering through storms — launching The Times on the iPad (when that was brand new territory), leading through COVID, and now advising on the AI tidal wave that’s hitting every corner of publishing. His core message? Publishing thrives in crisis.

Now, “thrives” might feel like a stretch if you’re running a three-person operation and trying to keep the lights on. But here’s where the small guys might actually have an edge: when the ground shifts under everyone, agility beats scale.

What small publishers should take away

1. AI isn’t just a newsroom curiosity — it’s a traffic problem.
Yes, AI tools can help you cut costs and automate grunt work. But Duncan’s warning is clear: generative AI could cut off more referral traffic than Google already has. For small publishers, that means you can’t afford to be a “search-dependent” business. Your audience has to remember you and seek you out.

2. Innovation isn’t optional.
He’s blunt: mobile journalism hasn’t seen much truly new since about 2012. That’s both sobering and exciting. If you’re a niche publisher, you don’t need to outspend The New York Times — you need to outthink them in your lane. That might mean interactive features, audio companions to your stories, or even an “insider’s app” for your core audience.

3. The platform era is shifting — be ready.
Duncan thinks we’re past the peak of Google and Meta’s dominance. That’s a rare window to build distribution without depending entirely on them. When big platforms are distracted by regulators and market shifts, you can make a move to deepen your direct audience connections.

Where to put your focus next

Here are three action items I think every small or niche publisher should put on their whiteboard after reading Duncan’s comments:

Build direct audience pipelines.
Start or double down on newsletters, podcasts, private communities, or events. Make sure your readers’ path to your content doesn’t depend on an algorithm.
Test one “genuinely new” product feature in the next year.
Could be a micro-app, an interactive archive, or a new storytelling format. The goal is to prove you can innovate without waiting for the industry to hand you a playbook.
Scenario-plan for a search traffic cliff.
If your Google referrals dropped 50% tomorrow, how would you adapt? Do that planning now while you have the luxury of time.

Duncan’s not saying this will be easy — far from it. But he is saying that urgency forces experimentation, and experimentation is where breakthroughs happen. For small publishers, the trick is to use your speed, focus, and audience intimacy as weapons in this fight.

You may not have a “war room” of strategists, but you do have something the giants often lack: a direct line to a loyal audience that cares deeply about your coverage. That’s your moat. Guard it, grow it, and use this crisis moment to get a little scrappy.

If you want the full keynote preview, it’s worth a read: Publishers work best in some form of crisis.

Takeaway for the fridge:
Crisis is coming. The question is — will you let it happen to you, or will you make it work for you?

Ride the AI Wave: Strategic Integration Over Litigation

Combined Strategic View – Forward-Looking Angle (Rooted in Bo Sacks’ Facts)

In his newsletter BoSacks Speaks Out: Notes from the Algorithmic Frontline, veteran editor Bo Sacks lays out a stark reality: AI has already ingested decades of Pulitzer-winning journalism without compensation; Judge Alsup’s ruling against Anthropic offers only a narrow copyright reprieve; Getty Images is pioneering revenue-sharing for AI-trained image datasets; and niche print titles like Monocle, Air Mail, and Delayed Gratification thrive even as legacy printers and binderies collapse. These are the hard facts on the ground.

These facts point to a stark choice: fight the tide or ride it. Relentlessly suing OpenAI or Anthropic over scraped archives may score headlines, but it won’t keep pace with machine learning’s breakneck advance—and it diverts precious resources from innovation. Instead, forward-thinking publishers should turn Bo Sacks’ own evidence into a blueprint for growth:

1. Automate & Accelerate

Archive Mining: Apply AI to sift your own backfiles—precisely the content under dispute—to surface timeless stories worth republishing or expanding.
Bite-Sized Briefs: Convert long features into “5-minute reads” or multimedia snippets for mobile audiences, mirroring slow-print curation but optimized for screens.

2. Elevate Craft with AI

Instant Fact-Checks: Use AI assistants that cross-verify claims on the fly, speeding up verification without sacrificing accuracy.
Rapid Design Mockups: Integrate AI-powered layout previews to iterate cover and spread designs in minutes, recapturing the precision Bo Sacks mourns in lost binderies.

3. Data-Informed Revenue

Smart Pricing: Leverage real-time engagement signals to adjust sponsorship and ad rates dynamically—echoing Getty’s revenue-share ethos but tailored to your audience.
Segmented Offers: Use simple clustering techniques to distinguish your premium-print devotees from casual readers, then craft subscription tiers and perks that drive loyalty and lifetime value.

Why this matters: The tools Bo Sacks warns are “already at home” in our archives have upended every stage of publishing—from discovery and design to distribution and monetization. Legal victories may buy time, but strategic integration of AI buys relevance. By running small pilots, measuring impact on both costs and engagement, and retiring manual processes that no longer move the needle, publishers can turn today’s adversary into tomorrow’s catalyst—and deliver the richer, more personalized journalism readers are hungry for.

Reignite Your Niche Magazine: Blending Timeless Marketing with Smart Digital Tactics

I just dove into Tom Goodwin’s provocative piece, “We’ve forgotten how to market. So, how should today’s playbook look?”—which I first spotted in BoSack’s newsletter (highly recommend subscribing if you haven’t!)—and it got me thinking: what if you ran a niche magazine or a specialist news outlet—how would you apply his six-pronged revival plan to your world?

1. Reclaim the Classics

When you’re covering, say, indie architecture or artisanal food, you already know your audience’s quirks. But have you written down your positioning statement lately? Dust off that 4-Ps playbook:

Segmentation: Beyond “interested in craft beer,” drill into motivations—collectors hunting rare brews, home-brewers, industry pros.
Proposition & Consistency: If your magazine promises “deep dives into brewing’s alpine terroir,” every newsletter, cover story, and Instagram Reel must echo that core promise.

By re-centering these fundamentals, you build a loyal, identifiable readership that transcends fickle click metrics.

2. Pick & Polish the New Tools

Goodwin isn’t anti-tech—he just wants us to be choosy. For your niche title:

Retargeting with Purpose: Don’t just chase “abandoned carts.” Use web analytics to spot readers who read three long-form essays in a session—serve them a webinar invite or premium newsletter upsell.
Lookalike Audiences: Model your highest-value subscribers (annual-plan renewers) and find similar prospects on social platforms. But keep it tight: a narrow +5% lookalike is better than broad +20%.
Creative Testing, Lightly: A/B test subject lines for your subscription emails, but only iterate on those that truly shift conversion by more than 10%.

The key? Only invest in tech that measurably deepens engagement or loyalty, not vanity metrics.

3. Define Your Success on Your Terms

Are your quarterly targets all about “lowering cost-per-click” or about “growing paid circulation by 15%”? Maybe you want to be known for live-streaming expert panels on emerging tech, even if that doesn’t spike immediate ad revenue. Clarify:

Short-Term: Boost open rates on your weekend roundup from 25% to 35%.
Long-Term: Cultivate a community around exclusive member-only Slack channels where your most passionate readers network.

When you know what you really care about, you can filter out the noise.

4. Fuse Old & New Playbooks

Put the two in dialogue:

Classic Insight: A paid subscriber is 5× more valuable than an ad-only reader.
Modern Tactic: Use cohort analysis (new tool!) to see which first-month issue topics yield the highest 6-month renewal rates.

You might discover that long investigative features drive retention more than listicles—and then double down on those premium stories.

5. Reimagine Your Canvas

Today’s screens are gorgeous and interactive. For a specialized news org:

Interactive Infographics: Instead of a static pie chart on artisanal cheese markets, build a click-through journey that lets readers explore each region’s unique strains.
Audio Supplements: Embed 2-minute mini-podcasts in your articles—think “soundscape of a New England dairy farm” alongside your written feature.

These high-quality, sensory-rich experiences align with Goodwin’s call for distinctive, creative work that stands out in a sea of bland ads.

6. Persuade the Powers That Be

This is often the toughest: convincing your board or investors that a six-month brand campaign—say, a “Founders Series” profiling craft producers—matters even if it doesn’t drive clicks immediately. Build your case by:

Benchmarking Success: Show how other niche titles (e.g., a gourmet-pizza newsletter) saw a 20% lift in subscriptions six months after launching a video miniseries.
Hybrid KPIs: Combine quantitative (subscription growth) with qualitative (Net Promoter Score, reader surveys on “how memorable was last month’s cover?”).

Frame it as “investment” rather than “cost,” and lean on your deep knowledge of your audience’s values.

Wrapping Up

If you’re running a niche magazine or specialist news outlet, Tom Goodwin’s rallying cry isn’t just about ditching hollow metrics—it’s about owning your unique space with conviction. Rediscover the bedrock of segmentation and consistency, wield modern tools to enrich—not distract—and champion the long game to stakeholders.

“Do we want to hide behind spreadsheets… or do we want to make work that we feel proud of?”

That question feels especially urgent when your brand is small but mighty. Here’s to bold, big-idea marketing in the specialist press—thanks again to BoSack’s newsletter for pointing me to this gem.

Riding the AI Wave: Why Marketing Pros Must Pivot or Perish

I came across Maarten Albarda’s electrifying piece in the latest BoSacks newsletter, originally published on MediaPost: “AI Is Not The Future — It Is Here To Take Your Job” (https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/407506/ai-is-not-the-future-it-is-here-to-take-your-jo.html?edition=139243). Eric Schmidt’s warning that AI could elbow aside programmers, mathematicians, and entire marketing teams in mere months isn’t sci-fi—it’s next quarter’s boardroom debate. Here’s why embracing AI now feels more like grabbing a lifeboat than steering into a storm.

From where I sit, the real magic (and madness) lies in AI’s leap from “helpful chatbot” to “autonomous strategist.” Imagine a system that doesn’t just draft your ad copy but plans the campaign, allocates budget, and optimizes in real time. That’s not some distant beta test—it’s happening. We’re talking productivity boosts economists haven’t even charted yet. And if you’re thinking, “Nah, that’s years away,” Schmidt’s blistering timeline—full automation of coding tasks within months, general intelligence in 3–5 years—is a gut-check you can’t ignore.

So, what do you do? First, audit your playbook. Map every repetitive task and ask: “Could an algorithm do this faster (and cheaper) than my intern?” Spoiler: the answer’s often “yes.” Next, retool your team for human-only superpowers—ethical oversight, pattern-breaking creativity, and relationship-building that no AI can fake. Finally, make AI fluency part of your culture. A five-minute daily demo, a lunchtime “what’s new” session, even AI peer groups—whatever it takes to demystify the tech and keep curiosity front and center.

Every revolution creates winners and losers. If you lean into AI as a teammate—albeit a supercharged one—you’ll surf this wave instead of wiping out. And trust me, that’s way more fun than reinventing the agency model on the fly while your competitors pull ahead.