Marketing communications

Serbian media going online

Boris Loman Thessaloniki, 12. January 2012.

In this article I will describe to you shortly how media in Serbia started to going online and who are usually users of Internet. This is very important if we plan some kind of marketing communication with Internet auditorium which is big one.

The Internet arrived in Serbia in 1995 when EUnet was the first company to sell dial-up connections on the market. Over the next seven to eight years it didnt change much. Few wireless and satellite providers were operating but were way too expensive for many users which relied on dial-up until late 2002 and 2003, when first cable providers came onto the market. Although it wasnt a quantum leap in speed, it allowed users to have stable connections that didnt rely on the quality of Telekom Srbijas infrastructure. Two years later, at the beginning of 2005, Telekom introduced an ADSL service as an alternative to the cable connections. According to the Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia, in the beginning of 2008, 47.6 percent of households in Serbia were owners of a computer (a desktop or a laptop), and 33.2 percent of households were regularly using the Internet. Less than a half of Internet users, only 15.5 percent of households have broadband Internet access, but the number of broadband users has almost doubled in comparison to the year before. The latest development is that new ADSL speeds that are available to the users give us good reason to think that broadband access will spread even more widely. Also, it is worth mentioning that 74.5 percent of households have at least one mobile phone, and that around the third of them use their phones to access the Internet. When you analyze the way the Serbian media responded to this rather fast development of broadband Internet penetration, you could see that they reacted rather late but also that things are moving in a direction which is beneficial to all. The best example is use of video materials on media websites. In the early days, only TV stations used some of their material online, and some of them streamed their programmes. Now, many media websites, those of traditional media going online, and those of media started online, use video materials to illustrate their stories. And sometimes, this video material is being produced for their websites, although its mostly something freely available online. Also, broadband connections allowed the users to more easily send their own contributions which are becoming more important for media. So when we talk about new media in Serbia, we talk about how the traditional media grasped the possibilities the Internet brought them, but also how the web only media and citizen media developed in recent years.

Traditional media in the new environment Although the national television network, which is now transformed into the public service network existed for much longer (radio for around 80 years and TV for half a century), it is best to follow its development from the point of dissolution of former Yugoslavia at the beginning of 1990s, when it started broadcasting under the current name - Radio Televizija Srbije (RTS). During the reign of Slobodan Milosevic, RTS was censored and known for manipulation and limited freedom of expression. As a response, a radio station with a different news concept was established by a group of young people under the name Radio B92. Over the course of the following years this became a well-established national TV and radio station B92. A year ago, B92 also established a cable news channel - B92 INFO, along with the new version of their online issue for mobile devices. Today, both RTS and B92 have a dominant influence on creating public opinion in Serbia and both have developed online news platforms with increasing number of visitors. Only a year after B92.net was started, in 1996, it was proclaimed as the most visited and the most influential website in the region. The contents of both websites are similar: mostly news, both allow streaming of radio and TV programme, and both influence public opinion. Both have blogs mostly written by well known public figures, as well as comments sections and forums. And both sites have much more cultural news than their radio and TV schedules. Millions of people confirm their trust in these stations on a day-to-day basis, and with the possibility to react (to comment their content on their websites, in their forums etc.) the trust in the two most relevant (new) media is far from being questioned, and its getting bigger by the day. Newspapers online Daily newspapers are probably the first printed media organisations to realise that the Internet will influence them greatly. This realisation leads newspapers in several directions. Some refused to use the Internet for anything more than a simple presentation, some decided they could sell access to most of their information (which proved wrong), and some started putting all of their content online for free. One of the first to use the Internet and to try to sell and provide their content freely was Danas (www.danas.rs) daily. This media outlet started as the opposition to the government print media in the 1990s and built their

reputation as the strong opposition, independent from the government newspaper, which promoted the voices of the opposition political parties, youth organisations and NGOs. Today, Danas web edition is a modern news website with contents updated several times a day and on the way to fully integrate video materials into their content. Similar to theirs is the website of Blic daily (www.blic.rs). They also update their content on when-it-happens basis. Their website also leads to other publications under the Blic brand, and provides their readers several way of communication with them; to comment on their stories and engage in a discussion forum. Blic also started their own blog which is written by several important figures from Serbias economic, political and public life. Another Ringiers newspaper - freely distributed 24 sata (www.24sata.rs), fully implemented their orientation towards younger audience on their website. Short news stories, commenting option and fresh design, with possibility to download each issue in PDF format for offline reading. They are also the only daily to experiment with KlikMee (www.klikmee.com) technology, which allows easier access to online content for the users of photo capable mobile phones. None of the daily newspapers have implemented a real web 2.0 oriented platform and citizen journalism is only in its infancy. Periodicals Weekly and monthly magazines showed mostly less understanding for the Internet. They usually provide content that is widely available online (mostly in other languages), and try to appeal to the readers by additional content and nicely designed packages. Therefore most periodicals websites are Internet advertisements for their latest issues without much freely available content. For instance, the weekly magazine with a good reputation Vreme (www.vreme.com), publishes some of the stories and offer web subscription for those who want to read it all online. On the other hand, another important weekly - Ekonomist (www.emportal.rs) discarded such a model and created a full web portal related to economic and political issues. Content from their printed issues is available for reading online and only requires a free registration. Their online content is much richer than the printed version.

Looking at bi-weekly and monthly periodicals, its even harder to find those with websites. It seems that mostly those ori ented towards younger audience put some effort in their online presence. For instance, relatively young free monthly (soon to be biweekly) city guide City Magazine (www.citymagazine.rs) created a website that has its own life between two printed issues and also used a bit of web 2.0 trends by implementing a blog which is written by some of the staff members as well as other figures relevant to the local urban scene. Similarly, RLN (www.realno.org) has a website developed with much attention. And although not much of their content can be read online, they allow the download of the PDF version of the magazine. Web magazines Today, there are more interesting web magazines in Serbia than websites of traditional printed media. Personal magazin (www.personalmag.rs) is one of those examples. A very informative IT related magazine run by one of the well known Serbian bloggers. Another good example is Benchmark (www.benchmark. rs), which follows the tradition of well known American technology websites with thorough hardware tests and a network of websites for different audiences. They also have a discussion forum with a lot of users and recently started a blog on which posts are written by staff members and readers. And related to IT is a web/PDF magazine called PC igre (www.pcigre.com). They created a combination of a website with fresh gaming news each day and articles about games for online reading as well as a monthly PDF issues which can be freely downloaded and is often distributed on DVD supplements of printed IT magazines. Connecting IT and gadgets with other topics of interest to Serbian Internet users is Domino Magazin (www.dominomagazin. com). They publish stories on many different topics and are one of the rare examples where users can generate content which is published in the same manner as the content written by magazine staff. Since its the first magazine of that type in Serbia, the concept still has to prove itself. Another good web magazine is Popboks (www.popboks.com). It is created to resemble printed magazines that write about pop culture. Since local magazines market doesnt have an issue that can satisfy the audience which craves such content, Popboks is rather successful and almost only relevant issue. They didnt implement any web

2.0 trends, but have a stable publishing policy and fresh content every day so readers come back. Since most Internet users in Serbia are high school or faculty students, its only logical that there is also a specialised web magazine called Studentski svet (www.studentskisvet.com). They cover topics related to education as well as topics of general interest. And magazines presented here are only a tip of the iceberg. There are many more good examples, and also o lot of bad ones. Media 2.0 The Serbian blog scene is a world in itself. Since most magazines, whether traditional or web oriented, didnt pay much attention to readers needs, they started writing for themselves. Yes, blogs did start as personal diaries, but nowadays they are a form and a concept of publishing different contents. The best place to start exploring Serbian blogosphere is Blogodak (www.blogodak. com). This is an aggregator with blogs sorted by topic. Not all blogs are Serbian, but all of them are written in one of the similar languages spoken in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. Most of the blogs are personal, or written from a personal perspective, and couple of good examples are Blogowski.eu and Artmistakes.com. There are also blogs related to specific topics which are rarely written from a personal perspective. Or when personal perspective is there, it is the perspective of a virtual character. One of such blogs is design related Dizajnersi.com with not too much posts, but with content relevant to those interested in design topics. Similar to that one (by concept) is Tracara.com (Gossip Girl), where a virtual girl writes about local and world celebrities. This is also one of the rare blogs to implement a micro blog (www.twitter.com/tracara) with short celebrity information into its content. And that web 2.0 trends do have good ground in Serbia prove a couple more micro blogs that are not personal. Kursna lista (www.twitter.com/kurs) and Vremenska prognoza (www.twitter.com/ vreme) provide their followers with new currency exchange rate, and weather information.