by Rosalind C. Truitt

From the well-chosen words of sympathetic souls and political pundits, to the vertical and horizontal challenges of crossword puzzles, to a morning chuckle from a certain round-headed kid and his delusional beagle, syndicates have long offered rich content to newspapers. Now those choices, aimed at attracting and holding readers, have grown even richer via the Internet.

Need a caricature of a famous face, from Abraham Lincoln to Fidel Castro to George W. Bush or Al Gore? Copley News Service allows you to browse through the images online before purchasing. And you can choose from multiple images—five different views of Bush and three of Gore.

Want to read David Broder’s take on Vice President Gore’s acceptance speech at the Democratic National C onvention? Visit the Washington Post Writers Group online.

Feeling wordy? Why not test drive a crossword puzzle? Universal Press Syndicate lets you ponder 15 across, a five-letter word for “catlike,” and times your progress as you tap in “agile” on your keyboard. Make a mistake, and it flags incorrect letters in red. It helpfully gives answers if you get stuck.

And, oh yes, comics. Boot up your computer for a morning chuckle from Web-site versions of comics such as Universal Press Syndicate’s “Doonesbury,” United Media’s “Dilbert” or King Features’ “Hagar the Horrible.”

Online Offerings Comics to suit every taste are available on the syndicates’ World Wide Web sites, but that barely scratches the surface of what browsers can find when they’re looking for content to post on their Internet pages. Lisa Wilson, vice president of sales and marketing for United Media of New York City, says, “The Internet creates a new opportunity for us, and though we try to stay a step ahead, it changes every day. What we are trying to do is offer something innovative, not only to our newspaper Web sites, but also to Web sites outside the newspaper marketplace.” Here’s a sampler: • Tribune Media Services of Chicago offers a site called Emuse (http:// emuse.tms.tribune.com), beginning with a photo of a 1950s housewife who asks the probing question, “Does your online content smell like yesterday’s halibut? Emuse works 12 ways to freshen and beautify your Web site. Sound complicated? Well it is a well-known fact that Emuse with PU-37 can eliminate tell-tale content funk quickly. Take it from me. Get Emuse.” Among the features are “15 Megabytes of Fame,” “Captain Ribman” and “Ask the Stars.” The formats range from animated cartoons to cursive columns and other “edgy content.” Other TMS interactive features include Ultimate TV, where boob-tube fans get video clips, news bites and online “star” chats. News in Motion offers QuickTime and GIF animations of breaking news and features, while Comic Edge is a “cobranded online comics page geared toward your younger audience.” Comic Edge presents a new cartoon every day from five new cartoonists, “enabling online editors to provide original interactive content not currently appearing in print.” • As is the case with most syndicates, United Media, a Scripps Howard company, offers online rights for most of the print products it provides. For the Web, however, it also offers interactive features such as “BookTalk,” a Q&A column with RealAudio files that allows users to hear authors discuss their books. And at United’s Dilbert.com Web site, users can provide “humorous answers on a topic of the day” for the Dilbert Short List. • When newspaper publishers subscribe to king-online.com, King Features, also of New York City, makes content available daily on their Web sites. Content remains on the King file server, and the syndicate maintains the equipment. King provides detailed usage statistics. • In addition to Motley Fool’s personal-financial advice, Web-based features from Universal Press Syndicate in Kansas City, Mo., include “Fashion Wire Daily,” continuously updated fashion stories and photos; daily Webcasts with journalist Ann Devlin, who interviews authors and newsmakers; and interactive puzzles, from Word Search to crosswords. • The New Media Division of the Los Angeles Times Syndicate offers “World’s Fare,” an online guide to travel that includes trivia, a photo gallery, a world clock and stories about different corners of the globe. Not surprisingly, given the syndicate’s proximity to Tinsel Town, an extensive movie database and celebrity photos also are on tap. Other features: John Gray’s “Men are from Mars, Women are From Venus” relationship column. • Creators Syndicate of Los Angeles provides Feature Wire, which gives subscribers direct links to subscription-based material. The syndicate hosts the custom-tailored pages, with links to two weeks of archived material, on its file server. Available content includes columnist Ann Landers; Joyce Jillian’s horoscopes; and comics such as “The Wizard of Id” and “Rugrats,” the comic strip version of the popular cartoon show on cable network Nickelodeon. • Earlier this year, AP introduced AP Streaming News, allowing newspaper and broadcast members to add audio and video feeds to Web pages. The content includes news, sports and business audio feeds updated around the clock. AP provides daily live video files of news conferences, space launches and other breaking news. The wire service sends members e-mail with the access information, and members set up links to the feeds on their sites. Audio and video clips accompany the day’s top stories, with unique URLs that can be placed right on a Web site. When a user clicks the URL, the content launches in RealPlayer from the member’s site. • The New York Times Syndicate offers features that may be sampled online. These include Jane Rinzler Buckingham’s “NextGen” column that discusses what under-30s are “buying, wearing, planning and dreaming.” Other content arises from The New York Times Book Review; the legendary New York Times Daily and Sunday crosswords; and op-ed pieces and commentaries by Jorge Castaneda, Geraldine Ferraro, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ken Hamblin, Flora Lewis,Tomas Eloy Martinez, Richard Roeper and Salman Rushdie, among others.

Shaking up the tried and true, the Internet is providing syndicates with new ways to work with existing clients, newspapers chief among them, by streamlining the marketing, sales and distribution of products. But that’s just the beginning: It also allows syndicate executives to follow newspapers into the electronic realm and forge new alliances and outlets for their content beyond their familiar customer base.

And don’t they know it.

PAPER AND PIXELS

“We are obviously a traditional business, and our core audience is newspapers. They remain our bread and butter,” says Lisa Wilson, vice president of sales and marketing for United Media, New York City, which has two syndicates, United Feature Syndicate and Newspaper Enterprise Association.

How they serve that bread-and-butter business , however, is anything but traditional. Syndicates now offer their many audiences materials online, from World Wide Web sites open to casual readers, to those aimed at turning cybershoppers into buyers, to password-access bulletin boards where subscribers pick up material they already have purchased.

San Diego’s Copley News Service, for example, transmits photographs, graphics, news copy and features from various Copley papers and bureaus. Its transmission methods include e-mail, The Associated Press wire, CD-ROMs and traditional hard copy.

The Internet showcases the offerings and provides quick, efficient means of getting product to market. Print editors download digital files that once arrived camera-ready in flat brown envelopes via the U.S. Postal Service. In fact, syndicates reward digital access.

Tribune Media Services Inc. of Chicago, for example, uses a financial incentive to encourage its customers to tap FeatureServ electronic delivery, which TMS introduced in 1998. Hard-copy delivery of TMS comic strips, panels and puzzles increased recently from $2.10 to $2.70 per week per feature; the cost to download these daily is only $1.50 per week per feature.

“FeatureServ is more efficient,” the company boasts in a message to its customers. “Your features are ready to go days earlier than hard copy and can be downloaded as often as you need them, when you need them....You simply download your TMS columns, comics and puzzles in a format that is ready to drop into your layouts. If your staff needs a paper copy for the section editor, that’s not a problem. Each file is easily printable on any standard laser printer.”

At Universal Press, Patty Donnelly, editorial-services manager, also touts the benefits of electronic delivery. She says that six years ago, when the syndicate began offering clients the opportunity to download files via password-access bulletin boards, about 100 took advantage of the service. Today, more than 1,600 do.

“It runs 24 hours a day, so our subscribers can download the files when it is convenient. We post material for two months so if they download a file and then need to access again, they can,” Donnelly explains. “And there is no connection charge.”

Electronic delivery also allows users to take paginated pages, such as a QuarkXPress-composed page that Universal produces during the NASCAR racing season. Online subscribers get the bonus of color, while those who opt for hard copies get black-and-white packages because color separations cost so much. As subscribers get passwords only for the features they purchase, Universal is protected from unauthorized use.

THE FRONTIER

Alongside their print counterparts, newspaper new-media managers purchase interactive features, audio files or streaming video. In the online realm, some prefer to “mirror” the same comics and columns on the Web that they use in print; others choose special offerings. United, for example, developed the comic “Trevor” for online use. Users roll the computer cursor over the comic panels for a “moving pop-up experience.” AstroNet is United’s twist on those old syndicate warhorses, horoscopes. United’s online users can choose from wellness horoscopes or romance-oriented star charts.

Kathie Jarmon Kerr, director of communications for Universal Press Syndicate, an independent syndicate in Kansas City, Mo., explains, “We have to create as many avenues to reach people as possible.” Universal’s Uclick, a digital-content company, hosts online content that includes the CNN.com online newspaper; animated editorials from Bruce Hammond; insider golf tips by T.J. Tomasi, a former pro; and interactive puzzles.

The Associated Press also sees opportunity—and has encountered some flak—in marketing to Web users. Earlier this year, the wire service created AP Digital to focus on commercial sales to Internet sites. Although executives declined to discuss exact numbers, AP says revenues generated will be used to keep down costs to members and improve coverage.

The AP board, made up of senior newspaper executives, approved creating AP Digital, but not all members agree with the unit’s purpose. The Wall Street Journal reported some large newspapers, including The Washington Post, suspect that AP Digital helps rival Web sites lure readers away from their own sites.

Thomas E. Slaughter, director of AP Digital, notes that AP has been selling content to online sites for about 15 years. While members have access to the new content being created, Slaughter says AP Digital’s primary focus is the commercial market.

AP has added staffers to create technology, business, entertainment and health content for online sale, a move prompted by its research.

“Stickiness” is the key to effective online content, Slaughter and others say; in other words, getting users not only to click on your site but also to hang around and sample. “Our research shows among the sites that buy content, there is a great deal of online interest in news about celebrities, music, film and television. That is why we focus on those areas.”

Slaughter says AP Digital currently has more than 100 clients for text, photos, audio and video. “The Internet has created thousands of potential customers that didn’t exist before.” The wire service offers content users the AP name as a highly regarded gatherer of news and the service’s round-the-clock availability.

“The lines between Web and print are blurring. It is important to provide both,” Kerr says. “However, there will always be people who are die-hard fans of print and wouldn’t want to read the comics any other way. And there will be people who prefer the Web. That is why it is important to us to do both.”

That, and the importance of taking the offense on serving a new market. The Web, Kerr and other syndicate executives say, represents a yawning maw—everyone wants quality content to fill that void, attract users and entice them to hang around. This hasn’t been lost on new-economy entrepreneurs; companies anxious to provide content are popping up. Four—iCopyright, iPipe, iSyndicate, and ScreamingMedia—number among the most active.

STRATEGIC ALLIANCES

No matter what the medium, content remains king, so syndicates are positioning themselves to get features to new online markets in this country or around the globe by forging bonds with others.

In July, King Features Syndicate, a unit of The Hearst Corp., signed an online distribution deal with iPipe Inc., an Internet content distributor. iPipe will distribute 14 King properties, including comics “Zits,” “Baby Blues,” “Curtis” and “Hi and Lois”; commentary from Roger Hernandez and Carl Rowan; “Daily Dial,” soap opera synopses; and “Play Better Golf” by Jack Nicklaus, among other offerings.

“Our deal with iPipe allows us to explore an exciting way to attract new audiences,” said King President T.R. “Rocky” Shepard III in a statement concerning the deal. Content-provider iPipe, on the other hand, sees King as a well-established brand, noted Bob Gorrell, iPipe’s editor.

In another deal last May, Tribune Media Services of Chicago, Universal Press Syndicate and Editor’s Press Service of Sarasota, Fla., formed a new company, Atlantic Syndication Partners, an international content syndication and marketing firm. Atlantic markets the syndicates’ features, news, information and graphics products in the United States, United Kingdom and Asia. They sell news, information and graphics from Tribune Co. and Knight Ridder newspapers, KRT Information Services, and U.K newspapers—The Mail; The Mail on Sunday; and London’s financial weekly, Sunday Business. The three companies began with an existing customer base of 2,000.

TMS restructured in August, integrating domestic, international and new-media functions of the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, and creating two operating units in the News and Features Division that will focus on “multimedia opportunities and international content syndication.”

Tribune acquired LATS when Tribune and Times Mirror merged. LATS distributes material from dozens of magazines, including Time, U.S. News & World Report, TV Guide, Wired and Rolling Stone, among others. It markets content to newspapers as well as Web sites and online services.

INTERNET-ONLY SYNDICATORS

When selling syndicated content, well-known names attract customers. This principle guides companies that are springing up to syndicate content online.

“Our relationship with King Features is a great example of iPipe’s desire and ability to provide online portal distribution solutions to strong offline brands,” explains Pat Kelly, iPipe’s vice president of business development. Incorporated in 1995, iPipe has more than 125 content properties and 600 advertising affiliates.

ScreamingMedia, iCopyright and iSyndicate also battle for quality content they can distribute online. Some content providers, such as AP and Copley News Service, have signed with both ScreamingMedia and iSyndicate.

When ScreamingMedia went public in July, it raised $60 million with its initial stock offering. The company, which asks the sticky question, “Does Your Web Site Scream?” counts more than 800 content providers, from AP PhotoStream, AIDS Weekly and the Atlanta Journal and Constitution to Where-it-is-at.com, Young People’s Press and the Yakima-Herald Republic.

In April, iSyndicate received $50 million in capital venture funding from investors that include Microsoft and NBC. The company’s list of content providers include Amazon.com, AdWeek, Billboard magazine, Court TV, Entertainment Weekly, the Knoxville Sentinel and the St. Petersburg Times.

Mike O’Donnell, founder and president of iCopyright, says that content providers are in the driver’s seat, despite all the free information available online.

“All content is not created equal....People only want content specifically meaningful at a particular time. They also want content that is authentic, useful and presented in the proper context. Publishers with established brands that provide editorial and other value-added services will continue to get mind share,” O’Donnell says.

He adds, “Publishers can make more money from their content now than they could if the Internet did not exist.”

Wilson of United Media sees a shift toward quality. “People are beginning to understand that with free material, you get what you pay for, and people are willing to pay for quality.”

United works with ScreamingMedia and iSyndicate “because our main goal is to represent talent, and we want to get them to as many markets as possible. We’ve carved out the market we know we can reach, but I am not going to pretend I know how to market to, let’s say, the banking industry. They are a tremendous resource,” she says of online syndication companies.

Such companies also have been a boon for self-syndicators like Sharon Haver, a former fashion-photography stylist who runs www.focusonstyle.com. New York City-based Haver produces style and beauty stories as well as links to Web sites that she says are aimed at “everyday women who can’t run out and spend $3,000 on a suit, women who don’t look like pampered models.” These are the new breed of must-reads.

ONE CLICK AHEAD

As the tried-and-true syndicates seek to reach clients as well as readers and viewers, they are re-evaluating how print and online customers use content.

Kerr of Universal says, “A lot of newspapers are working so closely together, and they are in such a competitive situation with other online media and video that a more timely release of material makes sense. I personally don’t believe that [newspaper] circulation will be affected by having more timely release of material. The people who like to read print will read print, the people who read online will do that.”

At United, Wilson says supplying quality content, as well as maintaining a commitment to newspapers, remains paramount. “No one will succeed just shoveling stuff at people.”

Still, she says, “we have a huge amount of leverage in this new marketplace. After years of going along with a steady but not really growing business, we have a nice feeling knowing that what we offer is being appreciated by an even wider audience.”

Debora Goldstein, United’s online sales manager, effectively bridges the gap between the old and new worlds when she notes that their work with newspaper clients carries weight when they work with online firms.

“One of our strengths is coming out of a traditional business. There is name recognition in what we do.The people who want our content realize we can’t put just any Tom, Dick or Harry into the newspaper.”

GETTING THERE
www.ap.org
www.copleynews.com
www.creators.com
www.kingfeatures.com
www.nytsyn.com (New York Times Syndicate)
www.postwritersgroup.com
www.timeslink.com (L.A.Times Syndicate)
www.tms.tribune.com
www.unitedmedia.com
www.uexpress.com (Universal Press Syndicate)

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