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WITH MALCOLM NETBURN
Deliberately Disruptive:
Lessons from Atlantic Media Company’s Digital Direction
Malcolm Netburn
Chairman and CEO of CDS Global

2.
FORWARD: with Malcolm Netburn December 2012
Deliberately Disruptive:
Lessons from Atlantic Media Company’s Digital Direction
Publishers who survived the print and advertising crises of 2008 continue to struggle in their
attempts to crack the digital success code. These publishers are increasingly turning to the defining
tenets of technology startups for suggestions on how to re-create themselves for the digital age.
A leading example is the daring stance taken by the Atlantic Media Company, which sought to
break the new media mold when it launched its mobile-centered startup, Quartz, in September 2012.
The publisher of the 153-year-old print magazine The Atlantic set out to embody a “disruptive,
open-minded and bold” approach to how the public consumes its business news.
In 2010, long before any inklings of Quartz had begun to surface, the Atlantic Media Company
deconstructed its legacy business, blowing apart even the most fundamental fibers of its model.
“We imagined ourselves as a venture-capital-backed start-up in Silicon Valley whose mission was to
attack and disrupt The Atlantic,” said Justin B. Smith, president of the Atlantic Media Company,
in an interview with The New York Times in December 2010.
“In essence, we brainstormed the question, ‘What would we
In 2010, long before
do if the goal was to aggressively cannibalize ourselves?’”
any inklings of
In a keynote delivered at the Alliance for Audited Media’s (formerly Quartz had begun to
ABC) annual conference in November 2012, Smith openly shared critical surface, the Atlantic
factors driving his business’s digital success strategy, advising industry
Media Company
peers to heed 10 game-changing developments that have emerged as
a result of the social-mobile landscape. Below are Smith’s 10 imperative deconstructed its legacy
factors accompanied by my own brief commentaries: business, blowing
apart even the most
10 Critical Opportunities Determining Digital Success fundamental fibers of
1. New media is a high-growth landscape that demands companies
its model.
act – fast.
Veteran media companies must embrace digital media’s disruption as a fresh, high-growth
opportunity. Diligently focus on this silver lining and pay extremely close attention to
emerging market forecasts in order to leverage previously nonexistent opportunities. Take a
lesson from startups and fail often, quickly and cheaply. Media companies – especially large,
industry-leading incumbents – who wait for safe, predictable circumstances in order to deploy
painstaking iterations, do so at their own peril.
2. The future of media is unclear for everyone, therefore instinct, not previous methods for
measurement, must lead the charge.
According to Smith, the media industry is wading through a “fog soup” of sorts. The future is
hazy and filled with unknown unknowns – and just how to transition remains unclear. Take a
lesson from renowned technologist Andrew Grove, who stresses that “business instincts and
personal judgment are all that can be relied on” in times such as these, where what used to
work for the company no longer can.
© 2012 CDS Global. All rights reserved. 2

3.
FORWARD: with Malcolm Netburn December 2012
3. The impending explosion of mobile devices will drive strong demand for mobile-rich content.
Although the new media landscape is rife with unknown knowns and unknown unknowns,
media must take advantage of one of digital’s most reliable, transformative known knowns:
the widespread proliferation of mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets. The implied
impact on media consumption is enormous. KCPB’s Mary Meeker, one of the foremost leading
experts on mobile forecasts, predicts that by the end of 2013 there will be 2.4 times as many
mobile devices as PCs. Cisco predicts that between 2011 and 2016 mobile cloud traffic will grow
28-fold, showing a compound annual growth rate of 95 percent. Statistics and research reports
demonstrating mobile’s expected growth are unending. The possibilities for media companies
seeking to leverage this growth may be as well.
4. Media must tap the growing demand for widespread, unlimited access to content.
The proliferation of mobile devices and the growing adoption of cloud computing is nurturing a
strong demand for unlimited, seamless access to content, driving the production of sophisticated
converged entertainment systems. Cloud and streaming content such as gaming, movies, Internet
browsing, photos, music and more are now being sent from mobile phones to the living room big
screen through software applications such as Xbox SmartGlass and Apple AirPlay, and facilitated
through the use of a single home hardware device like Xbox 360 and Apple TV.
5. As content increasingly narrows, media must focus on niche.
The proliferation of digital devices, the variety of content platforms and the continued free-
flow, democratization of information is producing an increasingly fragmented atmosphere.
Consumers are empowered to find highly specific content that caters to their exact needs how,
where and when they want it. Smith calls this “nichification.” Media companies who identify
and exploit their strongest niches have the opportunity to pursue a more captive, loyal audience
than media companies who continue to produce content for broad, general consumption.
6. Exploit the unbundling of content.
According to Smith, the bundled experience is becoming archaic. In print, each magazine issue
is compiled of multiple content pieces that produce a physical beginning and end, innately
defined by the issue’s publication date (“the September issue,” for example). Most print
magazines have transferred this traditional model onto their digital counterparts, but this is
not at all necessary in the digital realm. Similar to individual songs being digitally purchased as
opposed to whole albums, it’s an individual article that is most often being digitally consumed
(and shared), not whole issues. Quartz’s decision to adopt its continuous scroll format, where
stories stream in an uninterrupted, lateral fashion, was a direct response to how digital content
is intrinsically consumed.
7. Feed the new consumer’s insatiable appetite for socially optimized, real-time content.
The social Web is predominantly mobile, meaning today’s consumers are always connected – to
the Web at large and to their unique, personalized social spheres. From inception, content must
now be produced with shareability and real-time access in mind in order to engage with the
new consumer. Unbundled media produced for the real-time, social landscape has the potential
to become what Smith calls “the unfinishable, infinite scroll.”
© 2012 CDS Global. All rights reserved. 3

4.
FORWARD: with Malcolm Netburn December 2012
8. Increased influence of social networks on consumer buying behavior.
Social sites, both on the Web and in the form of mobile apps, are generating increased
consumer-based traffic. Users are being incented to share discounts with peers, rate purchase
experiences and seek peer community advice before making purchase decisions. As consumers
increasingly seek product knowledge firstly through their direct social spheres before searching
via the Internet, browsers such as Google face growing competition from consumer-focused
social sites such as Yelp, LivingSocial and Foursquare, as well as broader, leading social networks
like Facebook.
9. As digital competition mounts, exceptional user experience (UX) must become a priority.
The debate between whether content remains king in the digital era continues to wage on.
Some experts stress that, when it comes to digital, experience is king. As technologies become
commoditized, Smith stresses that the design becomes the differentiator. Competition in the
digital content space is fierce. Web and mobile designs that fail to demonstrate a best-of-breed
understanding of human factors and interactions will quickly alienate consumers, sending them
off in search of a better experience, perhaps even despite the quality of content.
10. Be mindful of the importance global connectivity plays in digital media.
Smith calls the Web a “boundaryless environment.” While businesses continue to demonstrate
the value of thinking global and acting local, product strategies must take the growing global
mindset into consideration when designing everything from content to user experience.
Quartz’s target audience is travelling business executives that place high value on keeping
abreast of global economic news. Not just for American jet set execs, Quartz has made its
foreign audience a strategic focus.
© 2012 CDS Global. All rights reserved. 4