Niche Web Sites Buck Media Struggles is a pretty provocative headline at a time like this, when content companies of all shapes and sizes seek profitability.
According to The Wall Street Journal, SB Nation, Seeking Alpha and HealthCentral Network, which create and aggregate content about topics like sports, business and health, are recording sharp gains in visitors and — in many cases — revenue.
“Consumer engagement is shifting toward niche-content experiences,” says Andrew Braccia, a partner at venture-capital firm Accel Partners who sits on the board of SB Nation. “Three to five years from now, people will no longer be drawing a distinction between traditional forms of publishing and what we know as blogs today.”
Whiskey Media, founded by the entrepreneur who co-founded CNET Networks, Shelby Bonnie, is yet another example of a small team making big gains online.
I love the team Whiskey’s mission statement:
We have all worked in small entrepreneurial companies before they grew, were acquired, or died. We are strong believers that this medium still favors a small team with a powerful idea.
Our company is built on the belief that “small is the next big”. One inarguable fact is that a small team of exceptional people can beat an army of good people. It is a very American principle. On that premise, our team working out of a small office in Sausalito is building a platform to launch lots of great sites. How will we do? We will have to let users be the ultimate judge.
Obviously, Shawn and I are big believers in niche publications. We’ve been putting this rag out since Oct. 16, 2004. But we didn’t bother to stop at the marcom niche, we also serve the Husker fans niche, the hyperlocal content niche, the food and beverage niche, the domainers niche, the Americana music niche and the literary niche. We sometimes refer to our holding company as 83 Digital. We’re also about to create a new identity that captures the creative services aspect of what we do.
