Features of Monetization of Internet Media: on the Example of Internet Periodicals of the Belgorod Region

Kornysheva Polina Postgraduate Student, Department of Journalism, Belgorod State National Research University 308000, Russia, Belgorod region, Belgorod, Preobrazhenskaya str., 78, building No. 9 kornysheva_pe@mail.ru

Monetization of online publications: analysis of features and opportunities

In the era of the rapidly developing Internet and the emergence of new opportunities, online media are expanding the range of advertising services offered. Advertising placed on the pages of online publications is one of the largest sources of income for online media editorial offices. Such advertising has its own specific features. First of all, it is an opportunity to track and control the feedback from the audience, and based on the available reaction data, it is an opportunity to adapt to the interests of potential buyers, flexibly changing the tactics of advertising promotion. It is important to emphasize that the monetization of online publications is one of the most important components of the successful functioning of online media ^[8]. 

To begin with, it is worth defining the concept of "monetization". Monetization is the extraction of profit from the functioning of the site through various advertising means. Conditionally, monetization can be divided into three types:

- Monetization, when funds are received from the advertiser;

- Monetization when funds come from users;

- Monetization, when funds come from third parties (government funding, grants, and so on) ^[9].

Let's look at each type of monetization in more detail.

Monetization is when funds come from an advertiser. This type of monetization involves receiving funds from advertisers for posting various advertising content. It is necessary to define the concept of "content". M. E. Bely defines content as "information that is interesting and necessary for the audience at a given time. An example of such information can be data from financial markets or reports of an incident" ^{[1, p. 286]}. These can be banners on the site, contextual advertising, native advertising, customized articles, placement of advertising links, recommendations. In this case, either the advertiser contacts the editorial office himself, or the responsible editorial staff member searches for advertisers and arranges for advertising. In order for online media to be attractive to advertisers, it must meet certain requirements, in particular, have good attendance statistics. In addition, each advertiser may have their own requirements for the publication. For example, the geography of the audience, gender, age. For some brands, the status of the media in which they plan to advertise is extremely important. All these indicators can be requested from the editorial office. So, it is important for editorial staff to track the statistics of online media to determine its effectiveness and audience. To do this, you can use specialized services, the so-called metrics. Such services, for the most part, are free and easily configurable. No special skills are required to install such statistics counters on the site. However, they give the editorial staff the opportunity to receive extremely important information regarding the audience and the effectiveness of publications.

Let's look at the types of advertising integrations in more detail.

Banners. These are graphic images of various sizes containing textual information about the products or services offered. Banners are placed on websites in order to attract the attention of potential users and buyers. Banners are usually clickable, that is, they contain an embedded link leading to a page with a detailed description of the products or services being promoted. Some statistics services allow you to track the number of clicks on a banner, that is, the number of clicks on the banner and clicks on the link. This data is an indicator of the effectiveness of advertising – people who clicked on the banner, became interested in the service or product offered, and went to an external site to learn more.

Contextual advertising. This type of advertising consists of text or graphic banners that are placed in the Yandex and Google search engines, as well as on partner sites. Such ads are displayed in a targeted manner, taking into account the interests of users.

Native advertising. Native or hidden advertising is a very successful type of advertising at the moment. Users are tired of annoying banners and contextual advertising. The difference between native advertising is that such advertising is served under the guise of useful articles in which an advertising link or a mention of the advertised brand or company is competently embedded. So, it can be the advice of a veterinarian or a list of recipes from a chef. Users like this kind of content, as it is often expert. It contains a certain problem and provides a solution to this problem from an expert in a specific field ^[2].

Customized articles. Such advertising is also hidden in nature. Usually these are promotional articles that are designed to form a loyal attitude of the audience to the promoted product or service.

The greatest result can be achieved by using different types of advertising, that is, a combination of them. This is beneficial both for the advertiser, as it increases the reach of the audience, and for the editorial offices of online media, as income increases due to the advertising budget of advertisers.

Pop-ups are pop–up advertisements that appear on the screen of users who visit the site. It is worth noting that this type of advertising is the least effective, as it causes irritation to users: such advertising banners interfere with viewing content, which cannot be perceived positively.

Monetization is when funds come from users. This type of monetization implies cases when online media receive funds from their audience. In this case, monetization is available through the use of special services (for example, the installation of a billboard service with the ability to purchase movie or theater tickets on the site), the placement of private ads and other services. Another way of monetization from users is Paywall, in other words, subscribing to the publication.

It should be emphasized that the subscription can be full – when any materials are not available on the site, without a subscription, or partial: when there is an announcement of an article on the site, but the full article needs to be purchased. Often, such a model is implemented by editorial offices with partially accessible content: some of the content remains free on the site, in full access, so that readers understand what they are paying for and have the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the publication's policy, publication topics, and form a personal opinion about the publication. It is fair to note that in our country, a paid subscription to content is rare, since Russian users do not tend to consume paid content.

Monetization, when funds come from third parties. This type of advertising implies that the editorial office of the online media receives funds from partners or government funding. As a rule, in this case, funds are allocated in a fixed amount, which is aimed at achieving certain goals. Therefore, this type of advertising should not be considered as a permanent source of income.

In the context of rapidly increasing competition, there is no optimal business model for online media. Just as there is no ideal type of advertising that would guarantee a stable and regular income for online publications.

From the point of view of successful financing, the editorial staff of online media needs to use all three types of monetization in order to obtain the greatest benefit. However, in order to do this, it is necessary to meet the criteria that will make it possible to become attractive to both advertisers and readers. In the first case, the most important indicators of site statistics, in the second – interesting, unique and useful content for which users will be willing to pay.

Ways to monetize online publications of the Belgorod region.

Let's consider the monetization methods used by the Internet media of the Belgorod region. For the analysis, the Internet media were selected, which topped the rating of the Information and analytical online service "Medialogia" for 2020, as the most cited publications of the Belgorod region for the specified year.  These are publications: Belnovosti, Lantern.TV", "Our Belgorod", "moe-belgorod", "GTRK Belgorod", "BelPressa", <url> news agency, "go31", "Belgorodskie Izvestia", "Mir Belogorie".

Let's look at the monetization of each online publication in more detail.

Belnovosti. There is a variety of advertising banners on the main page of this publication. So, users can watch the first banner at the very top of the site. There is a whole block with advertising banners on the side of the page. Advertising banners are also located among the news blocks. It is worth noting that most of the banners are "end–to-end", that is, they are placed on all pages of the site at once. At the very bottom of the main page there is a clickable link "Advertising", which leads to a page where possible formats of advertising interaction with an online publication are described.  According to the information provided on the website, the publication offers the following advertising services:

· Videos and movies;

· Banner advertising;

·        The case of "Opening" an office, a store, a medical center;

·        Case study "National project" information support;

·        Health and sports programs;

·        News story;

·        Interview in the studio;

· Placement in the "Weather Forecast" sponsor block.

The editorial board of the online publication also posted information on the page that may be of interest to advertisers: the coverage of the site, site partners, including other online media and well-known bloggers, the number of total audience on social networks, indicators of coverage of the regional audience and the number of Internet sites used for advertising.

In general, we can note the high quality of the banners placed, both static and animated, as well as high site statistics, which are a fundamental factor in choosing an advertising platform.

 "Фонарь.TV ". The Lantern website also has banner ads in various parts of the main and other pages of the site. Similarly to the previous edition, the site has a clickable link to the detailed terms of advertising on the site. According to the information provided, advertising on the site can be implemented in the following formats:

· placement of banners on various pages of the site (including "end–to-end");

· placement of PR materials (this includes press and post releases, placement of advertising text on the site, placement of an organization in the directory of organizations on the site, photo shooting of events or events, posting a survey, creating and posting an interactive survey, shooting and posting videos on the site);

· sponsorship of sections, headings and online broadcasts;

· batch advertising on the website and in the publication's groups on social networks;

· advertising in the site's community on the VKontakte social network.

In addition to the above-mentioned methods, the editorial board of "Lantern" has created a "Support" project, which implies voluntary donations to the editorial board from users. Those who wish to support the publication are invited to subscribe to the publication on a one-time or monthly basis. The amount of donations can be any.

"Our Belgorod". There are advertising banners on the publication's website, but their number is significantly less than that of the previous analyzed publications. However, Nash Belgorod offers to subscribe to the weekly newspaper "Business Edition" for a fee.

moe-belgorod also uses banner advertising on the site as monetization. However, it will not be possible to read in detail about other types of advertising on the pages of the publication: users can only see a summary of the site's statistics, as well as a message that the publication offers the services of a photographer, designer and journalist.

"GTRK Belgorod". In addition to advertising banners, contextual advertising is also present on the publication's website. Also, according to the information posted on the website, it is possible to advertise and order products on federal television and radio channels.

BelPressa. The BelPressa website also has banner ads, which are placed in different parts of the site page. According to the information provided on the website, BelPressa offers the following advertising services:

·        Text advertising (which includes: news, articles, photo reports, longreads, videos, infographics, tests, timeline, contests, quizzes). For an additional fee, the editorial board can disable commenting on a promoted publication;

· Advertising in the site's social media communities;

· Banner advertising;

· Branded advertising.

In addition, BelPressa offers advertising services on the website in printed publications of the publishing house.

<url> news agency. The website of <url> news agency has an abundance of advertising banners located both on the main page of the site and on individual pages. In the "Advertising" section, the editorial board of the site provides traffic statistics, and also emphasizes that the site is No. 1 in citation among the media of the Belgorod region in 2020. According to the information provided on the website, the editorial office of <url> offers the following advertising services:

·        News and press releases;

·        Interviews, expert opinions;

· Cards;

· Tests:

· Multi-format projects (reports, photo reports, investigations, longreads);

· Image project-presentation;

·        Video formats, media punch (videos);

· Advertising on social networks.

In addition, users see contextual advertising on the website of <url> news agency. As we can see, <url> uses various ways to monetize the site and the choice is quite wide.

go31.ru. There is a large abundance of advertising banners of various sizes on the publication's website. In addition, there are special sections in which advertising is published, for example, the section "Partner News", "Promo", "Press release", "Partner material", "Political news". Among the advertising services offered by the editorial office, the following services:

· Banner advertising;

· Placement in the directory of enterprises;

· Promotional articles;

· Special projects;

· Advertising on social networks;

·        Native advertising.

Belgorod News. There is no banner advertising on the publication's website, however, there is a "Partners" column where links to partner sites are indicated.

 "The World of Belogorie". There is no banner advertising on the main page of the site. However, it is available on other pages, in particular, in the "Advertising" block, which also contains additional information about the TV and radio company's advertising services. According to the data, the site can be placed:

· A PR article;

·        Press release;

· Banners;

·        Video topic;

·        Perform video targeting.

Conclusion

The growing popularity of online publications, due to their specific features, led the editorial staff to search for all possible models of monetization of their resources. However, it is worth noting that at the moment there is no ideal or unified monetization business model. Online publications of the Belgorod region offer a fairly wide range of ways to place ads on the pages of their Internet resources.

There is a general trend in the use of banner advertising: nine out of ten analyzed publications use banner advertising for monetization purposes. Of the ten analyzed publications, only one offers to subscribe to paid content – this is the publication "Our Belgorod".

The most diverse advertising services are offered by the online media Belnovosti, <url> news agency, Lantern.TV", "The World of Belogorie", "BelPressa" and "go.31". Advertising through press releases, native advertising, and photo reports are also quite common. Flashcards and surveys are much less common. It is important to note that most publications offer an integrated approach to solving the problems of advertisers, which is the best solution in terms of attracting both advertisers and the audience of the online publication.

A fairly wide range of advertising services offered, in our opinion, will continue to expand. The struggle for the attention of the audience and, as a result, for the attention of advertisers, will inevitably lead online publications to expand opportunities due, in particular, to the high availability of technical means. Various photo and video editing programs, special metrics for tracking audience reactions and analyzing statistics, are mostly available for free and do not imply that editorial staff have special skills. Such services can be both stand-alone and online products, which greatly facilitates their installation or use.

Since the functioning of any online publication involves certain costs (in particular, hosting and domain fees), monetization is necessary to ensure the continuous functioning of online media.