Meet the innovation influencers

Instagram and YouTube invented the paid ‘influencer’ — now an $8 billion industry. Cryptonite aims to turn innovation entrepreneurs into the rock stars of the ‘20s.

Most of the world’s new jobs and wealth are created by innovation entrepreneurs. These folks also represent the demographic with the highest business and consumer purchasing power and appetite for professional and investment risk.

The infobesity and mistrust challenge

Fueled by a growing mistrust of traditional advertising and media and the ever-expanding infobesity epidemic, people are radically more discerning about what they see online. Wary Millennials and Gen Xers regularly seek reviews from people they trust on social media before making purchasing and other big decisions. Over 80 percent of global executives surveyed admit to feeling overwhelmed and often confused by the volume of content they encounter and have become demonstrably more selective about what they read as a result. These executives also increasingly seek new perspectives and input from industry experts to help think through strategic issues and determine what technology platforms and web services to choose.

Madison Avenue has learned from these trends and now actively solicits the support of trusted influencers to help sway consumer behavior. Brands now understand that gaining the validation of knowledgeable, passionate, and authentic industry advocates is what will inspire the rest of the market to follow. Engagement is the new impressions. This gives influencer marketing its edge.

‘Nothing influences people more than a recommendation from a trusted friend. A trusted referral influences people more than the best broadcast message. A trusted referral is the Holy Grail of advertising.’

Mark Zuckerberg, Founder & CEO, Facebook

Over the last five years, influencer marketing has grown from obscurity to an $8 billion business. Research shows that 59 percent of marketers plan on increasing their influencer budget in 2020. 17 percent of marketers expect to spend over half their budget on influencer marketing. Big brand spending on influencer marketing is expected to mushroom to $15 billion by 2022. Driving this growth is the hard fact that businesses average making over $6 for every $1 spent on influencer marketing.

Israel’s Hillel Fuld has been dubbed the 7th top tech blogger worldwide and leading online influencer.

Gaining the micro-influencer as your brand advocate

Back in 1976, when a 21-year-old Steve Jobs needed a marketing expert to help him launch Apple — ‘the world’s first personal computer’ — he called Intel to ask who made their sharp-looking ads and was told its was Regis McKenna. Regis taught Steve Jobs to gain early market momentum by gaining the awareness and support of the top 1 percent of the consumer technology early-adopters and media influencers. ‘Everyone turns to people in-the-know when considering purchasing a product, especially when it's new to the market,’ he counseled. In other words, generating positive word of mouth from the top players offers the greatest marketing leverage.

With the birth of social networking, the rapid proliferation of human knowledge, and the fractionalization of media, the world of key influencers has grown 30-fold. The new generation enjoys consuming and engaging with online content and brands at a much higher rate than previous generations. Rather than focusing on the top 1 percent, B2B and high-end consumer brands in particular need to seek out and gain the support of a broad base of ‘micro-influencers’ to get their messages across.

A micro-influencer is someone who has between 1,000 and 100,000 followers. While their following may be small(ish), their authenticity is high and may wield immense influence in their niche. Research shows that real-life influencers who are passionate about what they recommend have 22.2 times more weekly buying conversations compared to an average consumer. 82 percent of consumers surveyed reported they were highly likely to follow a recommendation made by a micro-influencer. 98 percent of marketers who frequently run social media influencer campaigns say they now engage micro-influencers. The most important criteria marketers evaluate when choosing micro-influencers to partner with are their content, engagement rates, and audience demographics.

‘Both audiences and brands are shifting away from celebrity influencers towards real-life advocates who may have smaller followings, but their true passion and expertise make them more credible.’

Brad Fay, CoFounder & Head of Research, The Keller Fay Group

Malcolm Gladwell, who authored, The Tipping Point and Outliers, has it right when he observed, ‘There are exceptional people out there who are capable of starting epidemics. All you have to do is find them.’ Studies show that 59 percent of micro-influencers believe Instagram to be the most effective social media platform to connect with and engage their target audience. There has yet to be a dominant platform for professional industry influencers. Our initiative at Cryptonite is to be this platform. Our goal is to tap into the meta intelligence of some of the smartest people in technology and science, provide a way to measure their ‘power ranking,’ and connect them to the Big Brands who will treat them like rock stars.

The global Silicon Valley market

Over 1 billion professionals operate in the world today, with 130 million students preparing to join them in the global job market. LinkedIn alone boasts a membership of over 660 million professionals and 40 million students and recent graduates representing more than 200 countries. The professional segment is projected to double by the year 2025. In the US, professional services now account for more than 83 percent of the total workforce — a considerable increase from 60 percent in 1947.

‘Our job is to start raging infernos with s single match,’ says Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz

‘Who you know, what you know, and when you know it is the most valuable currency in the global Silicon Valley.’

Michael Mortiz, Partner, Sequoia Capital, founding investor, Google

Staying informed, connected, and relevant in this noisy world of 1 billion professionals is the greatest challenge for people seeking to advance their careers. The manner in which professionals conduct new web services have also disrupted business (e.g., Copper CRM, Slack, Yva.ai, WhatsApp, and Google.docs), smartphones with low-cost, ubiquitous Internet access, and blockchain technology. These disruptive tools have made it possible for 70 percent of professionals to work at least part of their average week remotely, fuel the ‘contracted worker’ boom. 1 in 5 jobs in America today are performed by independent contractors who are choosing personal flexibility over the security of working for others. Within a decade, contractors, freelancers, and virtual professionals could make up well over half of the American workforce.

Cryptonite members represent the pioneers and early adopters within the world’s billion professionals. They are innovation-driven executives, entrepreneurs, and risk investors that power the ‘global Silicon Valley’—the most robust job and wealth creation engine on the planet.

The ‘global Silicon Valley’ represents the innovators and risk investors at the top of the power pyramid. Their passion creates the products and services that change the way we work, play, educate ourselves, and organize and govern our communities for the better.

Venture-backed companies are the most dominant contributors to the growth of new jobs and wealth in the world. Despite the relatively young age of modern venture capital, a fourth of current public U.S. companies received VC financing. Today the top 5 (and 7 out of 10) of most valuable companies are VC-backed tech companies. The total market capitalization of these public tech companies now exceeds $7 trillion, and they employ over 3 million people. A CBInsights global ‘Unicorn’ tracking report also estimates that right behind these Internet behemoths is 440 private companies currently valued over $1 billion, each with a combined market cap of another $1.4 trillion.

‘Robust deal value was not the biggest story from 2019; however—it was the record-breaking $250 billion in VC exits with nearly 80% from VC-backed IPOs that is the jaw-dropper.’

National Venture Capital Association/Pitchbook Annual ‘Venture Monitor’

According to NVCA/Pitchbook annual survey, these unicorns have emerged out of the current pack of over 50,000 operating venture/angel-backed companies. Angel investing also hit a new record in 2019 with over 4,500 in new startups fundings for an estimated deal value of over $10 billion, which falls short of 2018’s record posting but is notably higher than figures of past years. In 2019 US early-stage VCs invested $42 billion across over 3,600 deals, which neared 2018’s record highs. Late-stage deal count surpassed 2,500 for the first time ever in 2019, finishing 2019 at nearly 2,600 deals totaling more than $85 billion invested. Capital raised by US venture funds reached $46.3 billion in 2019, the second-highest annual total in the past decade.

In May 2017, SoftBank’s first Vision Fund held an initial close of $93.0 billion, nearly hitting its unprecedented target of $100.0 billion. Pitchbook predicts Masayoshi Son‘s ’SoftBank’s Vision Fund II will not close at its $108.0 billion targets.

Driven by low-interest rates and the passage of the JOBS Act in 2012, a flood of committed capital, and increased participation from nontraditional investors, the Silicon Valley Mega Deal was born. Mega-rounds ($100 million+) and mega-funds ($500 million+) have emerged as a lasting industry component. Mega-rounds hit another record in 2019 with 237 mega-deals representing an 11.8 percent gain over 2018. In 2019, mega-deals accounted for almost 25 percent of private company fundings.

Pitchbook projects that 2020 will mark yet another new annual record for US mega-deals. Everyone wants a piece of the innovation growth story, from traditional VCs to corporates, emerging managers to mega-funds, sovereign wealth funds to family offices.

Over 40 percent of domestic venture capital is still invested in the San Francisco Bay Area, yet international venture capital investment has risen to equal footing with the United States. There is no question that the emergence and dominance of companies born out of the global Silicon Valley will continue to represent a greater percentage of total world economic power and output over time.

A high-IQ community where Gen-Narrators play industry DJs

Cryptonite aspires to play a major role in the development and growth of the influencer marketing boom by providing a way for brands to identify and gain top players' long-term support in the global Silicon Valley. Cryptonite’s platform allows brands to directly secure agreements with key influencers whereby they ‘power drop’ $Pro coins directly into an influencer’s wallet in exchange for brand advocacy and support.

Gen-Narrators act as industry DJs who curate, remix, and share high-value content that inspires conversation and debate.

Cryptonite is designed and edited for the growing class ‘Gen-Narrators’ — the new rising authorities and key influencers from the Millennials and Gen X generations that sit at the nexus of innovation, media, politics, entrepreneurship, risk investing, and environmental concern. Gen-Narrators take their online brand reputations very seriously. They are truth-seekers who want to inspire support for their causes and passions while also watch out for trolling and cyber-bullying.

Cryptonite offers Gen-Narrators a high-IQ community platform where they can act as industry DJs. Members may curate, remix, and share high-value content across all sections of the site to inspire conversation and debate and build a distinct, authoritative influencer brand that pays. Cryptonite’s average member has high business and technology knowledge, so Cryptonite community drivers feel empowered to ‘talk up’ to their fellow members and get to the point.

Cryptonite achieves this mission by researching and inviting only the most thoughtful, ambitious, and accomplished professionals in the global innovation industries. The goal is to build a ‘trusted network’ where qualified members can build their reputations, earn cryptocurrency rewards, and trade their capital for new opportunities.

Cryptonite measures its success by the number of game-changing relationships we can help facilitate between top brands and the most clever innovation influencers playing in the global Silicon Valley.

Our advice to marketers

• Honor your audience by putting them first.
• Develop and enshrine your brand values and stay true to them.
• Stop trying to be a thought leader — be a thought partner.
• Speak only where you have permission to speak.
• Be open source — involve outside experts, customers, academics, media partners, employees in your messaging.
• Choose influencers who have followers similar to the target market for the brand’s product.
• Allow influencers to control the narrative to preserve their voice and authenticity.
• Remember that engagement is the new impressions — draw a clear line between goals and KPIs.
• Innovate: Experiment with video, live streaming, surveys, and other content formats, try niche channels, and hold thought-leader events endorsements and podcasts.
• Think big and out of the box
• Work with Cryptonite!

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If you would like to join us on this amazing journey as a Network or Brand Partner, Cryptonite Wizards, contributor, or a Founding Member, please feel free to reach out in the comment section below or get in touch with us directly at concierge@cryptoniteventures.com.

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MORE INFLUENCER MARKET INTELLIGENCE [+]

• The proliferation of the nodes connected to the Internet and the rise of AI applications means human knowledge is now doubling every 24 hours.
• Digital media usage continued to accelerate in Y/Y 2018 (+7 percent) vs. 2017 (+5 percent) Source: eMarketer/Mary Meeker Internet Trend Report 2019
• There were 3.7 billion social media users globally at the end of Q3 2019 — a penetration rate of 48 percent of the world’s 7.7 billion population. This was an increase of 328 million social media users — a 9.6 percent increase. The world’s population rose by 1 percent in the same period—source: Hootsuite.
• There are 3.7 billion active mobile social media users globally. The vast majority of the people who use social media worldwide do so with mobile devices at times. This statistic grew by 15 percent over the last year. Notably, there are now 5.2 billion unique mobile users, making mobile phones truly part of our everyday life—source: Hootsuite.
• Mobile phones account for 52 percent of web traffic, with laptops and computers still accounting for 45 percent, Tablets, 3.7 percent, and other devices (such as gaming systems), 0.08 percent—source: Hootsuite.
• Since 2017, the Y/Y time consumer’s social media time spent on YouTube is up in 2018 by +5 percent (to 27 percent), and Instagram is +6 (to 19 percent). Source: eMarketer/Mary Meeker Internet Trend Report 2019
• The use of mobile devices for news continues to grow. As of spring 2017, 45 percent of U.S. adults often get news on a mobile device, up from 36 percent in 2016 and 21 percent in 2013. Source: Pew Research
• The gap between television and online news consumption is narrowing. As of August 2017, 43 percent of Americans report often getting news online, a share just 7 percentage points lower than the 50 percent who often get news on television. Source: Pew Research
• Two-thirds of Americans (67 percent) get at least some news on social media. This represents a modest increase from 62 percent in 2016, but similar to mobile; substantial increases among older Americans drove this growth. Source: Pew Research
• Many Americans believe fabricated news is sowing confusion, and about a third (32 percent) say they often see made-up political news online. Nearly two-thirds of U.S. adults (64 percent) say fabricated news stories cause a great deal of confusion about the basic facts of current issues and events. Source: Pew Research
• Americans have low trust in information from social media. Just 5 percent of web-using U.S. adults have a lot of trust in the information they get from social media, nearly identical to the 4 percent who said so in 2016 Source: Pew Research
• 98 percent of digital consumers are social media users, and adoption is high even among 55–64s (94 percent). An average of 2 hours 22 minutes per day is spent on social networks and messaging, although this figure has started to decrease in specific markets. Source: Global WebIndex
• People online have an average of 8.5 social media accounts and tend to use each platform for different purposes. That said, over the past year, we have seen an appreciable slowing in the number of accounts held per internet user, across generations. Source: Global WebIndex
• 28 percent of users of four major social platforms outside of China engage with live streams each month on any one of these services. Facebook takes the lion’s share, with the largest user base as well as the highest engagement rates with live video. Source: Global WebIndex
• Video as content has been growing in importance for many years, and this is expected to continue as one of the key social media trends in 2020. Videos will make up 82 percent of all internet traffic in 2020/ As users have short attention spans and limited time, the focus will be on creative, engaging storytelling that captures user attention in seconds. SocialMediaWeek.
• 33 percent of millennials spent 33 percent of their digital time watching videos. The younger Generation Z is even more into the video medium, and they spend 41 percent of their video time watching videos. Source: Vidmob
• Facebook is still the dominant social platform in terms of membership but falls behind YouTube in terms of weekly visitors. YouTube has fewer registered members but has visitor rates that are 7 percentage points higher than its membership. It’s the only major social service to find itself in this situation and shows that significant numbers of its visitors are either not logged into their accounts or not even members in the first place. Source: Global WebIndex
• YouTube is a strong second behind FB, with Facebook Messenger then having a decent lead within the third tier of services that includes WhatsApp, Instagram, and Twitter. Source: Global WebIndex
• All major players in social media are working to make social shopping (i.e. shopping from within the app) a massive new trend in 2020. Now, with just a few clicks, you can go from seeing something you like while scrolling Instagram to sharing your credit card information and making a purchase right then and there. Source: SocialMediaWeek.
• Users turning to private groups and messaging apps to connect with others will continue to be a growing trend in 2020. Messaging apps like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram Messaging allow users to create more intimate groups where we can share personal info with others. This return to direct communication (aka DM) also means messaging apps are now growing faster than social networks. The top messaging apps now combine for nearly 5 billion monthly active users worldwide, which is now more than traditional social networks. Source: Entrepreneur.
• Snapchat was the first to introduce the Stories idea, but soon Instagram and Facebook Stories, and this new format is now a popular way for users to interact. Stories can provide viewers with more authentic insight, as the videos are often created on the spot. These video stories are designed to disappear rather quickly, usually within 24 hours, which has inspired marketers to capitalize on the fear of missing out and to offer short-term deals. Source: SocialMediaWeek.
• Augmented reality technology is expected to make its way into social media in 2020 as a means to bring product discovery, special offers and more to life. An example of his augmented reality is already used by a big company to entice customers. Ikea’s augmented reality app allows consumers to see what their items will look like in their homes before they decide to purchase. Source: DigitalMediaSolutions
• Executives and marketers agree: Compelling Thought Leadership (TL) content is ‘innovative’, ‘big picture’, ‘credible’ and ‘transformative’. Executives are unimpressive by TL that is ‘superficial’, ‘sales-driven’ and ‘biased,’ and ‘jargon-laden.’ Trust is established through the research's quality or nature it is based on ‘hard facts’ and the data is ‘credible’. Source: The Economist.
• Nearly half of marketers believe that less than 20 percent of their TL content output gets engagement. But marketers seem undaunted by poor results because 80 percent plan to increase the amount of thought leadership content they produce in the coming 12 months. Source: The Economist.
• Marketers are not truly focused on the audience. Nearly half (47 percent) of all marketers cite differentiating their company from the competition as a primary objective of thought leadership. Four in ten (42 percent) cite gaining recognition for their company or key individuals as experts/authority in their field. Only 28 percent of marketers cited helping their audience to become more knowledgeable as a key objective. Source: The Economist.
• Yet, 82 percent believe that to create compelling thought leadership, the content needs to center on the audience’s interest rather than profiling the brand. Source: The Economist.
• …and that’s a challenge for marketers. The top ROI measures are achieving policy/issues objectives (35 percent) and citations in press or third party publications (28 percent). Only 24 percent cited social media shares and 21 percent cited time spent with content. Source: The Economist.
• Businesses are making $5.20 for every $1 spent on influencer marketing. The top 13 percent of businesses make $20 or more. Most companies get positive results from influencer marketing, with just the bottom 25% failing to generate any revenue. Source: The Influencer Marketing Hub
• 69 percent of influencers chose to be influencers so they could earn money. 58 percent claimed to engage as an influencer to make an impact or affect change. Source: The Influencer Marketing Hub
• The increase in influencer marketing 2014–2019 mirrors the decrease in print advertising. Google Trends shows a comparable rise in influencer marketing at the same time as print advertising has been falling. Searches for “influencer marketing” drew ahead of those for “print advertising” in mid-2017 and have remained that way ever since. Source: Google Trends
• There are four categories of influencers. While there are no strict definitions of follower numbers, a general guide to the types is:
  — Mega-influencers — social superstars with more than a million followers. These are often celebrities
  — Macro-influencers — influencers with between 100,000 and 1 million followers
  — Micro-influencers — someone who has between 1,000 and 100,000 followers. While their following may be small(ish), their authenticity is high
  — Nano-influencers — somebody with fewer than 1,000 followers who have immense influence with a comparatively narrow niche.
• Today, most campaigns average 5–10 influencers, an increase from 2017 when most campaigns averaged under 5 creators. Even still, a whopping 42 percent of campaigns engage on average 10–100 influencers per campaign in 2019, a significant jump up from 19% in 2018. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• Micro-influencers (those with 5K-100K followers) are the most engaged by brands, followed by mid-tier influencers (those with 100K-500K followers). Celebrities and Mega influencers (those with 500K+ followers) are generally tapped sporadically for high-investment partnerships. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• As the industry matures, both consumers and marketers are shunning archetypal influencers in lieu of those with more ingenuity and unconventionality. These influencers, while unexpected, are still more than capable of cutting through the noise. Of the unconventional creators leading the charge today, marketers are most open to aligning with nano-influencers and influencer duos. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• Typically, the highest volume campaign that a marketer has executed features up to 20 influencers. That said, more than 52 percent of influencers have executed large scale campaigns ranging from 20 to more than 500 influencers. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• Brands are diversifying their influencer engagements in a myriad of ways. While tried and true sponsored content collaborations (83 percent) continue to be the go-to activation approach, marketers are engaging influencers beyond social media through events, endorsements, podcasts and more. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• Marketers vet influencers for campaigns they most often consider an influencer’s content. Next, they move on to more analytical points of consideration including engagement rate, audience demographics, and pre-existing brand affinity. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• 85 percent of marketers have been turned down by an influencer before for a variety of reasons. An inability to agree on payment is the most common reason an influencer says no to a partnership. Interestingly, the second most common reason is that an influencer is involved with a competing brand. The third most common reason was a lack of alignment between the brand and influencer. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• As influencers become more seasoned with brand partnerships, it begs the question: Is there a point at which too many sponsorships make an influencer unattractive to prospective partners? It turns out there is. On average, brands deem influencer feeds with more than 44 percent sponsored content as oversaturated. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• More than 50% of marketers say that they now have a process to vet influencers with bots and fake followers. This is up from just 25% in 2018. More interestingly, 66% of brands are calling on social platforms to take more action to combat fraudulent activity amongst their users. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• A whopping 83 percent of marketers are repurposing content for organic social (versus 31 percent in 2018), with 78 percent of marketers re-leveraging influencer assets for programmatic, re-targeting or paid social ads, (versus 44 percent in 2018), and finally 41 percent of marketers leveraging the content for eCommerce or brand sites (versus 15 [percent in 2018). Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• As we look back to 2017 versus 2019, we are seeing influencer marketing spend for activations continue to grow. Most notably, in 2017, 66 percent of marketers were spending an average of less than $25,000 per campaign. Fast forward to 2019, only 49 percent are spending less than $25,000 per campaign. Moreover, we see over 12.5 percent of marketers spending an average of more than $100,000 per influencer program in 2019, versus only 2 percent of marketers doing so in 2017. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• In tandem with an increased budget for each program, marketers are also continuing to increase their overall budgets year over year. 70 percent of marketers said they are increasing their budgets from 2018 to 2019, up from 62 percent of marketers who said they would increase budgets from 2017 to 2018. Most are increasing their investments by 1–25 percent. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• In-house or Agency? This is one of the biggest questions in influencer marketing today for marketers looking to make the most of the energy in the space. By the looks of it, most marketers (77 percent) have a preference for handling their influencer marketing endeavors in-house. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• Technology has become core to the influencer marketing industry, with 57 percent of marketers leveraging some form of technology to run their influencer programs in-house, and another 18 percent letting us know that their influencer marketing agency uses a technology. Only 25 percent responded no or not aware of the use of technology. Source: ACTIVATE 2019 State of Influencer Marketing Study
• The FTC has taken an interest in influencer marketing, where influencers have failed to disclose that they received payment for their posts. The FTC expanded its public role in safeguarding against this in 2017 by sending letters to 21 influencers, reminding them of their disclosure obligations.
• Instagram has more than 1 billion monthly active users, 71 percent of which are under the age of 35. While there are fewer Instagrammers than people using big brother Facebook, Instagram is now the preferred platform of the young and is also rapidly becoming the most popular influencer marketing platform. Instagram’s ad revenue is growing at a faster rate than Facebook’s.
• Instagram Stories has become pivotal to influencer marketing success. Instagram introduced them in 2016, and by January 2017, there were 150 million daily Instagram Stories users. Numbers have continued to rise, surpassing the 500 million mark in January 2019.
• Snapchat users have shown that they are highly responsive to influencer marketing. 39 percent of Snapchat users say they discover brands via celebrity endorsements, online posts from expert bloggers, or through vlogs.
• YouTube has 2 billion users worldwide equaling Facebook’s audience. Its popularity is increasing across nearly all age groups. Not only do the young use it as a television replacement, but the older generations cherry-pick videos on topics that interest them, too. While most of the other social networks now cater to video, YouTube is still seen as the preeminent site for longer videos. This makes it ideal for brands wanting to showcase a product’s benefits and features, or a place for in-depth video reviews
• Twitch had 3.2 million streamers in November 2019, who people collectively watched for 880 million hours. There was an average of 1.2 million concurrent viewers at any time. Sunday is the most popular viewing day, although more people broadcast on Saturdays on average.
• While Facebook users may not be the most targeted audience by influencer marketers, they still regularly use the social site. Pew Research has found that 51 percent of Facebook users use the app/site several times a day, with a further 23 percent using Facebook about once a day. This compares with Instagram (42 percent multiple times daily, 21 percent daily) and Snapchat (46 percent numerous times daily, and 15 percent daily). YouTube and Twitter users visit the sites on a less regular basis.
• Considerably more rich people use Pinterest than poor people. While the percentage of people using Pinterest is lower than for more mainstream sites, such as YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram, there is much more variation in income levels.
• Although many people think of LinkedIn as a large-scale collection of resumes and a job market, professionals also publish and share content. Many firms in the B2B sector market on LinkedIn. According to LinkedIn, they have had 9 billion content impressions, with 15 times more content impressions than job postings.
• Publishers continue to bet strongly on reader revenue, with half (50%) saying this will be their main income stream going forward. Around a third (35%) think that advertising and reader revenue will be equally important, with just one in seven (14%) pinning their hopes on advertising alone. Source: Reuters/Oxford University Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends in 2020
• It looks set to be another big year for podcasting, with over half of our publisher respondents (53%) saying podcast initiatives would be important to them this year. Others are looking at voice and turning text articles into audio as a way of capitalizing on the growing popularity of audio formats. Source: Reuters/Oxford University Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends in 2020
• We’re likely to see more moves by news organizations to personalize front pages and pursue other forms of automated recommendation this year. Over half of our respondents (52%) say these AI-driven initiatives will be very important this year, but smaller companies worry about being left behind. Reuters/Oxford University Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends in 2020
• Editorial partnerships. With publishers realizing that they can’t cover every option, they are increasingly looking for partnership opportunities. In the recent UK election, Sky News teamed up with Buzzfeed News to help tap into the social conversation. In return, Buzzfeed got access to brand exposure with a much bigger audience. In podcasting, partnerships are the order of the day, with Gimlet working with the Wall Street Journal and Slate and The Economist getting together to produce the Secret History of the Future. Reuters/Oxford University Journalism, Media, and Technology Trends in 2020

The birth of Beatlemania

Can’t buy me love.