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OPA: Forbes online success without cannibalising print

Posted: 09/03/07 By: Oliver Luft

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The head of Forbes.com told an industry conference that online success has not come at the expense of the print product.

Speaking at the OPA forum for the future, in London today, James Spanfeller, president and CEO of Forbes.com, told delegates that his site drew 16 million unique visitors per month.

"The success of Forbes.com has not come at the expense of our print product, in fact the two media platforms have been a great complement to each other... we've had all the magazine content on the site for ten years, from launch, during that time readership for the magazine has increased.

"The strategy has paid off handsomely for us not only in terms of increasing readership for the print product but we have also seen tremendous uptake of folks reading our sites."

Mr Spanfeller said that growth was based on the recognition of the Forbes brand rather than a specific single delivery platform.

"The manner by which people find our content is less important than having a brand that stands out and that people recognise."

He added that Forbes was prepared for a platform agnostic publishing world where the focus was on providing business news on a local basis.

He said Forbes had just launched a Polish version and further local language services with geographically specific content were planned.

He added that Forbes was investing heavily in creating original video. Currently it has two production studios in New York making up to 60 videos a week.

A third is being built on the west coast of the US and a fourth planned in Asia.

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