Business Policy and Strategy

Running head: BUSINESS POLICY AND STRATEGY
Business Policy and Strategy
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

BUSINESS POLICY AND STRATEGY1
Table of Content
1.0 Introduction – goals of the report.........................................................................................3
2.0 State of the newspaper publishing industry today................................................................3
2.1 Data on declining circulation and revenue.......................................................................3
2.2 Status of newspaper leaders, e.g., New York Times, Wall Street Journal........................5
3.0 Why newspapers are facing declining circulations and revenues........................................6
3.1 External assessment.........................................................................................................6
3.1.1 Economic forces........................................................................................................6
3.1.2 Social, cultural, demographic, and environmental forces.........................................7
3.1.3 Political, governmental and legal forces...................................................................7
3.1.4 Technological forces.................................................................................................8
3.1.5 Competitive forces...............................................................................................9
3.1.6 External Factor Evaluation (EFE) matrix...................................................................11
4. Internal assessment...............................................................................................................11
4.1 Organizational processes and structure..........................................................................11
4.2 HR capabilities...............................................................................................................12
4.3 Financial position...........................................................................................................13
4.4 Marketing/sales capabilities...........................................................................................14
4.5 Operational capabilities..................................................................................................14
4.6 Our strengths and weaknesses as a publisher.................................................................15
5. How companies in the publishing industry are adjusting their strategies to cope with the
challenges.................................................................................................................................15

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6. Steps The Chronicle Gazette might take in order to deal with the challenges.....................16
References................................................................................................................................19

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1.0 Introduction – goals of the report
There is no doubt that business industries irrespective of their type and sizes have been
dynamic in nature and major characteristics of businesses are changing in a rapid way
alongside. No business today can stick to one single approach for surviving in the market.
Marketers, entrepreneurs and even the most successful businesses today are in the rush of
applying a better and unique one. Some have effectively managed to do so, while some are
still in the race. And, publishing industry is no exception as the sector has observed a sudden
downfall indicating an alarming future. Technology advances, undoubtedly, changed the
business trends. It can be mentioned that spread and implementation of internet technology
across the globe have significantly influenced the behavioural of consumers when it comes to
reading newspapers or collecting social information. Technology has strong impact on
traditional newspaper agencies as consumers’ taste and preferences are completely changed.
Thus, the focus of this report is on how traditional newspaper publishing organization like
The Chronicle Gazette would deal with such turn in its business. Report critically analyses
the existing market positions of publishing organizations today and proposes strategies that
must help organizations to deal with the emerging trends of business.
2.0 State of the newspaper publishing industry today
2.1 Data on declining circulation and revenue
It has been identified that newspapers are fundamental part of American news landscape but
they are hit hard as many American tend to consume news digitally. The financial fortune of
industry as well as subscribers base have been in decline since the early 2008 and eve the
website audience traffic has developed for many. On the other side, Brüggemann et al.
(2016), mentioned that papers have also observed a significant drop. Holm et al. (2013)
mentioned the fact that overall U.S daily newspaper circulation in 2017 was around 31

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million for weekday as well as 34 million for Sunday which is 11% and 10% respectively
from the previous year. It has been identified that the highest decline was found in the print
circulation. It is learnt that Weekday print circulation decreased by 11%, while circulation of
Sunday decreased by 10%.
Figure 1: Estimated Circulation of U.S daily Newspaper
(Source: Holm et al. 2013)
It is learnt that even though gains of the top sellers such as New York Time as well as Wall
Street Journal did not translate into circulation for the sector for the industry as a whole- both
print and digital dropped by 8% in 2016 (journalism.org. 2019). Fan (2013) provided that the
overall gains could include a 10% of decrease in weekly and print circulation and the decline
in weekly print circulation is only 1%. On the other side, McLennan and Miles (2019)
mentioned that overall circulation dripped to 35 million but overall circulation declined to 38

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million. It has been identified that overall decline in circulation coincided with a decline of
double digits in advertising revenue for the sector as a whole. It has also been learnt that
newspaper organizations tend to suggest that advertising revenue across the sector decreased
even more sharply compared to the figure found in the recent time. On the other side,
according to the financial statements, New York Time observed a year over year decrease of
9% in advertising revenue however almost 3% rise in circulation revenue has also been there.
So, for an overall decline in revenue is around 2% (Nytimes.com. 2019).
2.2 Status of newspaper leaders, e.g., New York Times, Wall Street Journal
On the other side, due to technology advances, New York Time and The Wall Street
Journal nonetheless observed a large gains in digital circulation in the previous year. This
means that the digital circulation of New York Time is 42% and Wall Street Journal recorded
26% and these two remain at the top of the gains. It has been identified that as leading
newspapers like New York Time and The Wall Street Journal tend to give boost their overall
circulation but the industry as a whole faced a significant challenge. Sjøvaag and Helle
(2014) mentioned the fact that Financial Statement demonstrate that New York Time add
more 50,000 digital subscriptions in 2016, while another leader The Wall Street Journal
added more than 150,000 digital subscriptions and this means there is rise of 23%. On the
contrary, Sridhar, Shrihari, and Srinivasaraghavan Sriram (2015) mentioned that there are
about more than 14000 daily newspaper in Unite State and Thousands of community papers
which usually publish weekly or biweekly; however handful of papers such as The Wall
Street Journal, USA Today and the New York Time have a national print readership which
tops million and more. It has been particularly noted that almost 50 papers tend to account for
a third of circulation which is among the large city papers. It is particularly learnt that New
York Time reported the revenue increase of 6.7% in 2019, while the overall revenue growth
of competitors is around 4.6%. Doyle and Gillian (2013) mentioned the fact that Wall Street